Minecraft Wiki
Advertisement
This article is about music played in Minecraft. For the command, see Commands/music. For other uses, see Music (disambiguation).
This article is missing information about legacy console battle, glide, and tumble mini game music. 
Please expand the article to include this information. Further details may exist on the talk page.
Split-arrows
It has been suggested that this page be split. [discuss]
If this split may potentially be controversial, do not split until a consensus has been reached.

Minecraft contains many music tracks, which play at various points in game, including the main menu, in Creative mode, in the Nether, in the End, and during the credits.

Playing[]

Music tracks can play at various points during gameplay. Some types of music are triggered by events, while others play randomly while certain criteria are met. The song "Alpha" always plays instantly during the credits, and the song "Boss" always plays instantly while the player is in the End if the ender dragon is undefeated or resummoned. Both of these tracks start playing in place of any already playing music. If the player is in the End and the ender dragon has been defeated, the normal End track plays for 15 minutes after any currently playing tracks are finished.

If the player is underwater in an ocean or river biome, random underwater tracks play randomly 10 to 20 minutes after any currently playing tracks are finished.[1]

If none of the previous criteria are met, but the player is in the Nether, a random general Nether track or a Nether biome-specific track plays, except warped forests, which don't have any music. If the player is not in the Nether and is currently in Creative mode, a random track plays (Creative only on Bedrock). If the player is not in Creative but is currently playing (i.e., not on the menu screen), a random general track plays. These tracks all play 10 to 20 minutes after any currently playing tracks are finished.

All of these above conditions do not apply for music played with the /playsound command. As such, a second track may play overlapping the one played with commands.

If the player is on the menu screen, a random menu track starts playing after 1 to 30 seconds.

Menu music stops playing in Java Edition when the player leaves the main menu and stops playing in Bedrock Edition when a loading screen finishes. Game music stops playing when the player quits the world. When the game is paused in Java Edition, game music also pauses and resumes when the player exits the pause menu. in Bedrock Edition, this is not the case because the game does not pause. All music regardless of type (including from /playsound) stop playing immediately when the player sets the music slider in settings to 0, and won't continue afterwards.

All music as well as sounds in Minecraft are stored in the sound directory. However, the sound files are obfuscated and cannot be directly accessed. To get around with this, the sound directory can be extracted by the methods showed in Tutorials/Sound directory.‌[Java Edition only]

List[]

Tracks by C418 have been shortened to 30 seconds on this wiki, due to an agreement with the composer. "11" is exempt from this.

Overworld music[]

These music tracks are played when the player is in the Overworld.

Underwater music[]

Not to be confused with Underwater Ambience, set of various sounds that play in the same conditions as Underwater Music.

These music tracks can be heard while the player's head is submerged in water in any river or ocean biome.

Nether music[]

These music tracks play while the player is in the Nether.

End music[]

These music tracks play while the player is in the End and throughout the Credit Sequence.

Menu[]

These music tracks play in the main menu.

Composers[]

All music in Minecraft was originally composed by C418. However, as the game got more popular (specifically starting with the Update Aquatic, according to Mojang[3]), others started to produce music and soundtracks for the game. Tracks for the Nether Update, Caves & Cliffs: Part II, The Wild Update, Trails & Tales, and 1.21 Soundtrack were composed by Lena Raine, Kumi Tanioka, Samuel Åberg, and Aaron Cherof. They also composed many recent ambient sounds. Some of the mash-up packs created by 4J Studios and certain songs that play during Minigames on Legacy Console Edition include music by Gareth Coker.

