Step into the world of Disney theme park music as we journey through the captivating history of its soundtracks, with classic stories, sounds, and symphonies preserved on vinyl and CD. Join us on this nostalgic exploration of the timeless melodies that have brought the magic to life for generations of park fans.
We delve deep into the captivating story of how Disney’s theme park soundtracks made their way out of the parks and into our homes…and cars… and eventually our phones. From the nostalgic crackle of a well-worn record to the pristine sound of a compact disc, we’ll unravel the stories behind these enchanting compositions and collections… and collectibles… showcasing how they’ve shaped the immersive experience at Disney parks worldwide, and their enduring impact on guests.
Timestamp Moments
- The importance of music in storytelling [00:00:00]
Discussion on how music enhances the enchantment within Disney theme parks and the immersive experience it creates. - The journey of Disney theme park soundtracks [00:01:22]
Exploration of the evolution of Disney theme park soundtracks and the collectibles they have become. - The role of music in creating a cohesive and immersive experience [00:04:48]
Examining how Disney theme park soundtracks contribute to the overall guest experience, evoke emotions and memories, and create a cohesive storytelling experience. - Walt Disney takes you to Disneyland [00:11:48]
Walt Disney narrates a tour of Disneyland with music and sound effects, capturing the early days of the park. - The birth of attraction-specific vinyl soundtracks [00:20:27]
The idea of creating vinyl soundtracks for specific attractions, like the Haunted Mansion, to recreate the magic of the park at home. - The Story and Song from the Haunted Mansion [00:21:44]
A record featuring narration by Ron Howard and Thurl Ravenscroft, providing a backstory and capturing the ambiance of the Haunted Mansion attraction. - The Haunted Mansion Record [00:22:52]
Discussion about the release of “The Chilling Thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House” record in 1964, before the Haunted Mansion was fully developed. - The Enchanted Tiki Room Album [00:29:00]
Exploration of the 1968 album featuring the full original show of the Enchanted Tiki Room, including the Offenbach chorale. - Moonlight Time in Old Hawaii [00:33:00]
Description of the 1969 record featuring music used as Adventureland area music, particularly associated with the Tahitian Terrace and the Enchanted Tiki Garden. - The Country Bear Jamboree Soundtrack [00:35:16]
Discussion of the popularity of the Country Bear Jamboree attraction and the release of its soundtrack album. - The Country Bear Jamboree Album Extras [00:36:27]
Explanation of the additional tracks included in the Country Bear Jamboree album that were not part of the original show. - The Hall of Presidents Album [00:44:01]
Overview of the Hall of Presidents attraction and the release of its album, including its historical significance and popularity. - The World’s Fair Records [00:46:24]
Discussion about the records released from the 1964 World’s Fair, including Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln and It’s a Small World. - Hall of Presidents Soundtrack [00:47:29]
Exploration of the audio captured on records from the Hall of Presidents attraction, its historical significance, and its popularity in the 60s and 70s. - Compilation Albums and Jack Wagner [00:53:22]
The introduction of compilation albums featuring area music and live performances, as well as the contribution of Jack Wagner, the voice of Disneyland, to the theme park’s sound design. - The Trend Chasing Albums [00:58:30]
Discussion on the park-specific albums like “Splash Dance” that aimed to appeal to the youth of the 80s. - The Importance of Official Albums [00:59:50]
Exploration of the significance of official albums in the pre-YouTube era, as collectors’ items and a way to recreate the park experience at home. - The Wonderland Music Kiosks [01:01:05]
Description of the CD burning on-demand kiosks in Disney parks, allowing visitors to create their own CDs with a wide range of music selections. - The Evolution of Disney Soundtracks [01:10:51]
Discusses the transition from vinyl to digital music and how Disney embraced streaming services like Spotify. - Disney Vinyl Collectibles [01:12:08]
Highlights the availability of vinyl records from Disney, including picture discs and limited edition releases. - Unusual Disney Records [01:16:53]
Mentions a unique Disney record, the original cast album of “Summer Magic,” distributed through a promotional partnership with Alcoa Wrap. - The Collectibles Market [01:22:54]
Discussion on the lack of rarity and variants in Disney souvenir albums, making them easily accessible for collectors. - Favorite Disney Theme Park Track [01:22:54]
Eric Schumann’s desire to hear the Dapper Dan’s singing “Making Memories” as his go-to Disney theme park track. - Gratitude to Eric Schumann [01:23:58]
Lou Mongello expressing his gratitude to Eric Schumann for joining the show and sharing his insights.
Thanks to Eric Schuman for joining me this week. You can find Eric on Twitter: @theericschuman and Instagram: @theericschuman
Do you own or collect any Disney park soundtracks on vinyl or CD? Which one is your favorite? Share your thoughts in the WDW Radio Clubhouse at WDWRadio.com/Clubhouse, or call the voicemail at 407-900-9391 (WDW1) and share your story on the show.
