Tommy Tallarico

My age: The 29 age thing is an inside joke to all my friends who know me. When I was turning 30 I decided I would cheat Father Time so the day before my 30th birthday I got on a plane and went to Australia! I crossed the international dateline and landed the day after my birthday... thereby NEVER officially having my 30th birthday! And you can't turn 31 unless you're 30... so I'm kinda just stuck at 29 now!
True story!
:)
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Tommy Tallarico is a veritable video game industry icon. As one of the most successful video game composers in history, he has helped revolutionize the gaming world, creating unique audio landscapes that enhance the video gaming experience. He is considered the person most instrumental in changing the game industry from bleeps & bloops to real music now appreciated worldwide by millions of fans. As a well-recognized on-air television personality, Tommy brings his in-depth knowledge, years of experience, and love of cutting edge multimedia and video games to the masses. Tommy has worked in the gaming industry as a designer, product manager, producer, writer, games tester and heads of both music and video departments.
An accomplished musician, Tallarico has been writing music for video games for more than 17 years. He has won over 35 industry awards and has worked on more than 300 game titles; to date, they total sales of more than 100 million units and over four billion dollars in revenue. No one in the history of the video game industry has ever worked on more titles and projects. In 1994, he founded Tommy Tallarico Studios, the multimedia industry's largest audio production house. In video games, television, film, radio, soundtracks, toys and even on floats in the New Years Day Rose Parade in Pasadena CA, Tallarico’s music has been heard by hundreds of millions of people around the world. Tommy is a cousin of rock star legend Steven Tyler (nee Tallarico) and in 2002 Tallarico’s music was used as the opening song for Aerosmith’s “Girls of Summer” world tour. His top titles include Earthworm Jim, Tony Hawk Pro Skater, Disney’s Aladdin, Spider-Man and Metroid Prime as well as top selling popular game franchises such as Madden Football, Blitz Football, Unreal, Pac-Man, Knockout Kings, Mortal Kombat, Test Drive, Scooby Doo, WWE, Lineage, Twisted Metal & Time Crisis. His score for Advent Rising has been noted as "one of the greatest musical scores of all time" by websites such as Yahoo, Gamespot and others.
Tallarico has been featured on numerous national and international television shows, appearing repeatedly on CNN, FOX and MTV. Currently, Tommy hosts, writes and co-produces the top rated and very popular Reviews on the Run/Judgment Day television show as well as the longest running award-winning video game television show, The Electric Playground (www.elecplay.com), which has been on the air since 1997. The show is syndicated worldwide and airs daily in prime-time. The Electric Playground won the 2001 Telly Award for “Best Entertainment Cable Program”. In 2006, Tommy also started hosting the Championship Gaming Series for DirecTV.
In 2002, Tallarico teamed up with fellow video game composer Jack Wall to form Mystical Stone Entertainment, the front runner in the field of live game music performance. Together they created the critically acclaimed Video Games Live (www.videogameslive.com), an immersive, audio and video concert experience celebrating video games. Video Games Live features music from the best video games performed by top orchestras and choirs around the world combined with synchronized video footage, lasers, lights, special effects, interactivity and live action to create an explosive and unique one-of-a-kind entertainment experience. The debut performance was launched on July 6th, 2005 at the world famous Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles with the LA Philharmonic. Over 11,000 people attended making it the biggest video game concert in the world. Most of the game music played (Halo, Sonic, Metal Gear Solid, Mario, Zelda, Warcraft, Tomb Raider, Myst, Kingdom Hearts, Tron, Medal of Honor, Advent Rising, etc.) had never been performed live. On October 30, 2005 they broke new ground once again by putting on the very first video game concert in Canada (Vancouver). They followed with groundbreaking first ever game concert performances in countries such as Brazil, New Zealand and England. Video Games Live was also the very first American video game concert to perform in Asia (Korea). In 2007 they were recipients of a major industry award in Brazil for "Special Breakthrough Achievement" following their performances in Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo the year before. Sponsored and endorsed by some of the top corporations in the world, the Video Games Live concert event is currently touring the world.
Tallarico was the first musician to release a video game soundtrack worldwide (Tommy Tallarico’s Greatest Hits Vol. 1 – Capitol Records). He has released seven video game soundtrack albums since, including the highly acclaimed James Bond Tomorrow Never Dies, MDK and award-winning Advent Rising and Earthworm Jim Anthology. Tommy was the first person to use a live guitar and 3-D audio in a video game (The Terminator), and was instrumental in bringing true digital interactive 5.1 surround to the gaming world. He has written, produced, performed and recorded with a wide range of talented musicians including the LA Philharmonic, Hollywood Studio Symphony, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, the Hungarian National Symphony Orchestra, the English National Ballet, the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, the Budapest Chamber Choir, the band “Fear Factory", composer/DJ/artist BT and guitarists Dweezil Zappa and Steve Vai. He continues to work with a plethora of GRAMMY and Academy Award winning producers and engineers. He has performed on the biggest and most prestigious stages in the world including London's Hammersmith Apollo, the Olympic Park Stadium in Korea, the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. and multiple shows at the Hollywood Bowl attended by tens of thousands of fans. In 2004 he performed the grand finale music act on national and worldwide television (E! Entertainment, G4TV) with BT & Mobius 8 for the G-Phoria awards show.
Tommy is the founder, Chairman of the Board and CEO of the Game Audio Network Guild (G.A.N.G.), which is a non-profit organization educating and heightening the awareness of audio for the interactive world (www.audiogang.org). With over 1,200 members representing over 30 countries since its inception in 2002, G.A.N.G. has quickly become known as one of the strongest and best examples of helping the game industry community. Each year during the Game Developers Conference Tommy produces the annual G.A.N.G. awards revered by many as one of the best award shows in the industry. Tommy is an Advisory Board member for the Game Developers Conference, a Governor for the National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences (NARAS/GRAMMY's), a spokesperson for the Entertainment Consumers Association, a proud member of the International Game Developers Association and a nominating peer panel leader for the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences. From 1991 to 1994, he headed Virgin Interactive’s music and video division, and executive produced numerous video game “green screen shoots” for films including “Demolition Man” with Sylvester Stallone and Wesley Snipes.
Tallarico has appeared in a myriad of magazines and newspapers, including the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Washington Post, Billboard, the Hollywood Reporter, Rolling Stone, Daily Variety and the Chicago Tribune. In 1999, he helped secure official recognition of video game music by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (NARAS) and the GRAMMY's. Also in 1999 he co-designed the award-winning boxing game “Knockout Kings” for the Nintendo 64 with Electronic Arts which went on to win the “Best Console Sports Product of 1999” by the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences.
Tommy has consulted for Fortune 500 companies such as Intel, Sony, AMD, Microsoft and Apple as well as audio companies including DTS, Dolby, Roland, THX and Creative Labs. He has given lectures and speeches all over the world on audio and video games which include his keynote at the 1999 Game Developers Conference, and MILIA 2000 (the multimedia conference in Cannes, France). He also teaches courses and has been the guest speaker at many schools, organizations & universities such as Yale, UCLA, USC & Full Sail.
Tommy is involved in many community, non-profit, scholastic and charitable organizations which include the Hollywood Arts and GRAMMY In The Schools. In 2007, Tommy's many charitable works were recognized by the Hollywood Arts organization when they chose him as the first honoree and recipient for their now annual Dream Awards. The IDG video game industry white paper mentions Tommy (along with Bill Gates) as one of the people who contributed the most to the advancement and growth of the industry in 2003. His popular website www.tallarico.com has received over 75 million hits by more than 3 million unique users.