Martin O'Donnell

Few composers get to score the defining mythology of a generation, but Martin O’Donnell essentially built the sonic architecture for the Halo universe. As audio director at Bungie, he and longtime collaborator Michael Salvatori fused Gregorian chants with sweeping orchestral movements and military-grade percussion, creating a sound that felt both sacred and profoundly alien. From the moment the monks begin on the 2001 Combat Evolved theme to the blistering Steve Vai guitar riffs of Halo 2, their work became inseparable from the game itself—this wasn’t background music; it was the main event. That legacy carried into his initial work scoring Destiny, where tracks like the charging boss theme “Sepiks Prime” proved his knack for crafting combat anthems that are still revered.