Let me help you build your brand and business and turn your passion into your profession, or speak at your event, conference, or school! – Learn more at LouMongello.com
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Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] - Lou Mongello Music. It is a critical element in storytelling. It is evocative, emotional and acts really as a powerful guiding force that ignites our imagination and transports us into extraordinary narratives. And in past episodes of the show, we've looked specifically at how music enhances the enchantment within the iconic Walt Disney World theme parks. Back on shows six one and six two, we looked at the music of Magic Kingdom six nine and 610. We looked at the music of Future World in Epcot 626 and 627, the music of World Showcase and 7475, we looked at the music of Disney's Hollywood Studios. I promise you, I have not forgotten you, disney's Animal Kingdom. It is coming very, very soon. But when we do visit the Disney parks, we are immersed using all five senses and in 360 degrees. And I think that what we hear is equally, if not even more important than what we see and smell, yes, even taste. And I think because the music is so important, we often find it comfortable and comforting, and we use it to bring back memories of past park experiences and or connect us to a place and a feeling that we want to get back to again soon. And I think Disney has known that from the very beginning and has afforded us the opportunity to bring the magic of music home with us. So this week, we're going to look at the journey of Disney theme park soundtracks and the wonderful reminders and collectibles these records and CDs have become. And joining me on our musical journey is Eric Schuman, longtime listener and lover of music and Disney. Eric, welcome to the show. [00:01:51] - Eric Schuman Thank you so much, Lou. I finally get to say the things that radio folks and podcasters love to hear, which is first time contributor, longtime listener, first time contributor. Thank you so much for having me on. Yeah, it's really wonderful to take a piece of the parks home with you, especially, like you said, when it is something as evocative and just immediately sends you back as the music that you hear in the theme parks. And Disney has known that for quite a while, although, as we'll discover, it took them a little bit to really send you home with exactly what you heard in the parks. But some truly wonderful souvenir albums have been put out over the years. [00:02:36] - Lou Mongello Yeah, we'll talk about sort of where we came from and where we are now. Sometimes with convenience, you lose the collectibility of certain things, but you said, just by quick way of background, you said you're a lover of music and of Disney, but really music is not just a passion of yours, it's also your profession. Just to sort of give us a sense of context. How is sort of music really part of your career? [00:03:01] - Eric Schuman Music is entirely my career. I work at a public radio station in Philadelphia, WXPN. We're home to an NPR syndicated show called World cafe that features live performances from bands from here in Philadelphia and around the world. I personally have recorded dozens, if not hundreds of bands in our performance studio. And I've just been an avid music listener and music researcher for more than most of my adult life. I've been working here at XPN for over ten years and have been just obsessive about learning as much as I possibly can about most things, music included and Disney included. And the overlap, the Ven diagram overlap of that is the music from the theme parks especially. I, of course, always love music from the Disney movies, but the theme parks and the place making that they create is really something unique, is really something special. And I think you don't quite notice the impact that the music in the parks has. And I'm pretty sure you brought this up before. When they have, especially in an after hours holiday party in the parks and they pipe in different music over the speakers, that's when you notice the effect to the impact that the music has the rest of the time. So my love of music, my love of record collecting, and my love of Disney has really come together in this, what we're going to talk about today. [00:04:34] - Lou Mongello Yeah, and I think you touched on it. And to sort of lay the foundation for our conversation. I think it's important to look at the importance of the role of music and sort of the Disney theme park soundtracks we're going to talk about specifically and tell me, how do you think the soundtracks contribute to the overall guest experience about the emotions and the memories that they evoke? And I think more importantly, how the music helps to create a cohesive and really immersive storytelling experience within the parks. [00:05:12] - Eric Schuman Sure. So like I said, it kind of took Disney a little bit when they started releasing records. Even before Disneyland opened in 1955, disney had a long standing partnership with Little Golden Books. So most of the Disney records that came out before the theme parks opened were these storyteller records that you would kind of read along your little golden book and listen along to the story that was usually a retelling. Of something from one of the feature films or one of the shorts and would often feature new recordings if not direct lifts of the soundtracks from these movies and shorts. So the first record that I could find that is connected to any of the Disney theme parks was actually released before Disneyland opened. It was from 1954. And it was a little golden book storyteller record of the little man of Disneyland. And Disneyland fans may know about the little man of Disneyland. They've reissued this book a number of times, especially around Milestone, Disneyland, Anniversaries, but in Adventureland, kind of near the Jungle Cruise, kind of near the Indiana Jones Adventure queue, there is a tree that I'm pretty sure is a real tree. But at the base of the tree, there's what looks to be a little door and a little lamp, if you kind of picture Winnie the Pooh's house with the sign over the door built into a tree. And there lives, according to this story, the little man of Disneyland, this Lilliputian, kind of Leprechaun styled character who allegedly was already living in that plot in Anaheim before Disneyland was being built. So that was the first, or at least one of the very first disney Parks related records that people could get their hands on. Does it have music from the parks? Not really. Is it connected to an attraction in the parks? Barely, I would say. But as far as giving people something to take with them to take home from the parks, it really took until the opening of Walt Disney World for official recordings that kind of gave you a snapshot, all inclusive, postcard audio postcard of the music in the Parks experience. And if you want, we can get into the first of these records that I want to talk about that I think is maybe the one that most people have. And actually, I know everybody loves visual AIDS on the radio and podcast, so I actually brought with me some copies of CDs and records that I have. And the first one, as I will show you, is the official album of Disneyland, Walt Disney World. Does this look familiar to you? [00:08:15] - Lou Mongello It does. Sometimes I wish we were doing this on video as well because I have some of these. They are in the archives. And by the archives, I mean buried in my closet and or my garage somewhere. But before we get into some of the specific oh, yeah, I want to just I want to quickly take a step back. And almost from a business perspective, I thought it was interesting because before 1956, the Disney Studios didn't even have their own record company. They were sort of partnering with labels like RCA and Capital and Columbia and Deca and a bunch of smaller independent labels who produced and distributed and advertised all of the music from the Disney films and the songs and the stories. And it took some time and some convincing for Disney legend Jimmy Johnson to convince Roy, Roy O Disney to sort of internalize that operation and to justify the costs. He sort of explained what the profits would be. And it really took sort of the Mickey Mouse Club phenomenon to help him sort of convince Roy that, yeah, we're going to need our own record company, not just for this, but for what I and I think we as a company have planned for the future. I think even before we jump to Walt Disney World, I think it's important to sort of, again, lay the record foundation. And one of the ones I think is most interesting, and even if you can't find the record or record, if you want to find the record or CD. [00:10:01] - Eric Schuman I'm sure that they're out there. [00:10:02] - Lou Mongello They're out there probably the audio recordings, because the Disneyland and the Disney, I think, theme park record really sort of has its origins at Disneyland in 1955 and back at that time, they didn't have specific soundtracks released for the attractions, but they did have background music. And this is where names like George Bruns and Buddy Baker come into play. And in 1956 they released Walt Disney Takes You to Disneyland, which really, I think, was the first Disney