Oblivion:Music

Cover art of the Oblivion soundtrack

Original cover

Oblivion's music was composed by Jeremy Soule. It is available from iTunes, Amazon, and Google Play, and was previously available from Directsong. If you have the PC version of the game, you can find the music files in the Oblivion\Data\Music folder, divided into 5 sub-folders depending on where they are used. They do not have the descriptive track-names and ID3-tags you'd get by purchasing them from Directsong, but are otherwise identical.

The music varies from slow, "exploration" themes to faster, "battle" themes. It is often easy to tell when an enemy sees the player character because the music will change sharply.

Soundtrack

There are 28 tracks in total but only 26 are included in the soundtrack. The tracks "Success" and "Death" are not included and are played when the player levels up and dies, respectively. The game divides the tracks into five categories:

• Special: These tracks are played at special times during the game. See Notes for more information.
• Explore: All of these tracks are randomly played one after another while the player is in the countryside (outside cities and dungeons).
• Public: All of these tracks are randomly played one after another while the player is in a city, inn, house, or chapel.
• Dungeon: All of these tracks are randomly played one after another while the player is in a dungeon (Ayleid ruins, caves, forts, mines etc).
• Battle: All of these tracks are randomly played one after another while the player is under attack.

Track number	Title	File Name	Length	Type
01	Reign of the Septims	tes4title.mp3	01:51	Special
02	Through the Valleys	atmosphere_03.mp3	04:19	Explore
03	Death Knell	battle_07.mp3	01:12	Battle
04	Harvest Dawn	town_01.mp3	02:51	Public
05	Wind from the Depths	Dungeon_01_v2.mp3	01:42	Dungeon
06	King and Country	atmosphere_08.mp3	04:05	Explore
07	Fall of the Hammer	battle_04.mp3	01:16	Battle
08	Wings of Kynareth	atmosphere_07.mp3	03:30	Explore
09	All's Well	town_02.mp3	02:26	Public
10	Tension	dungeon_02.mp3	02:32	Dungeon
11	March of the Marauders	battle_01.mp3	02:08	Battle
12	Watchman's Ease	town_04.mp3	02:05	Public
13	Glory of Cyrodiil	atmosphere_01.mp3	02:28	Explore
14	Defending the Gate	battle_06.mp3	01:26	Battle
15	Bloody Blades	battle_05.mp3	01:14	Battle
16	Minstrel's Lament	atmosphere_04.mp3	04:42	Explore
17	Ancient Sorrow	dungeon_03.mp3	01:05	Dungeon
18	Auriel's Ascension	atmosphere_06.mp3	03:05	Explore
19	Daedra in Flight	battle_03.mp3	01:02	Battle
20	Unmarked Stone	dungeon_05.mp3	01:06	Dungeon
21	Bloodlust	battle_02.mp3	01:07	Battle
22	Sunrise of Flutes	town_03.mp3	02:56	Public
23	Churl's Revenge	battle_08.mp3	01:08	Battle
24	Deep Waters	dungeon_04.mp3	01:11	Dungeon
25	Dusk at the Market	town_05.mp3	02:11	Public
26	Peace of Akatosh	atmosphere_09.mp3	04:11	Explore
N/A	N/A	success.mp3	00:17	Special
N/A	N/A	death.mp3	00:13	Special

Development and reception

Awards

It won the MTV Music Award for Best Video Game Score and the Official Xbox Magazine's Soundtrack of the Year. The score was also nominated for a British Academy of Film and Television Award, losing out to Tomb Raider: Legend, and for the Outstanding Achievement in Original Music Composition award of the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, which it lost to LocoRoco.

Jeremy Soule's commentary

Jeremy Soule stated that while composing the music he did not imagine any specific characters or events; rather, he wanted it "to comment on the human condition and the beauty of life". In a 2006 interview, he related that this desire came as a result of a car accident that occurred during his composition of the score. He said, "I ended up rolling in my car several times on an interstate while flying headlong into oncoming traffic ... I felt no fear ... I simply just acknowledged to myself that I've had a good life and I would soon have to say goodbye to all of it in a matter of seconds". Soule sustained only minor injuries, but commented that his feeling during the crash—"that life is indeed precious"—remained with him throughout the rest of the composition.

Soule has shared some background on his composition for a couple of tracks:

Fall of the Hammer:

• Celtic dance music has always fascinated me, and it is an inspiration I incorporated into this melee composition. There's just something that comes from nature itself when Celtic melodies and progressions are presented. And these sounds, once married into the ultimate human instrument known as the symphonic orchestra, tell an epic tale.

Minstrel's Lament:

• My own personal favorite from Oblivion...
• Another example of the "Elder" motif, this time in Oblivion. You can here [sic] the cadence in the men's voices in the final bars.

Live Version

In 2009, the Czech Philharmonic Chamber Orchestra & Kuehn's Mixed Choir released an album called "Play! A Video Game Symphony" that consisted of orchestral versions of video game soundtracks. A nine-minute medley consisting of Reign of the Septims, Glory of Cyrodiil and Watchman's Ease features as track 11. The orchestra took the music on a world tour, including an April 2010 performance in Eugene, Oregon, which was attended by Jeremy Soule himself.

Notes

• The track "Auriel's Ascension" is not included on the original Xbox 360 version of the game. However, it is included on the PC and PS3 versions and the GotY edition of the Xbox 360 version. The track is also not included on Xbox One, as even the GotY disk uses the base game for backwards compatibility purposes.
• A slightly different version of "Reign of the Septims" is used for the game's introductory cutscene.
• A section of "Reign of the Septims" is used in The Elder Scrolls: Legends for Chaos Arena loading screens. Wes Johnson, the voice actor for Sheogorath, hums along.
• The battle theme "Daedra in Flight" and the five dungeon themes are present in the data files for Skyrim Special Edition's soundtrack, allowing Creation Club content and mods to make use of them. Notably, "Daedra in Flight" is featured in the Umbra Creation and "Wind from the Depths" is featured in the Saints & Seducers Creation.
• Not all places play the expected type of music. For example, an "Explore" tune is played in the Cheydinhal Fighters Guild Hall even though it's in a city. A "Dungeon" tune is played in the basement of The Oak and Crosier even though the upper floors use "Public" music.
• All tracks have significantly shorter playtimes than the ones listed above. The last few seconds are blank. This is most likely to break up the tracks in-game and give the player's ear a rest before moving on to the next track.
• The track "Through the Valleys" is a reworking of Morrowind's "Silt Sunrise".
• There is a track called LauncherMusic in the Oblivion folder which is the music played when the launch menu opens. The track is a sample of the 44 last seconds of "Reign of the Septims".
• The track "Peace of Akatosh" is missing from some versions of the soundtrack. Notably, the versions on Spotify, Tidal, Amazon and Deezer. The Steam and Apple Music version include the track.
• The Apple Music version of the album is to date the only true lossless release—all other releases are transcodes of the MP3s from the game data.