One of the more unusual winners at last night’s Grammys were the 8-Bit Big Band, who picked up the Best Arrangement Instrumental or A Cappella for their Super Mario remix.
Who are the 8-Bit Big Band, you might well ask? Well, they’re a jazz orchestra whose USP is that they re-work classic video game music. Remember that wave of cheesy early-'90s rave tracks like Super Mario Land? (And if you’re over 40, how could you not?) Well, they create more credible versions of those, with a full brass section.
Formed in 2017, they’ve built up a fair following in the decade since and released five albums, the most recent of which was last year’s Orchestrator Emulator.
The band greeted the news of their win on Instagram with: “Holy shit we just won another Grammy. So incredibly honored to have won this award along with my overwhelmingly talented friends and collaborators.”
“More thoughts to come on this insane moment soon as they may have moved on with the show before I could speak (it happens!), but another huge win for the video game music scene as a whole.
"Thank you all so much for your continued listening and support of all of the incredible musicians that give us their time and talent to make this project happen!! Long live video game music!!”
As they indicated, it’s the group’s second Grammy. They won in the same category in 2022 for Meta Knight’s Revenge from the game Kirby Super Star. This year the Big Band won for the Super Mario Praise Break, a medley of four tunes associated with the titular game franchise: the Super Mario Bros theme, Bob-Omb Battlefield, Gusty Garden Galaxy and Athletic Theme.
In case you were wondering, there is a Grammy category for Best Video Game soundtrack. It was picked up last night by the soundtrack for Sword Of The Sea. So now you know.
