Daniel DeCastro is a composer of Latino descent specializing in Video Game and Concert music in a significant array of genres. He was Born Oct. 27, 1980 in NY, NY, raised in houston TX from age 2-10, and came back to NY in 1990 where he continues to reside today in Bayside Queens. Since age 5, Daniel has been exposed to the works of Video Game composers, and was most inspired at a young age by composer Koichi Sugiyama and his work "Endless World" from Dragon Quest 2.

During his earliest days with gaming, Daniel would hear his own melodies, and he would go out to his large backyard, play with his dogs, and pretend that he was a hero in a video game all the while imagining the music to go along with it. Unfortunately the financial situation and the location in Texas was not such that Daniel could learn to write music. His only training was listening to great Video Game works, popular late 70's, 80's and 90's music from prog rock to hip-hop, latin music, and film music. He was fascinated with music technology and even took apart a fisher-brand speaker system his father had purchased for him when he was 6 just to see how it worked.

Daniel was a shy youth often concerned with the opinions of others, and growing up in an environment where Video Games were taboo and considered mentally unhealthy by peers and teachers, he was reluctant to share his tastes with others in fear that he may not be taken seriously about his profound experiences with game audio and hence his ability went unnoticed by family members and friends. He was not aware that his ability to hear musical ideas was anything special, and later on when he would express his love of game music to his teachers and peers, they would not take it seriously and instead direct him elsewhere.

At age 10, his mother would divorce his father and they ended up moving back to NY with his two siblings and mother. Here his mother eventually remarried to his stepfather, a PHD, Summa Cum Laude in Philosophy from the University of Milan, Italy. He was exposed to the works of the classical masters by his stepfather and learned about opera and rock bands like Genesis, Jethro Tull, Pink Floyd, and others. Due to his stepfather's background in philosophy, he would later engage in a critical re-evaluation of his beliefs and ideas after a 3 year stint in trouble with the law. He discovered himself to be an atheist (Technically Weak Atheist).

Daniel ended up going through a teenage crisis becoming involved with a rough crowd. He began smoking Cigarettes at age 13, and pot at age 14, and come age 15, he was drinking alcohol regularly. Out of fear, he wished to make an impression on the tough guys of his neighborhood to avoid becoming their victims, as the kids at the time enjoyed making hassle of those they considered pushovers, and Daniel was bullied often during his younger years. He ended up part of the Hip-Hop culture for several years as a result, and developed a "Teenage Hoodie" character which would actually backfire on him.

It started with Daniel's arrest at age 14 for selling pot to an undercover police officer that a young friend of his said was ok. Daniel had never before sold substances to anyone and was in fact very unfortunate to have had this occur to him. He was placed on probation for 1 year, and he would use this arrest foolishly to make an impression on the neighborhood bullies, which to this day never goes without regret for having done so. Nevertheless, it put him on common ground with the backgrounds of his newfound friends.

On March 12, 1996, Daniel was assaulted by two brothers from his local Community College, Queensboro. He was struck over the head twice with "The Club", an anti-theft device, after being confused for someone the brothers thought they had gotten into an argument with earlier that day. This violence resulted in Post-Concussive Stress syndrome, and Daniel became afraid to complete high school. After completing the 10th grade via home instruction, he was relocated to Francis Lewis High School where his fears would resurface as he was confronted with another bully.

A large male had been staring at Daniel from across the lunch table, and Daniel's reaction at this point only prompted more cause for alarm as he brashly shouted, "What are you looking at?". Daniel, just having been out of the hospital for no more than 4 months, was in no condition to get into any fights; the titanium bolts holding fragments of shattered skull together were not yet fully healed. Even though Daniel had been very interested in martial arts having taken Tae Kwon Do (Not the best fighting art) at age 11, he was not a violent individual, of course not being without two scuffles as an early teenager, but in fact did go out of his way to avoid physical disputes.