History[]

June 4, 2009C418 showcases "calm1.ogg" playing over edited footage of 0.0.14a_08.
Java Edition Classic
0.0.22aMusic was released to the public for the first time.
Java Edition Indev
0.3120091223-1Sound engine has been disabled.
Music is now disabled.
20100104Music now no longer plays.
20100207-1Music now plays once again.
Music is now ambient.
The player can now hear music only within a short distance from the spot the player was in when the track started.
In most instances, the music was heard loudest near the starting house, and got quieter the farther the player went from the house.
20100212-2Music has been disabled again.
20100213Music plays once again.
Java Edition Infdev
20100227-1Music now no longer plays.
Java Edition Alpha
v1.0.14Music now plays once again.
Added "piano1.ogg", "piano2.ogg", and "piano3.ogg".
Music is no longer ambient.
Music now plays everywhere in the world.
v1.1.1Added sliders allowing the player to change the volume of in-game music.
Added the "calm4.ogg" file.
v1.1.2Removed the "calm4.ogg" file.
v1.2.0?"piano2.ogg" now has a slightly different mix and "piano3.ogg" was extended.
Added "hal1.ogg", "hal2.ogg", "hal3.ogg", "hal4.ogg", "nuance1.ogg", and "nuance2.ogg".
v1.2.1Music now plays in multiplayer.
Java Edition
1.6.113w24aMusic can now be altered using a resource pack.
Music is now stored in assets/music
1.7.213w36aThe volume of jukeboxes and other music can now be adjusted independently.
13w42aMusic is now stored in assets/sounds/music.
13w43aMusic played by jukeboxes now loops.
1.7Music now pauses when pausing the game.
1.7.313w49aMusic files are now stored as an indexed hash, rather than stored directly in the .minecraft folder.
2013 Music UpdateAdded tracks "boss.ogg", "creative1.ogg", "creative2.ogg", "creative3.ogg", "creative4.ogg", "creative5.ogg", "creative6.ogg", "credits.ogg", "end.ogg", "menu1.ogg", "menu2.ogg", "menu3.ogg", "menu4.ogg", "nether1.ogg", "nether2.ogg", "nether3.ogg", and "nether4.ogg".
1.12pre6"credits.ogg" now plays properly during the End Poem and credits.
1.13pre1Added tracks "shuniji.ogg", "dragon_fish.ogg", and "axolotl.ogg".
1.1620w15aAdded tracks "rubedo.ogg", "chrysopoeia.ogg" and "so_below.ogg".
20w17aMusic no longer stops abruptly when switching gamemodes or going underwater.[4]
1.1821w42aAdded tracks "an_ordinary_day.ogg", "comforting_memories.ogg", "floating_dream.ogg", "infinite_amethyst.ogg", "left_to_bloom.ogg", "one_more_day.ogg", "stand_tall.ogg", and "wending.ogg"
1.1922w16aAdded tracks "ancestry.ogg", "aerie.ogg", "firebugs.ogg", and "labyrinthine.ogg".
1.2023w17aAdded tracks "a_familiar_room.ogg", "bromeliad.ogg", "crescent_dunes.ogg", and "echo_in_the_wind.ogg".
"Aerie", "Firebugs", and "Labyrinthine" can no longer be played in the menu screens, and all types of jungle biomes.
23w43aRemoved legacy filenames from the index (calm1, calm2, calm3, etc.) Replaced with trackname.ogg (minecraft.ogg, clark.ogg, etc.)
Pocket Edition
1.0.0alpha 0.17.0.1Added downloadable vanilla in-game music, which contains "boss.ogg", "calm1.ogg", "calm2.ogg", "calm3.ogg", "creative1.ogg", "creative2.ogg", "creative3.ogg", "creative4.ogg", "creative5.ogg", "creative6.ogg", "credits.ogg", "end.ogg", "hal1.ogg", "hal2.ogg", "hal3.ogg", "hal4.ogg", "menu1.ogg", "menu2.ogg", "menu3.ogg", "menu4.ogg", "nether1.ogg", "nether2.ogg", "nether3.ogg", "nether4.ogg", "nuance1.ogg", "nuance2.ogg", "piano1.ogg", "piano2.ogg", and "piano3.ogg" tracks.
Bedrock Edition
1.12.0beta 1.12.0.2Music now still plays if the keyboard is being used.
1.16.0beta 1.16.0.57Added tracks "shunji.ogg", "dragon_fish.ogg", "axolotl.ogg", "chrysopoeia.ogg", "rubedo.ogg" and "so_below.ogg".
1.16.100beta 1.16.100.51Music no longer stops abruptly when switching gamemodes or going underwater.[1]
1.18.0beta 1.18.0.22Added tracks "an_ordinary_day.ogg", "comforting_memories.ogg", "floating_dream.ogg", "infinite_amethyst.ogg", "left_to_bloom.ogg", "one_more_day.ogg", "stand_tall.ogg", and "wending.ogg"
1.19.0beta 1.19.0.26Added tracks "ancestry.ogg", "aerie.ogg", "firebugs.ogg", and "labyrinthine.ogg".
Legacy Console Edition
TU1CU1 1.0 Patch 11.0.1Added "calm1.ogg", "calm2.ogg", "calm3.ogg", "hal1.ogg", "hal2.ogg", "hal3.ogg", "hal4.ogg", "nuance1.ogg", "nuance2.ogg", "piano1.ogg", "piano2.ogg", and "piano3.ogg" as ambiance music tracks.
Added sliders to change the volume of in game music.
Added the "calm4.ogg" file.
TU9Added tracks "end.ogg", "nether1.ogg", and "nether2.ogg"
TU13Added tracks "nether3.ogg" and "nether4.ogg"
TU24 1.07 Added tracks "boss.ogg", "creative1.ogg", "creative2.ogg", "creative3.ogg", "creative4.ogg", "creative5.ogg", "creative6.ogg", "credits.ogg", "menu1.ogg", "menu2.ogg", "menu3.ogg", and "menu4.ogg"
TU36CU25 1.28 Patch 7Added Battle minigame tracks.
TU41CU30 1.33 Patch 11Added Tumble minigame tracks.
TU51CU41 1.44 Patch 201.0.3Added Glide minigame tracks.

