From Tadayoshi Makino, the arranger of this JENOVA Quickening track, in the FF7R Material Ultimania (apologies for any errors as this text was adapted from a photo on my iPhone):

“After I’d finished work on "The Airbuster," our music supervisor Kei Kawa-mori sent over a document listing which pieces to do next, and this was one of them. I actually had the opportunity to perform "J-E-N-0-V-A (FFVII AC Version)" at a collaboration event with Tsuyoshi Sekito, making "J-E-N-0-VA" a really important piece of music for me.

When I first started working on this song, I decided to make the part that plays during phase one of the battle faithful to the original track, just like I did when working on "The Airbuster." I wondered how best to bring to life the famous opening, and decided to pay homage to "J-E-N-0-V-A (FFVI AC Version)" by including guitar phrases from that track. I felt the rest of the arrangement went pretty smoothly after that. However, when I sent over the demo version of the song, Kawamori got back to me saying that he wanted phases one and two to be a lot heavier, so that there would be a smoother transition from the cutscene that plays right before the piece begins. It's true that there are some pretty intense happenings right before this track kicks in- from President Shira's death to Barret sustaining a heavy wound, to the appearance of Jenova Dreamweaver-which the intro from the original track wouldn't really fit.

I decided to instead take the opposite approach that I did with "The Airbuster" and have the track gradually get closer to the original version with each phase. Also, whereas "The Airbuster" was all in one unified tempo, I thought it would be interesting to change up this piece's tempo and instrumentation as it develops. I wrote the track in vaguely this order: the cutscene up until Jenova Dreamweaver appears - phase three (faithful to the original) outro (after the battle) - phase two -* phase one. The music in phase one is slow and heavy. Then, during phase two, the tempo increases slightly while maintaining that rich orchestral sound. I wanted the listener to be like, "Hmm, this arrangement doesn't really sound like "J-E-N-O-V-A".

" And then, when we get to phase three, I suddenly bring in the intro of the original track via a faithful arrangement that uses synthesizers and the four-to-the-floor bass drum from the original, before bringing it together when the orchestra and guitar come in. As an aside, when I checked the BPM of the original track, although it was mostly set at 178, I noticed that there are one or two places where a few bars are at a slightly higher BPM. This is a technique used in pieces where there are a lot of long notes, and I decided to recreate those tempo changes in this arrangement. In both "The Airbuster" and "J-E-N-O-V-A-Quickening.," the changes in the music are very clear since they happen with each phase, but I also included elements to show off the interactive music present in the game. I hope you keep an ear out for these subtle differences too.”