Park related record. And what I love about this, Eric, is it wasn't just the music of Disneyland or the sound of Disneyland, but it's Walt providing a guided tour with narration and sound effects. And to have sort of little like walk side by side with Walt on this ten inch vinyl record was amazing. And they would rerelease this later on as a day in Disneyland. And there was some Jiminy Cricket narration and whatnot in there. But I think this was really important because it presented this music in a way that guests had never experienced before. Right. So they took all these original master recordings and film tracks and had Walt, who really this is the first time he's ever sort of recorded for the label, sort of bearing his name, about him sort of taking you on this tour. But at the beginning of each land, he speaks briefly about it. And then there's these wonderful overtures composed by 2D Camarada. And you hear Walt reading from the dedication plaque and to hear him, in his own scripted words, talk about some of these lands, especially like Main Street USA. It's the longest of all the tracks and you can almost sort of get a sense of a heightened passion from Walt about that. But I love this combination of Walt sort of giving you this tour with the music and the added sound effects as well. [00:12:28] - Eric Schuman Yeah, this is a really special recording and actually I have it on CD. I have the reissued version that was released for Disneyland's 50th anniversary that combines the way it was originally released, kind of like you said, was in a series of records. Some were ten inch records, some were seven inch 45s, depending on what year of the issue it was. They were released in a way that each land was represented on a different record. So you could have this very nice keepsake album of all of Disneyland being brought to you, presented to you by Walt Disney himself. And like you said, there's some Jiminy Cricket narration. Tudi Camarada is one of my favorite people in Disney history. He's just a fascinating character who led the way not just musically and arrangement wise, but was the manager of the companies when it finally did establish its own record label and studio, Sunset Sound. He was the manager of that studio for many, many decades. What is really interesting about this, the Walt Disney takes you to Disneyland record is, it strikes me almost as much as an audio version of the Disneyland TV series. Almost more than if you were to actually go because it is the most perfect going through experience. You're not hearing any other people, you're just hearing Walt and the sound effects and the music. And it is so lovingly and lavishly produced that it must have been very enticing. It must have been. If somebody only heard this just the way that people only saw the Disneyland TV series and the previews of the parks before or the preview of the park before it opened, they must have thought, my God, I have to get to this place and see and hear, especially hear all this stuff for myself. And it serves as a really wonderful time capsule because as everybody knows, Disneyland changed very dramatically over those first several years of its existence. So this captures Disneyland in its earliest days, similar to the Disneyland TV series, but also the People and Places disneyland USA special. It reminds me of that too, with this very almost kind of stately, very official narration by Walt. It's really great. I'm thrilled that Disney has, at least as recently as the mid 2000s, has kept this in print and has made this available because as we'll see with some of these other records, not as easy some of them are not as easy to get your hands on as this. And the version that I have that's on CD, it's been remastered. It's all of the lands all in one package and it's really great. I highly recommend checking this out if you if you've not heard it before. [00:15:33] - Lou Mongello And what I love, and I think what's important about this one as well is, yes, it's Walt, but it's it's the format that it uses. This format and formula that it uses and we'll sort of replicate later on in other ones that we're going to talk about, like the chilling, thrilling sounds of Honda Mansion. Is it's Walt's narration and then instrumental music and some sound effects, but it's not an audio description meaning right. [00:16:04] - Eric Schuman He's only in it he just sets it up. Yeah, he's only in it for like the first, maybe 45 seconds of each track. [00:16:10] - Lou Mongello Because I love the idea of this affords you the opportunity to let your imagination take over and imagine where it is that you are. I think this is also a very intentional yet very brilliant idea as well. So when you look at things like Frontier Land, roy used to call it cross pollination, we now call it synergy. They worked in some tracks that were very meant to be promotional as well. So we have things like The Ballad of Davy Crockett, but then Westward Ho the Wagons was this feature film that was starring some of the Mousketeers and Fest Parkers and things like that. So this was sort of this first live action soundtrack to originate on Disneyland Records which by the way has beautiful cover art by Peter Ellenshaw. We can talk about some of the COVID art for some of these as well. So I think very much by design. Like you mentioned, there's Disneyland the place, there's Disneyland, the TV show and now we have Disneyland, the record label as well, which are all ways to sort of give you this sense of being there or this desire to go to this place that they have set the stage and sort of teased your imagination with. With records. Like Walt Disney takes you to Disneyland. [00:17:38] - Eric Schuman Yeah, they were just as much souvenirs for people who had been to Disneyland as they were advertisements for people who they wanted to bring to Disneyland and for people to encourage their friends and family members to come. And this one stands out. Walt Disney Takes You to Disneyland stands out as pretty unusual because like you said, it is very imagination based. It's very much just like sort of like a Binaural audio tour of a theme park except without somebody giving you fun trivia as you go along. It would be decades before the technology would catch up to that sort of thing. But it's really unusual in that they, to the best of my knowledge, never released something quite like this ever again where it was really up to your own imagination or your familiarity with the parks. If you had been to Disneyland you would recognize what some of these things music cues, sound effects and things like that were. But if you had never been it was up to certainly there was no internet back then and in Disneyland's earliest years it was probably information was probably limited to people who saw it on TV or saw it in person on the West Coast. It was really up to you to kind of piece these things together. And I can only imagine somebody hearing this record or any of these records having not been to Disneyland and hearing like my gosh, what are this spaceship counting down? The Tomorrowland section is one of my favorites because Tomorrowland has not sounded that way in quite a long time. So to hear the very clinical, hard, scientific tomorrowland committed to record is really cool. [00:19:30] - Lou Mongello That sort of that mission control dialogue and that original George Bruns music as well. That very much you hear that and that you know, you are in the late 50s, early 60s. But what I think this does, Eric, is it gives rise and really sort of gives birth to the realization that not only was something like this very popular, but instead of just doing this overall tour of Disneyland, I think it's this idea of giving the people what they want and now starting to create attraction specific vinyl soundtracks, which they started to do in the Think. They serve a couple of purposes. Right. Yes, there are collectibles and souvenirs and things you can take home. But it's this idea of like we want to do now why we listen to and create podcasts and watch videos, just recreating the magic of the attractions at home, being able to relive some of your favorite experiences. And I think they sort of did it really kind of two ways. I look at things like the Haunted Mansion album in 1969, slightly different than things like Pirates of the Caribbean and Enchantediki Room and some of the others. Because the Haunted Mansion the thrilling, chilling sounds of the Haunted Mansion was, I think, sort of a stepping stone from Walt Disney takes you to Disneyland. Because here it wasn't just the music that sort of Buddy Baker music of the Haunted Mansion, but it is this macabre narration and sound effects and atmosphEric music, which really was sort of meant to sort of capture the feel and sort of the ambiance of the Haunted Mansion attraction. But with this completely new story and new narration, if the young Mike, the narrator in the attraction in the record, sounds familiar, you may know Ron Howard from such movies and TV shows as Insert them all here. But this is young Ronnie Howard, the actor and director playing the voice of Mike in this story. That almost if you've never been to the Haunted Mansion before, it almost sort of sets the stage and sort of gives you like a backstory about what it is and what to expect when you go. So