It turns out that a lot of my favorite Disney movies were made in the 1990s. From 1990-1999 Disney rolled out a bunch of their most successful films like Tarzan, Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, and Aladin. I have had at least 2 songs from each of these movies memorized for a while, so they must be pretty good right? Well, each of these movies won at least one Oscar or Grammy for one of their songs or soundtracks. Actually, every Disney movie made during the 1990s that had songs as an integral part of the story received at least a nomination for an Oscar for a song. The 3 highest rated Disney movies of the 1990s (according to imdb. since they have such a large sample size i'd assume it's rather accurate), The Lion King, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin (ordered number 1-3) all had the Oscar for "Best Music, Original Song" which beat out a couple of their other songs that got nominated. I really doubt it's a coincidence that the more amazing songs there are in a movie the more people like it.
i have heard and read scholarly sources that Disney utilizes many of the same chord structures, bridge build up and effectively same basic 'formula' for the namesake songs of many hit Disney animated movies. this reminds me of the basic formula marked on by the writer behind so many of the #1 billboards hits in pop music globally - he contributes this success to basically re exposing listeners to only slightly tweaked differences in each song yet we associate each one with different artists, different imagery, and so we essentially hear it entirely new without a second thought. however the creator himself basically laughs at the public for liking the same thing over and over again. i bet Disney works in a similar way - the public loves classics, after all.
ReplyDeleteTYPO - *NON-scholarly
ReplyDeletenot "scholarly sources"