The Nokia tune is a phrase from a composition for solo guitar, Gran Vals, by the Spanish classical guitarist and composer Francisco Tárrega, written in 1902. It has been the icon of Finnish corporation Nokia since the 1990s, becoming the first identifiable musical ringtone on a mobile phone.
History
In 1992, Nokia used Francisco Tárrega's Gran Vals as the background music in a commercial for the Nokia 1011. The excerpt of Gran Vals used includes the phrase that would later be used for the Nokia tune ringtone. In 1993, then Executive Vice President of Nokia, brought the whole Gran Vals to Lauri Kivinen and together they selected the excerpt that became "Nokia tune". The excerpt is taken from measures 13–16 of the piece. The Nokia tune first appeared on the Nokia 2110 released in 1994, under the name ringtone Type 7, showing that it was just one of the normal ringtones. The tune's original name varied in the ringtone list, being listed as Type 13 on some phones, or Type 5 on others. In December 1997 with the introduction of the Nokia 6110, ringtones were each given a specific name, and the tune received the name "Grande valse". Some later Nokia phones still used Type 7 as the name of the Nokia tune. In 1999, "Grande valse" was renamed as "Nokia tune" and effectively became Nokia's flagship ringtone. In December 1999, Jimmy Cauty, formerly of The KLF, and Guy Pratt released the mobile telephone-themed novelty-pop record "I Wanna 1-2-1 With You" under the name Solid Gold Chartbusters which heavily samples the theme. It was released as competition for the UKChristmas number one single but only got to number 62. The release of this song prevented the Super Furry Animals from releasing their song "Wherever I Lay My Phone " from the albumGuerrilla as a single, on the grounds that it was also based on a mobile phone theme.
Evolution
It has since been evolved into many different types with the evolution of mobile phones' audio capabilities:
The original tune from 1994 until 2002 was in monophonic form, where one note is played at a time. With the release of Nokia 6110 the tone was called "Grande valse". This Nokia tune is in the.NRT file format.
The first known polyphonic MIDI version of the Nokia tune was introduced in 2000 with the release of two South Korea-exclusive devices, the Nokia 8877 and the Nokia 8887. They were also the first mobile phones in the world to feature polyphonic ringtones.
In 2002 the Nokia 3510 introduced the polyphonic MIDI Nokia tune to other parts of the world. Several different variants of these exist which differed between every phone's MIDI capability. This Nokia tune has also been used in much later Nokia models, the final Nokia phone using this Nokia tune was the Nokia 7070 Prism from 2008.
In 2008 a new extended guitar-based version was made introduced with the Nokia N78, the shortened version was introduced in 2009 with the release of the Nokia 5030 XpressRadio. The full version for all other phones was used until 2011.
In 2010, the Nokia C7-00 was launched with the option of downloading a full orchestra version of the Nokia tune.
The Nokia N9 in late 2011 introduced a new tune based on bells and chimes, and was present on early Lumia devices and was also used on the Nokia Android smartphones in 2017 and their MT6260A running Nokia 210 and Nokia 5310. The shortened version was introduced in 2013 on basic Nokia phones and also appeared on Nokia 3310.
There was also a dubstep version of the Nokia Tune.
With the release of Nokia 108 in 2013, a bells tune in polyphonic MIDI form was introduced for their MediaTek devices and is still used today for the Nokia 106 and 130.
A similar, but higher-pitched and shorter version of the N9 bells and chimes tune was available in 2013 on Lumia and the last batch of Series 40 devices.
In 2014 the Nokia 220 introduced a different polyphonic variant thanks to the MT6260 chip by MediaTek and was used on other Series 30+ phones.
A new version of the Nokia tune was introduced in 2017 with the Nokia 6.
The new bells and chimes tune was introduced with the Nokia 1 in 2018.
There are a few more versions of the Nokia tune that were uniquely used on one model, such as those on Nokia 9110, Nokia 2300, Nokia 8800, and the Nokia 8800 Sirocco. An official dubstep version was made in 2011 as part of Nokia's crowdsourcing campaign the Nokia Tune Remake competition; this is available alongside the traditional Nokia tune on certain models of that time.
Legacy
The tune was prominently featured in a recurring sketch on the British hidden camera/practical joke reality television seriesTrigger Happy TV. In 2009, it was reported that the tune was heard worldwide an estimated 1.8 billion times per day, about 20,000 times per second. The tune has been registered by Nokia as a sound trademark in some countries.
Covers
Canadian pianist Marc-André Hamelin wrote a short composition entitled Valse Irritation d'après Nokia based on the tune. The Indonesian rock band The Changcuters included the segment of the Nokia tune on their song "Parampampam". The song was included on their 2011 album Tugas Akhir.
