Castlevania: Nocturne Composer Trey Toy Talks Translating Love of Franchise Into Music

Castlevania: Nocturne has arrived on Netflix just in time for this year's spooky season, letting fans follow along with the bloody journey of Richter Belmont and his quest to take down the Vampire Messiah. Returning for this new series, Trey Toy is acting as the series' composer, creating dynamic beats to help accompany this generation of vampire slayers. We had the opportunity to chat with Trey about his love of the franchise, how a composer creates a soundtrack for a series like Nocturne, and how telling a story as a musician can differ from others bringing a series to life.

To start the interview, Toy talked about how he was currently playing Castlevania: Symphony of The Night to immerse himself in the franchise, having always been a fan of the Belmont Family's series of games. Symphony of The Night is regarded by many gamers to be one of the best entries of the series, putting Alucard in the driver's seat and giving Richter Belmont a very unexpected role. "We know how much these games mean to the fans," Trey confirmed, "so we keep that in mind when it comes to creating the soundtracks, as they mean a lot to us too." Now that the series is on Netflix, viewers can see that Trey remixed quite a few legendary ballads from the game series.

A Castlevania Composer

Trey discussed how he, as a composer, worked alongside directors Sam and Adam Deats at Powerhouse Animation and Executive Producer Kevin Kolde in creating the video game adaptation, "Kevin, Sam, and Adam are great creators to work with, we get the written scripts before we see the animation so we are able to have a very in-depth understanding of what we want to create. Kevin, Sam, and Adam are storytellers in animation but my storytelling is with my music, so we all have this great relationship going working with one another."

Nocturne isn't the first time that Toy has worked in the world of the Belmonts, as he was both a composer and co-producer on Netflix's original series. Alongside his resume featuring series such as Fear The Walking Dead, Ozark, Vikings, and The Witcher: Blood Origin, Trey also scored as an additional composer on the recent Diablo IV. Having plenty of experience in the gaming world, we asked what game franchise he'd like to try to compose for next. "I would love to work on Warhammer. I know there's that new Amazon series on the way with Henry Cavill and the mythology and lore of that franchise makes it a classic." 

What did you think of Nocturne's killer score? Feel free to let us know in the comments or hit me up directly @EVComedy to talk all things comics, anime, and the world of the Belmonts.