when you approach New Orleans Square and you approach the gate and you approach that mansion, you have some context that either you heard before on this album or you get to sort of expand on your experience by taking this home after you visited Disneyland. [00:22:08] - Eric Schuman So, Lou, I would not be a record obsessive if I did not point out that you, my friend, are actually conflating two different records that were released to tie in to the Haunted Mansion. What you're describing is and I have the CD copy here and I have the vinyl copy at home, it's framed on my wall back home. This record, the one with Ron Howard and the narration by thorough Ravenscroft stepping in as the ghost host narrator. This is from 1969. This is from the year the Haunted Mansion opened in Disneyland or thereabouts. And this is the story and song from The Haunted Mansion, the chilling, thrilling sounds of the Haunted House as I bring out my vinyl copy of this. This record was released in 1964 while the Haunted Mansion was still in development in Disneyland. As you've covered many times on the show over the years, the Haunted Mansion had a long and troubled development over the course of well over a decade. The building was built in the early 60s, before the World's right around or before the World's Fair sat empty pretty much in New Orleans Square for a while. And there was a Marty Sclar plaque outside that really only gave people an inkling as to what the plan was, because from the sounds of things, the imagineers weren't quite sure what the plan was themselves. So along with that, they released this record in 1964, the chilling, thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House. So they hadn't even figured out Haunted Mansion just yet. This record is if you think that the story and song of the Haunted Mansion is an unusual account of the attraction that we know so well backwards and forwards. They've released the official audio for the Haunted Mansion's anniversary over the years, which that CD, that record is really, really cool. Especially the outtakes of Paul Freeze in the recording booth as the ghost host, giving different line readings of all the lines that we hear now and that we know like the back of our hands. This record, the chilling, thrilling Sounds of the Haunted House from 64, has almost nothing to do with the Haunted Mansion itself. It is a collection of sound effects and narration, little stories and audio vignettes. Really well done. I love this record. But if you are looking for grim, Grinning Ghosts or any of the ghost host narration or any of Buddy Baker's music, it probably hadn't been written yet by the time this record came out. So this is really cool. I know that this album from 64 has a really devoted fan base among sound effects and sound design aficionados. I think even the band Fish, quote unquote performed this album at one of their Halloween shows years and years ago, which there's not much music on it, so I'm not entirely sure what they did on stage. It's mostly a lot of creaking bridges and whales. And whales like whaling, not like sea whales. I can read some of the tracks on here. I love this so much. Side one. The haunted house. The very long fuse, the dogs, timber, your pet cat shipwreck. My personal favorite, the Unsafe Bridge. That's one of my favorites on there. Chinese water torture, the birds, the Martian monsters. Inside two has things like a collection of crashes, a collection of creeks, thunder, lightning and rain, screams and groans. So these are some of the sound effects that some of them would later be used in the Haunted Mansion, but these are just like things that they had in the Disney Sound Library that they thought, gosh, we don't know how much longer this Haunted House thing is going to take. We better put something out to keep people interested in it. Or maybe this will serve as inspiration for what we eventually got and what is more accurately represented on this record from 1969 with Ronnie Howard and great cover art. You want to talk about great cover art? I love the COVID art from the story and song of the Haunted Mansion. I'm not sure if this is Ken Anderson or who did this, but the characters on it are just delightful. They definitely had the final, or at least close to the final Haunted Mansion figured out. I would imagine that the artwork for this was done maybe around the same time that they were putting in the animatronics. So you have somebody who looks like the hat box ghost. You have the characters making their way out of the open hearse like you do in the ballroom scene. You have the opera singers from the graveyard. So this is much, much closer, at least in visual inspiration, to what you would find in the Haunted Mansion once it finally opened. The story is not exactly the same as you said. [00:27:27] - Lou Mongello Yeah, forgive me that I had sort of gotten these two confused and sort of jumbled them both into one. But I think, like you said, the chilling, thrilling sounds because it's almost sort of disconnected from the Haunted Mansion is almost not considered sort of a haunted mansion. I mean, it is, but it isn't because it is exactly the stories that are sort of narrated that are in there. And the sound effects, like you said, for the most part, are completely separate. But this is part of this series of records and albums that are released that either take you on narrated journey through certain attractions like Pirates of the Caribbean, along with the music and songs and sound effects or things. Like the Enchanted Tiki Room, which was really just this idea of bringing the tropical serenade home to you and having sort of that Schuman music and Wally Bogue as Jose acting as your narrator. But it is it's sort of this idea like we want to do now of bringing the elements of the show that we love or the attraction we love so much home with us in sort of record format so we can replay them over and over and over again. [00:28:44] - Eric Schuman Right. The Enchanted Tiki Room album, which came out 1968. I don't have a copy of that, but I listen to it all the time. That one is most of these records, some of them are available on streaming services. Disney has kept them, quote unquote, in print that way. But a lot of them that are not on there in any official capacity, some enterprising folks have ripped their vinyl copies and uploaded them so you can listen to them the way they were meant to be heard with all the crackles and pops and skips and things like that. What's really great about the Enchanted Tiki Room album? The Tiki Room is, I would say right up there with haunted Mansion is my favorite Disney attraction. I love the tiki room. And what's great about the album is that it is the full original show. And over the years, not just with the under new management Redo in the 90s, but over the years, bits and pieces of music and dialogue have been cut from the Tiki Room just to make it move a little bit faster. We'll hear the same thing once we get to the Country Bear Jamboree. But what is great about the Tiki Room album from 68 is that the entire original show, including the often Bach corral, which early Tiki Room fans probably remember that quite fondly, but that has not been in the show for a really long time. That's on there. And the other side of the record is The Jungle Cruise. It is the Jungle Cruise, narrated once again by Thorough Ravenscroft doing a very recognizable spiel. But it's a time capsule in a different way than the Tiki Room side is because the Jungle Cruise, by 1968, it's been open for almost 15 years at that point. It has had some of Mark Davis's additions, the elephant bathing pool, the Trap Safari, but they still hadn't quite fully committed to. This is an attraction filled with gags and jokes. They were still doing some of the yes, we will tell you the true life adventure, scientific facts, biological facts about these animals that you are seeing. So there's a bit of humor in it, and Thorough Ravenscroft plays those moments wonderfully. But there's also a bit where, okay, obviously this was recorded before they had the full joke about Schweitzer Falls because I'm pretty sure in his spiel, thorough Ravenscroft introduces Schweitzer Falls, and it's named after the famed explorer and philanthropist Albert Schweitzer, and it lands. So I'm like, I'm listening to this, and like, I know this joke. And that is not how that joke goes. There is similarly so close to being a backside of water joke. But he says another review of Schweitzer Falls, this time from the back. And I can't help but think, how long was it before some wise cracking cast member was like, I can punch this up. I can come up with a better line for this. So in that way, it's a little OD. It's a familiar but unfamiliar kind of thing. But it's a neat time capsule. The Tiki Room and Jungle Cruise record is really great. And similarly, we've mentioned George Bruns a couple of times. There was another record that featured music that was used as adventureland area music, and I listened to this one a lot, and it came out the year after, in 1969. It's called moonlight time in old Hawai. And this is just a great not tied to any specific attraction, although I have to imagine it was played most at the Tahitian Terrace in Disneyland. But my favorite place in pretty much anywhere in the Disney