David Wise (composer)

David Wise
David Wise
Also known as	Dave Wise
Born	13 September 1967 (age 56)
Origin	Leicestershire, England
Genres	Various
Occupation(s)	Composer, musician
Instrument(s)	Synthesizer, saxophone
Years active	1985–present
Website	davidwise.co.uk

David Wise is an English video game music composer and musician. He was a composer at Rare from 1985 to 2009, and was the company's sole musician up until 1994. He has gained a cult following for his work on various games, particularly Nintendo's Donkey Kong Country series. Wise is known for his atmospheric style of music, mixing natural environmental sounds with prominent melodic and percussive accompaniment.

Career and influences

Wise has said that he has had a wide range of musical influences, though the first instrument he learned to play was the piano, before later learning the trumpet, and then learning to play drums during adolescence. He played in a few bands during his youth, and was still active in a band as of 2004. His career at Rare began when he happened to meet its two founders, as he explained in response to a question posted on its company website: "I was working in a music shop demonstrating a Yamaha CX5 Music Computer to a couple of people, Tim & Chris Stamper. I'd written and programmed the music for the demonstration material. They offered me a job."^[1]

While working at Rare, Wise soon gained wide attention and acclaim for his work on the Donkey Kong Country game series. In addition to the percussive and ambient 'jungle' influences that serve as a thematic undercurrent for much of the series, the games feature a wide variety of different musical styles that are reflective of the various areas and environments they appear in. In the January 1996 issue of Electronic Gaming Monthly, Wise stated that his travelling experiences largely shaped the sound and mood of each Donkey Kong soundtrack, further saying that the music for Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest was composed during what he called his "experimental Paris phase". He has also composed the soundtrack for the Game Boy Advance port of Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!.

In late October 2009, it was announced by the OverClocked ReMix community that Wise was remixing a track for Serious Monkey Business, an unofficial Donkey Kong Country 2 remix album. Grant Kirkhope and Robin Beanland also collaborated on this track, playing guitar and trumpet respectively.^[2]^[3] On 15 March 2010, Serious Monkey Business was released and Dave Wise's track, 'Re-Skewed', was featured as Track No. 33. Much like his contribution to Serious Monkey Business, Wise later remixed his own composition, the GBA version of "Jungle Jitter", for an unofficial Donkey Kong Country 3 remix album titled Double the Trouble!, which was released on 1 December 2012.^[4] Wise also provided a saxophone solo for another remix, in addition to mixing and mastering the track.

On 30 October 2009, Wise announced his resignation from Rare and his intention to work as a freelance composer/sound designer.^[5] In December 2010 Wise created a personal studio called the 'David Wise Sound Studio'.^[6] In June 2013 it was announced that after eleven years without composing for a major console title, Wise would be returning to the series that made him famous with Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze.

For the game company Playtonic Games, Wise's name is listed under the staff members list as a "Music Man" and is composing for their future game, Yooka-Laylee.^[7]