Trivia[]

  • The End track is "Calm1" echoed and samples from the original Minecraft - Volume Alpha distorted.[5]
  • "calm3.ogg", or "Sweden", is a Passacaglia, with a changing melody over a repeated bass line.
  • On April Fools' Day 2014, Mojang played a bunch of villager themed pranks on the players, including temporarily replacing the track "hal1.ogg", or "Subwoofer Lullaby", with a version that had a villager singing along, as well as temporarily replacing all the menu songs with the villagers singing the Game Of Thrones theme song. This was reverted on April 2, 2014.
  • hal3.ogg (Haggstrom) is in septuple time (precisely 7/4 time).
  • The word "Shuniji" (しゅにじ, 主虹) means "primary rainbow" in Japanese.
  • According to C418, the track "Mice on Venus" (game filename is piano3.ogg) was originally a short piano solo, but was then changed later in Minecraft's development and an addendum was added, which made the track that we have currently.[6]
  • The title of the track "So Below" is a reference to "As above, so below"[7], a phrase heavily associated with Hermeticism that is derived from a passage from the Emerald Tablet of Thoth[8]. The Emerald Tablet is widely associated with the secrets of creating the philosopher's stone. The choice to use the "so below" part of the phrase was meant to be evocative of the underworldly nature of the Nether.
  • The word rubedo is Latin for "redness". The term was adopted by alchemists to refer to the final stage of creating the philosopher's stone.[9][10] It is also likely associated with the red-colored environment of the Nether.
  • The word chrysopoeia (χρυσοποιία) is an alchemical term that describes the creation of the philosopher's stone, or the transmutation of a given object into gold.[11][12]
  • "Bromeliad" refers to a taxonomic family of flowering plants. This family contains a few pitcher plants, as well as several species which resemble torchflowers.
  • The Warped Forest is the only biome in the game devoid of music. However, in Java Edition, a sound event (music.nether.warped_forest, empty by default) exists nonetheless.
  • Even though the tracks weren't supposed to appear in-game, Flake and Kyoto appeared in the Festive Mash-up pack for Legacy Console and Bedrock editions.
  • "Relic" can also be heard while playing Sniff and Seek in the 15 Year Map.
  • "otherside" can also be heard while playing Cave Parkour in the 15 Year Map.
  • "pigstep" can also be heard while playing Strider Stroller in the 15 Year Map.

See also[]

References[]

Advertisement