Due to his heavy use of alcohol to supress the feelings of fear, his manner towards his family became increasingly agressive and cause for concern at which point, his mother, tired of his not wanting to cooperate with the rules of the house and in fear of Daniel becoming violent like his biological father, reported his behavior to his probation officer. This resulted in an extention from 1 year of probation to 2 years, and he was forced to attend an "Alternative to Detention" school, "The Roy Wilkins center for Recreation". He was also assigned to child guidance councelor Pablo Abreu, who would have a profound influence on him, and also his Uncle in Houston TX, Daniel DeCastro (Yes the same name), a successful computer engineer for Compaq at the time.

Daniel breezed through alternative to detention having scored the highest grades on their tests in their history. His time was up having been two months in the school with many other troubled and violently prone youth. He managed to make positive impressions there often discussing video games with his counterparts/teachers, and discovering the profound influence games also had on their enjoyment of life. Video games were one of the few things he had reached common ground with in all of his aqcuaintances during these trouble years.

While all these things were happening, Daniel was living a double life. He would work Summers and days off from school with his mother at a Luxury Linen Boutique on Madison Avenue, where he would be exposed to those of high class backgrounds and celebrity status. Naturally, the music playing at the store would have to be of high quality, and there was plenty of opera and classical to listen to, but Daniel would also have his diskman in hand. He was wholly himself when he was part of this world, exploring the city, and observing the lifestyles of the wealthiest bracket. He met many wonderful people like Woody Allen, and Steve Martin just to name a few (Luciano Pavarotti even came by the store once and called Daniel's mother a Bella Donna), and this too would have a profound influence on his life, especially one who would interest Daniel in the Japanese culture profoundly; Yoko Akashi, his mother's longtime friend.

He began to realize that many of his interests surfaced from the ideas of eastern culture, from as early as age 4 with the passion he had for the Japanese Anime Thundercats, Voltron, Inspector Gadget, and others. No doubt, Daniel also had a thorough interest in channel 13 programming, a real child geek. Daniel started to take up learning Japanese, and started training in the martial art of Aikido (Another questionable fighting art form, although both martial arts he had chosen to take up were indeed quite beautiful). He decided to drop out of high school and get a GED before joining Aikido, as he wanted to work, and make money to buy a new computer so that he could learn them and explore the world of technology further. He even saved up enough money from his job to purchase a Yamaha Keyboard, and during his free time at work, he'd draw Role Playing Game concepts, worlds, and charaters, and even hear music in his head during the process. Daniel had found his passion, but he felt he needed some discipline to snap him out of his fears.

The martial art of Aikido helped him to attain the discipline he sought. Sensei Robert Waltzer had a profound influence in his development, and having learned about Mixed Martial Arts really made him realize just how weak his friends were. The true tough guys are athletes with discipline and respect for one another, a respect he could not find in the crowd he was part of. The crowd he'd joined out of fear would like to speak behind his back, cheat with his ex-girlfriend, and senselessly engage in physical bullying of their own friends and intimidation of others. This was not the lifestyle he ever wanted to live, so after two years of intense mental discovery, trial, and tribulation, the decision was made to attend college.

Daniel will take it from here.

"Up till this point, I had gained instruction about networking from my uncle, instruction on computers, HTML and graphic editing software, philosophy, literature, and even attempted to pull a team together to work on a video game (This failed of course because of a falling out I had with my main artist; she was fantastic, but it was ultimately my fault, the last mistake I would ever make in my relationships would occur here). I was tinkering with my music keyboard, and was twiddling with some hip-hop beats that my friends would hear and say, "Yo dawg, that sounds mad ill! Yo that shit sounds like something from Conan the Barbarian, drop them beats son!", and so my friends would come by and have fun freestyling to the beats I'd make in my house. At this point, my friends began to mature, however, I had other goals which would require a hiatus in my involvement with them. Hip-Hop was not my main passion although I find the genre to be of extremely high potential.

At age 19, I started my formal training in Music Theory, and formal training in Music Technology, so I became a dual major at Queensborough Community College, the college that the brothers who assaulted me went to. There, I met some great faculty, but not without a few bumps in the road, you can't get everything your way I guess. My first summer, I had been working at a Linen Boutique in SOHO NY called "Bellora Fine Linens", and on the corner of Broadway and West Houston, I had a stroke of luck. A software pirate was selling music editing software there, and it was the first time I came across "Cakewalk 7.0". This software enabled me to write my musical ideas with such ease that I couldn't believe it. Never before had I been given the opportunity to write out my most complex ideas, and the matrix view of Cakewalk was the best thing that could ever happen to me.

