Heavy Rain Composer Normand Corbeil Dies at 56

Posted at 10:11 AM on January 28, 2013 by Emily Reese

Normand Corbeil (NOR-mahnd cohr-BAY), the BAFTA award-winning composer of Heavy Rain, died of stage-four pancreatic cancer over the weekend.

The French-Canadian composer was best known in the film world, with more than fifty titles to his credit. But gamers fell in love with his music for his projects with studio Quantic Dream.

Corbeil was working on Quantic Dream's upcoming game, Beyond: Two Souls. I cannot put into words how excited I was to hear his music. I was thrilled when I heard he was the composer for the game, and I could not wait to speak with him again.

When we talked in the spring of 2011, it was like talking to my musical doppelgänger. We talked of the complicated simplicity of Bach's counterpoint, the lush beauty of Ravel's Ma mère l'oye (Mother Goose) and the brilliance of the construction of Beethoven's symphonies (particularly the 9th).

Another French-Canandian recently recorded some of Corbeil's music from Heavy Rain; Angèle Dubeau and her ensemble, La Pietà, on their recent release titled Game Music.

Corbeil was diagnosed in August 2012.