parks, at least the ones that I've been to in the States, is the Enchanted Tiki Garden. That is in Disneyland. That's in front. It's like the waiting queue area in the Tiki Room in Disneyland. This just transports me there immediately. I don't know if it's the exact same music that they're still using these days, but it is the right vibe. The vibe is right. Listening to this record and this one, too, you can find. On YouTube. I believe somebody has uploaded all of this record. [00:33:27] - Lou Mongello Yeah, a lot of these a lot of stuff that we're talking about. And we'll get to this later on. You can find it officially on streaming or sometimes unofficially in other places as well. We mentioned the Pirates of the Caribbean. Another one. This one too. It's not just the music, it's this idea of the narration through the scenes as well. And you sort of just imagine sitting by your record player, closing your eyes and allowing your imagination to take over, remembering where you are, sort of filling in the gaps and sort of allowing you to go on this. Continuing adventure that you experienced when you were in the attraction while also hearing other music that you might have heard either in the queue or in adventureland like Michanandoa and some of the other theme music that you'd find in the area as well. But again, you've got thorough Ravenscraft. Thorough Ravenscraft as the narrator with the George Brunswick underneath. [00:34:29] - Eric Schuman It's really great. I would have to assume that's because the length of The Jungle Cruise, spiel as it was in the late 60s, was not quite long enough to fill out a full album side. So, like you said, there is some extra really nice orchestration for the last few minutes of the side of that record. And as we're moving closer towards the opening of Walt Disney World, you can tell that they're figuring it out. They're figuring out what people want to take home. The records are much more attraction based. They are much more the specific soundtrack from the actual soundtrack, not just something inspired by the attraction, but it is the music or the narration from the attractions themselves. And if you want to get into the next one that we have here, kind of going chronologically, the Country Bear Jamboree, when that finally opened in Disneyland, is when they released the record, the soundtrack album, because it was so popular. First Disney World attraction to be transported back to Disneyland because it was just that popular and it was a hit. And again, it is the show. This is the one that probably translates the best to a record for an attraction because it's a musical show, just like the Tiki Room. It's a musical review and it translates perfectly to a souvenir album. [00:36:01] - Lou Mongello Yeah. And again, this idea of using your imagination, because you do have, I think all of the tracks from the attraction are on there and more. Right. Because I was going to say there's a couple of other ones, like, I think Come Again and Old Food, like, there's a few other ones that are not in the show, but are added to the track list as well. [00:36:27] - Eric Schuman Right, right. There's a couple of the songs. So it's the Country Bear Jamboree album from 1972. It is the full show with the little bits of chatter and narration and introductions to the songs. But at the end, there are a few extra tracks that much like the Tiki Room, the Country Bear Jamboree has been shortened by a few seconds here, a few minutes here, or a song here, a song there, a bit of dialogue here and there. So once again, it's the time capsule version of the Country Bear Jamboree. But I'm sure that just like The Jungle Cruise, because it didn't take up the soundtrack, didn't take up a full LP's worth of space, they probably thought, oh, we have a few other tracks that we recorded that we didn't include in the final show. So that's included on there. What's not included because it didn't come until years and years later are the vacation songs and the Christmas songs from the Summer Vacation and the Christmas versions of the Country Bear Jamboree. I'm not sure if those were around if either one of those were around long enough. Certainly the Summer Vacation show ran at Disneyland for a really long time after it was converted from the original show. I'm not sure if they released a soundtrack like a souvenir album of those iterations of the show. I just remember growing up watching the Disney sing along songs, cassette tapes, the VHS tapes that had no songs from the original Country Bear Jamboree, but it did have the Great Outdoors song. So the first time that I saw the Country Bear Jamboree and it was not the summer vacation version, I'm like, where's this song that I love? [00:38:18] - Lou Mongello Yeah. The Country Bear vacation. Hodown. And the Christmas versions that are no longer and I haven't listened to this in a long, long time, but wasn't the and again time period what it is? Names. Like Tex Ritter, the grandfather of John Ritter. You're like who's john Ritter? Three's Company. He was very, very funny. Wasn't the version of Blood in the Saddle that was on the record, not the one from the attraction, but it was this early vintage recording of Blood on the Saddle. [00:38:57] - Eric Schuman Yeah, it's been a while since I've listened to this one, but there are a few differences either. Maybe it was a different take that was used in the final recording. It all kind of depends. And this is true not just for Disney Records or at least Disney Parks Records, but a lot of movie soundtracks with dialogue are released. They put together the soundtrack recording at a different time than the final editing. So they might change things from the soundtrack to the movie or the attraction to the soundtrack, things like that. So I'll have to double check. But I'm pretty sure, to the best of my recollection, that most, if not all of the Country Bear Jamboree album features stuff that is indeed, or at least was at one point heard in the attraction. It's not like one of those KTL compilations where it's like, oh, all the original artists, all the original bears singing all the original hits. It wasn't quite like that. They seem to, at this point, be okay with releasing the actual audio that was used as long as it was ready, I would assume. [00:40:13] - Lou Mongello And the thing that's important to mention to these two is when you bought this album, you were not just buying a sleeve with vinyl in it, you were buying something that had this book accompaniment with beautiful photos and stories and artwork that's in there. I mean, you can almost sort of collect these for the album, for the artwork, as much as you can collect them for the album, as much as you can collect them for the artwork that was inside because they really were sort of collectible story picture books as well. [00:40:49] - Eric Schuman Lou I totally spaced out because I actually have the Country Bear Chamboree album. It's been sitting right in front of me this whole time that we've been talking. So, yeah, this opens up as a gatefold album with some really great photos of the show and the illustrations as well, the profiles of each of the characters. This is really wonderful. I love how they have profiles of not Big Al, Big Albert as he is officially named Backstories. [00:41:21] - Lou Mongello They give like, Wendell his own backstory. [00:41:25] - Eric Schuman It's really wild to think that somebody would go see the Country Bear Jamboree and think, I need to know, I need to know more about Gomer. What's? Gomer's story? I need to know everything there can be known about Wendell and Liver Lips. [00:41:43] - Lou Mongello But we did, right? This is the these albums and we'll get to another one that you'd be like, why would you buy this one? These albums and that thin, very thin, black story of Walt Disney World that was sort of almost shaped like the letter D. That's what I read in the car ride from Orlando to New Jersey every year. And to the point that they weren't just dog eared. Like, this is just what I read over and over because we just wanted to consume anything and everything that we could. And I could not wait to get home and put these records on my turntable to sort of keep the Disney World sort of vacation experience going. [00:42:25] - Eric Schuman Oh, sure. And it's the same reason why we do things like collecting Disney memorabilia. And my favorite thing is I love to rewatch the hotel room. Information channel loops the tip for today. That's the one that sends me right back almost as much as any soundtrack album does. But they were figuring this out. And if you want to get to the next big record and this is the one, if people aren't record collectors, they may not have the attraction specific ones. Or if you were on a tight budget back in the, you might not want to have purchased a record for every single attraction. So in 1980, if you want to leap ahead to 1980 wait, I was. [00:43:16] - Lou Mongello Going to jump ahead to jump to 19. Yeah, because what kid didn't want to run into the souvenir shop and say, I don't want the Plush, I don't want the Mickey ears, I want the hall of President's album with the eleven page book of full color illustrations. There was like nine different tracks that was released in 1972, narrated by Larry Dobkin, and again the Buddy Baker score and Royal Dano as the voice of Lincoln with not just taking you through the attractions, but it literally is sort of this historical musical snapshot through time. Interestingly, this one was in full stereophonic sound and the Country Bear Jamboree was only in mono even when they were rereleased. But this one's important too, because when the hall of Presidents opened and I used to do tours of the parks, even now, if I'm with friends or family, I sort of like it or not, I sort of give many tours as we walk through and help it. The hall of Presidents was a ridicuLously popular attraction. How ridicuLously popular? One, it was an E ticket attraction. Two, that covered area to the left of the hall of Presidents that sort of was built because the lines were so long, they wanted to build shade cover for people who were waiting literally hours to go into this. [00:44:54] - Eric Schuman Right. [00:44:54] - Lou Mongello And I like the fact tires that it has its musical roots and its visual roots in the World's Fair and in Disneyland. Right. Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln and some of the dialogue that was taken from that for the hall of Presidents and some of the scoring based on themes from Great Moments from Mr. Lincoln and some of that narration from Larry Dobkin and Dallas McKinnon, who's not credited on the album, but he has some dialogue in there as well. They even created this one later on. They rereleased it as we'll talk about the picture discs, sort of adding something even more to this. Not just the records that you got with the sounds and the sound effects and the music and the story, but the visual element that was added because of the book that came along with it. [00:45:49] - Eric Schuman Yeah, I think more than most of the ones that we've talked about so far, you had to be committed and a big fan of the hall of Presidents to it. That's not something that you just pop on in the background while you're having a swinging cocktail party in the mid to late 70s. From personal experience. I born and raised and grew up here in Philadelphia, so seeing a little part of Walt Disney World dressed up like Old City, we have this at home. I have a Liberty Bell at home. What do I need to go and see this for? But yeah, to hear. Much like the Tiki Room, much like the Country Bear Jamboree, the hall of Presidents by its very nature, has changed a lot over the years. And so to get this time capsule where, yeah, a lot of the audio still was held over from Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, which I wasn't sure if we wanted to get so deep into this, but why not? There were records released from the 64 World's Fair, mostly in a 45 format, and that was like a total keepsake thing that was not meant to last longer than the World's Fair itself did. So those are a little harder to come by. But there were records released of great moments with Mr. Lincoln. It's a small world. Not sure if there was one of Progress City or anything like that, but there probably was, if nothing else than to help out the sponsors. But yeah, like you said, it's an interesting time capsule of what they thought or what they even knew people wanted to take home. From their experience in the theme parks, it comes up a lot that there are, especially in the early days of Disneyland, there are very few photos of certain attractions or shops because people were not wanting to spend the film or the flashbulbs to capture something. And in a similar way, these records capture for posterity, if not for ongoing enjoyment, they capture for posterity what these attractions were either right when they opened or when they were still in the process of being developed in some cases. And it's really interesting to me in that respect because if you go to the hall of Presidents today, I'm not sure when they did away with it was always the speeches were from Lincoln. There was a short thing from Lincoln, and then the current president spoke, and that started maybe in the 80s or maybe with Ronald Reagan or maybe with George Bush, but before that, yeah, it was mostly the audio that was drawn from great moments with Mr. Lincoln, with Royal Dano that you would hear on the record and was such a familiar voice to people who had seen that show in Disneyland that once they brought a version of it to Orlando reached a much wider audience. People probably still remembered it from seeing it at the World's Fair less than a decade before and wanted to take something home with them. But yeah, I really can't picture people honey, what do you want to listen to while we're making dinner? While we're having some friends over for a shindig, let's put on my number one hot hit the hall of President soundtrack. [00:49:36] - Lou Mongello But I'm sure maybe even individually, or I can imagine sort of maybe not kids, but sort of gathering around the record player and sort of reliving that attraction experience together or like we have done and continue to do, getting ready and excited for our next trip. By the way, Clinton was the very first one to record his voice for the hall of Presidents, but this did this sort of led to a number of other individual attractions getting their own album right. Space Mountain got one in 77. Stupid little fun fact the voice of the narrator was Dick Too feld. You're like, who's that? He was the robot in Lost in Space. You're like, what's that? I know I'm really old but this sort of things but it was this idea of this continuing journey through space, mountain and space. We had ones for It's a Small World for the Electrical Water Pageant which also got one of those gorgeous picture discs. [00:50:41] - Eric Schuman I love those. I love those so much. [00:50:43] - Lou Mongello They did one for Sorn Over California for the Orange Bird in the early seventy s and even they would do ones later on from different lands. I remember music from Mickey's toontown fair. So this snowball effect that happened obviously evidences the fact that we love this idea of bringing the music and the stories home through these individual and then we can obviously talk about a lot of the compilation albums that were made available in the parks. [00:51:16] - Eric Schuman Sure. And before we get too far afield on that, it does occur to me that records like the I feel like I was maybe unnecessarily bagging on the hall of President soundtrack as being not the coolest thing. But it occurs to me that records like that were very, very popular in the I'm thinking of albums like The First Family by Vaughn Meter spoken word comedy record that was a parody of the Kennedy White House, that was a massively successful album stan Freeberg's production of the United States of AmEric. Records like this, not by Disney, were really, really popular around this time as things that, yeah, you would get around a record player and just listen to with your friends and family comedy albums and spoken word albums were just really big at the time. And so it makes total sense, despite my attitude, it makes total sense that Disney would want to make their own version of that. And hey, we already have this attraction that is so chest thumpingly patriotic, that is right in line with these kinds of records that were already popular around the same time. [00:52:34] - Lou Mongello Yeah. And then they did, I think, when they realized, too, it wasn't just these individual attractions that for sake of attractiveness and I think convenience, this idea of creating compilation albums and these sort of sort of complete park related soundtrack. And I think 1972, I think you showed this earlier, was the first one, was the musical souvenir of Walt Disney World, literally just a few months after the park had opened. Really not just about attraction specific but I think really more about the area music in mind. And I know Jack Wagner had a lot to do with designing a lot of the loops for the park. Disney sort of allowed him to go and do his things in Walt Disney World and then bring them back to Disneyland as well. [00:53:31] - Eric Schuman Yeah, Jack Wagner was the voice of Disneyland and you heard his voice so many times and I was astonished when I learned that he was also a big record nerd and a big record collector. And yeah, he designed and put together these multi hour long you may not think about how long the music loops in the theme park, just the ambient area music loops are until if you go online and you fire one of them up and you see oh, my God. This Main Street music loop is three and a half hours long. I never thought of it being that long. Well, you don't want to hear sorry. With the fringe on top every 20 minutes when you're walking around down Main Street. So, yeah, these loops had to be really long. And Jack Wagner contributed things from his personal record collection to the Imagineers when they were designing the sound of the theme parks. What I have is not that early one, but is indeed the first compilation record. But, yeah, like you said, a lot of these early recordings, the more compendium kinds of recordings that gave you a snapshot of the theme parks, not any specific attraction, were mostly, yes, area music and sometimes performances by live artists or live performers or live groups that would play in the theme park. So you would get maybe a little snippet of a ragtime piano player