In 1986, Nintendo released a role-playing game in America known as The Legend of Zelda, which has since become a world-wide gaming sensation. A unique game element to the series is the use of musical instruments and in 1998, the Nintendo game makers brought the musical material to the forefront in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. For the first time in The Legend of Zelda series, players were required to remember short tunes in order to complete the game. The memory and skill of the main character, and thus the player, expands over the course of the game, resulting in the use of the ocarina to travel forward in time to save the world. In 2002, The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker was released, with the main character acquiring a baton to conduct musical works for individuals as well as for the world at large, once again in the quest to save the world from evil.
Using the theoretical framework described by Bob Snyder in his book, Music and Memory, I will utilize the three types of memory that Snyder identifies in his study to examine the musical world of The Legend of Zelda. The three types of memory are as follows: 1) echoic memory, which is the immediate recognition of the raw sensory data, 2) short-term memory, the conscious awareness of the information, and 3) long-term memory, or the unconscious storage of information. Long-term memory has several types of cues, which will be considered in regards to the player as well as the game characters and world of The Legend of Zelda. This study of memory will help facilitate further scholarship that explores the complex relationship between the game world, the real world, and the music that traverses both.