I was struggling to write music with the notation system they were teaching us in music school, and to this day, I still struggle to process all of those notes on one page, but with the aid of the computer, I had full control of my ideas for the first time. I wanted to put my ear to the test, and so, I wrote out my first symphonic poem in one month on october 29th, 2001, over a month since Sept. 11th, and the death of my grandfather. That year, I had also taken 22 credits in one semester; truly a testament to my dedication and resolve. My professor, Mr. Allan Kashkin, was not without objection to my proposed task to write a symphony, and he told me not to bother. Upon showing him this work, I believe there was utter shock at how a seemingly underprivileged, hoodie looking young guy who doesn't get straight A's managed to compose what he did. What I had done was actually quite advanced and complex according to faculty both at QCC and at NYU, where I would later recieve my M.A. degree from.

Little did anyone know however, that my music was actually a product of many years of listening to Video Game music. No one at the university would believe that game audio had anything to do with it, but it did. They are not to blame however because they were still under the impression that game music was still just a bunch of bleeps and boops. By now, masterpieces like Final Fantasy 7, Final Fantasy Tactics, Kessen, Dragon Quest, and many others had already come out. I was not too pleased with the disregard for my claims, and it compelled me to embark on demonstrating the truth about game audio, a feat that would take me 6 years to put in the final form of a Master's Thesis.

At this point, I was beginning to have enough with regards to the ignorance of what Video Games had to offer, and my grades shot up rapidly. I wanted to prove them wrong about Video Games and show that there is in fact something quite special about them. I felt that film and opera did not get the same kind of negative reaction from them that video games did, and given the talent of composers like Yoko Kanno, Koichi Sugiyama, Rob King, Jeremy Soule, Junichi Nakatsuru, Hitoshi Sakimoto, and many others, I found such claims to be unfair, untrue, biased, and misleading. Such ignorance about game audio really made my accomplishments seem trivial, as the individuals who would make such comments were men and women of learning, people I had been advised to look up to by my uncle and stepfather during my negative years.

Nevertheless, my passion was being ripped apart. This was truly very depressing and discouraging. It really required an enormous amount of will and persevereance to ignore those comments, but I could only take so much as by the end of my Bachelor's degree from NYU, I was completely decimated after having been told by a professor regarding game audio, "Why do you listen to that Japanese Stuff?" in a condescending manner. The very thing he had dismissed was a profound influence on my music, of which he deemed to be great! I didn't know what to believe at this point, and it made me confused, as if he were just giving me compliments to motivate me and not because he actually meant it. This merits an attempt to set things straight, and if I can't prevent this from happening to someone else, I don't think I'd feel very good about myself for it knowing that I could've prevented it.

My past is my buffer, and it is what drives me to recreate the profound experiences I've attained from music in my own creations in the goal of providing work I deem to be of high quality. I care passionately about the truth, and therefore speak about these experiences knowing full well that from a business perspective, it is not the most tactile thing to do. I do not believe in sugar coating reality, and I believe more can be gained from knowing the truth than none at all. I will use the knowledge I gained from my studies as best I can, and the insight from caring friends and professors I've gained as best I can." ~Daniel DeCastro

Mr. Decastro's accomplishments are as follows:

New York University MA in Music Composition, May 2007
- GPA 3.82
- Recipient of Dean’s Opportunity Scholarship for Graduate Students

New York University BA in Music Composition, May 2005
- GPA 3.731
- Recipient of Founders Day award
- Who’s Who among students
- Recipient of CCTOP (Community College Transfer Opportunity Program) Scholarship
- Recipient of Steinhardt Education Scholarship
- Nominated by Music Department for Fulbright Scholarship to study in Japan
- Vice President and Treasurer of Music Undergraduate Student Government from 2003-2005- ------- Recipient of Hispanic Scholarship Fund Scholarship

Queensborough Community College AA in Music Fine Arts & AS in Music Technology, January 2003
- GPA 3.56
- Phi Theta Kappa: Lambda Sigma Chapter honor society
- QCC Women’s Club award for leadership and service to the college community