from Main Street or the fifend drum from Liberty Square, or a Dixieland band from New Orleans Square. There are a ton of records recorded. This is an entire separate sidebar that we can go down a different time. But there's a bunch of records recorded at Disneyland by folks like the Firehouse Five plus Two, the Dixieland Band, formed by a bunch of Disney animators, date Night at Disneyland by the Elliot Brothers. That is there. They were the house band at the Carnation Plaza Gardens. And so this is a representation of one of their shows would be like, there's a Golden Horseshoe album. I have this written down. That was my other favorite that I wanted to mention. Oh, yes. Okay. This is the weirdest one. And it's maybe the weirdest one because Disney has officially uploaded this to Spotify. There is no reason why Disney should have this uploaded in 2023 because the shop and the person that this is connected to has not existed in ages. And that is Echoes of Disneyland from 1957. This is an album by D Fisher. Who's D Fisher? I don't know who D Fisher was. D. Fisher was the manager of the Main Street Worlizer shop in Disneyland. And at night, he would perform on the organ that they had there, and they would pipe the music from the Wirlitzer Shop out onto Main Street for these evening concerts. And it's all Disney music, which is another thing that is unusual, that many of these records, especially the area music, the orchestration albums, and even the Ragtime and the Disneyland Band albums that were released, didn't actually feature music from Disney movies. This does, but performed in a solo Worlitzer organ. It's a little spooky, it's really atmosphEric and it's very place making. You can just picture yourself walking down Main Street at like Twilight or After Dark and hearing this music coming out of the Wirlitzer shop and whether that motivated anybody to go and buy a Wirlitzer. I guess buying the record of the Wirlitzer music was the second best thing to schlepping a Wirlitzer out of Disneyland with you. But this is a really cool record and it is beyond me why it is as available as it is all of these years later. [00:57:50] - Lou Mongello Yeah, it's interesting to see. Obviously Disney realizes the popularity of the compilations of the park related soundtracks. I mean really starting to release them almost on a yearly basis. Sometimes with music specifically from the attraction. Sometimes you just have JP and the Silver Stars doing a steel drum band adventureland background music. So it gave you a sense of not just the attractions but place making as well. And not just songs that were written for Disneyland, but especially in places like Liberty Square you would have Fiften Drumcore and Battle Him of the Republic. So there's music that is maybe rearranged for the Disney Parks but is very familiar because of context in storytelling. So these official albums of Disneyland and Walt Disney World continue on, even start getting some park specific albums like Splash Dance. Yes, Splash Dance really was yeah, I. [00:59:00] - Eric Schuman Was wondering if we were going to go down that avenue, but yeah, I would call it trend chasing or snake charming kind of stuff of how can we reach the youths of today. It's basically the album version of Videopolis. How do we reach these hip 80s kids? Let's just put a disco beat underneath the maple leaf rags like that. [00:59:30] - Lou Mongello It was a soundtracked for water related activities in Walter's World. So you might have had music from River Country and things like that, but it was meant to sort of reflect the upbeat trendy, like you said, atmosphere of the Disney water park and sort of water based attractions. But there was that time, I think especially in the early two thousand s, that there was this just constant run of albums, whether they were compilations, whether they were even legacy collections, whether they were about parades and fireworks. I mean, there were dozens and dozens that had come out through the year. So you were able to get something from the Parade Memories and the Electrical Parade and Happily Ever After as early as and Disneyland Forever as late as like 2019. So they had these continued releases and special event. You'd get official albums to recognize this dated anniversary or the release of this show, whatever it was. And I think especially before we got to streaming services. These became things that collectors and just fans alike. It was probably again, this is for a lot of this, this really is like pre YouTube. So there was no way to experience from at least an audio forget video perspective unless you were recording these things on your own, be able to sort of recreate that at home. And one of the things that I loved that Disney did, and it's funny because Eric, I mentioned this on the show before, and people are like, you're insane, mangello. They never had this thing. This is like you. It's like Mandela. They used to have what they called Wonderland Music Kiosks, where you were able to make your own CD. So there was one on Main Street as well as in Once Upon a Toy at Walt Disney World. There was one in Disneyland at the 20th Century Music Shop. And what you were able to do was not just browse collections of CDs that were, quote unquote, off the shelf, but if they didn't have what you want, you could burn a CD right on the spot. And it came with Jewel Case, and it came with the art and things like that. And it gave you obviously with CDs and being able to sort of burn on demand, it gave you the ability to have access to a much larger catalog of not just current releases, but past releases. So you were able to get highlights from the Mickey Mouse TV show and the Walt Disney World, the marching band and the Jungle Book and Mickey Mouse and friends. So there was a lot of I think at one point there was about 60 different recordings, current and vintage that you were able to have manufactured right in the store on demand in like two minutes. [01:02:35] - Eric Schuman Lou, in this instance, I can say you are not insane because I had this instance we've only just met. But yeah, I had this written down because I was trying to think of and listeners, please, I encourage you to share any memories that you have of buying these records in the parks. And that is where I'm kind of drawing a blank, because when I first started going to Disney World and eventually Disneyland in the through the do remember these kiosks, these CD burning on demand kiosks as really the only place where you could find soundtracks from the parks. They would maybe have like a rack of CDs maybe by the cash register. I think I'm maybe confusing that with my local Disney store. Probably had that. But yeah, the kiosks where you could browse through on a futuristic touch screen all of these things from movies and shorts and audio from the theme parks, some of that stuff, to the best of my knowledge, was only available there. Obviously, you could get burned. You want a copy of the Haunted Mansion soundtrack? Here's the Haunted Mansion soundtrack. But there were some elements that they had to digitize them in order to make them available on these kiosks, but have not been released in any capacity in any format since. They're kind of lost or locked to time on whatever database served these kiosks. So I would implore anybody who is connected to Disney's audio archives to make that stuff available. Some of us really want to hear all of that until now, like very lost audio. But if you want to talk about compilations and I've been inching towards these two records that I think are the two heavy hitters, these are the ones that I think most people probably have. If you don't have an individual attraction record, if you didn't want to spring for a dozen albums, a dozen LPs of all of your different favorite attractions, you probably bought the official album of Disneyland and Walt Disney World, which I have here. This is from 1980 and it has the Main Street Electrical Parade on the COVID And I was trying to tell if they did a composite of Sleeping Beauty Castle and Cinderella Castle because they didn't want to make it park specific. But no, it is very definitively Cinderella Castle, it's on the front of this. But this should be very familiar to a lot of folks. It has main Street Electrical Parade, it has Pirates of the Caribbean, it has the music of Main Street, which highlights from the Dapper dans and the main street pianist, the ragtime pianist. It has a little bit of the enchanted Tiki Room it has a little bit of the country bear jamboree and it's a small world and the Haunted Mansion it has a little bit of AmEric sings and it has a little bit of the hall of Presidents and more. This is a collection, like you were saying, of not just attraction, soundtracks and audio, minimal dialogue. They were definitely trying to squeeze as much as possible onto this record, which makes it interesting that they would include so many performances that were kind of ephemeral of the FIF and Drum Corps and the Adventureland Band and the Royal Street Bachelors are on this too. So this was released in 1980. It is the first official compilation of Disney Park audio that was commercially released. And it was followed a few years later by this, the official album of Epcot Center, which I love this, because it is every one of those early Epcot Center Pavilion theme songs that I don't think any of them well, One Little Spark is still around in some capacity, but you want to talk about time capsules? There is nothing more time capsule than a record from 1983 of Epcot Center Pavilion theme song. So it has all of your favorites. It's got energy, you make the world go around. It's got Magic Journeys, the Other Universe of Energy, song and Lou. It has your favorite from the Epcot computer central. It has the computer song. [01:07:18] - Lou Mongello You're tempting me to start singing it. You see, my friends, the computer makes life. I'm not going to do it. Ken Jennings did a much better but what we're starting to see though is there is this progression, evolution, devolution of getting. Away from these narrated story based albums to more compilations of the theme park music themselves. I think what you start to see is you start getting things like the picture discs because now you're collecting it not for the music that's on there, but for almost the displayability of some of these picture disc records of which I still have some. Because things like the artwork for the Electrical Parade is beautiful, right? [01:08:06] - Eric Schuman It's great. I couldn't find wonderful. [01:08:08] - Lou Mongello It shows wonderfully on the record itself. [01:08:11] - Eric Schuman It's really great. And that ties in again to something that was very popular around the time outside of Disney picture discs. And nowadays colored vinyl is pretty commonplace way for record labels to make something with visual interest. But yeah, picture discs and die cut records were pretty common, or at least emerging in the early eighty s and around the time that Disney would have been exploring these in an effort to keep up with record technology. What's interesting to me too is about this Epcot Center album. Only two countries, it's all of Future World, including some area music. The Entrance overture that's very dramatic, I think is pretty well known. They got a lot of mileage out of that. Only the AmEricn Adventure and Canada are represented on this. And if some of this sounds familiar, there's a Kitchen Cabaret medley and my other favorite, Making Memories from the Journey into Imagination post show. If some of this is sounding a little bit familiar to listeners, these two albums, the Music of Disneyland and Walt Disney World and the music of Epcot Center, these were combined into a CD in 1989. And it is my gosh, the type on here is so small. It is 28 tracks. 28 tracks of music from those three theme parks. And the track list is pretty much the same. Unfortunately, the astuter computer song that didn't make the cut this time around, it probably wasn't around anymore in 89, but there's some music from some of the attractions that were not yet open. There's a lot of music from Splash Mountain on here. What is really interesting to me is that there is a three and a half minute track and it's track three on this CD. Again. This is the music of Disneyland, walt Disney World and Epcot Center. There is a track on here called The Droid Rooms and you want to talk about them getting away from this place, making this is probably like them saying around a boardroom we have to put in something from this Star Tours thing. We don't have the budget to license the John Williams music. What else have we got? So this is three and a half minutes of Clanking. [01:10:44] - Lou Mongello I can hear it in my head like I know what Android Room soundtrack actually sounds like. And we don't care, right? We don't care because exactly, again, it connects us to this place. But you know, over time, Eric, you would think as vinyl starts to disappear, CDs start to disappear. Disney would just stop producing these in this digital era with streaming services. And obviously, as these things started to as digital music started to come about, you were able to find stuff not necessarily officially recorded and licensed, but you were able to find stuff on the Internet. And then Disney certainly very much went all in and embraced it. So you can find, for example, on Spotify, there are official playlists from Disney. And what I love is it's not just here is the 50 years of Walt Disney World, 65 songs, three and a half hours worth of music that'll keep you busy on your car ride to and from work, but other sort of interpretations and compilations of different types of music. So you'll find music from Sunset Boulevard, you'll find Disney Park, music that's rearranged in jazz format. Disney, I think, really sort of embracing. And if you do want I think people don't realize this, Eric, because if you do want to either own or look, a lot of people, a lot of audio files will say, listen, there is something warm, there's a warmth to playing something on vinyl. I do not disagree. If you go to Disneymusicemporium.com, they still produce a lot of vinyl, a lot of these picture discs, specifically, not just from old movies, but from recent releases and the theme parks as well. They actually just released a Disney 100 set. I think it's like two silver vinyls to celebrate the 100 anniversary. But you can still get like the Haunted Mansion picture disc. It's like $20 on there that features that original poster art on there. And not just tracks like from Walt Disney World, but even like that ghostly music box, which is just so hauntingly beautiful. From Disneyland Paris as well. [01:13:18] - Eric Schuman Yeah. Earlier this year, I went to the world premiere of the Disney 100 exhibit at the Franklin Institute here in Philly. And they have a whole section that's about music and specifically about records that have been released from the theme parks, but also the movies and TV shows and shorts and specials and things. And it's like a whole collage on the wall of all the COVID art. And I went around looking for all of the Annette Funicello releases because she's my favorite. But there's a listening station there, so you can hear a pretty wide selection of Disney records, both from the parks and not from the parks that they have kept in some kind of circulation. You talk about interpretations and in addition to the music of Disneyland and Walt Disney World and Epcot Center CD that I grew up listening to, the other one that I have an immense amount of fondness for is Disney's Music From the park. And this may look familiar. I'm showing it to you right now. Disney's music from the park. This is an album that came out in the 1990s, and I don't think that it was connected to any it came out in 1996, so that would have been after it was the 25th anniversary of of Disney World, I suppose. But I don't think it was specifically connected to that. This features interpretations of music from the theme parks, some from the movies, but they cheated a little bit by folks like the Pointer Sisters and Bare Naked Ladies. Linda Ronstadt. Tim Curry is on it doing The Ballad of Davy Crockett. I think that he read over the lyrics once and just did his own adlib interpretation. I was listening to it the other day. It is phenomenal. Unfortunately, this CD is out of print. But if you do find a copy of it, the production on it is, let's say, not maybe the most contemporary sounding production, but it's really cool to hear the Pointer Sisters do a great version of A Pirate's Life. For me, which I didn't know that I wanted that in my life. But now that I have it in my life, I'm all the better for it, I think. But yeah, like you were saying, it is interesting what they have made available and what they haven't made available. Some of my favorite music loops from the parks, the things that you've talked about on previous shows, a lot of them are not available from Disney in any official capacity. That doesn't mean that you can't find them. But it's really interesting to me and it makes me wonder if Disney knows, they have to know what a connection people have with their background music loops. They have rolled out on their official streaming channels. They have rolled out things like Minnie Mouse's version of Lo Fi hip hop beats to relax or study to. But I would just as soon listen to the music from Main Street USA or from mid 90s tomorrowland to focus or to keep me occupied while I'm writing or researching. But it is interesting. I think the overarching story of all of these records is it is very OD to think what they thought people wanted to take home with them and what they don't think people want to take home with them by the absence of some of these what you would think would be no brainers, some of these recordings. But if you want to wind down, I do have one more thing that I wanted to bring up to you that is not a direct connection to the theme parks, but is one of the more unusual Disney records that I have in my collection. And this is Walt Disney's popular record label, has the original cast album of Summer Magic. And this is a 45 single. That is a sampler of songs from Summer Magic that this record made specifically for Alcoa Rap. This was a brand of, I want to say, either wax paper or aluminum foil. That for a promotional maybe you sent a UPC or if there was a tear off thing on the package and you sent away and they would send you a handful of songs from Summer Magic in return. And even the label it is released through. So Disneyland Records does still exist. It was renamed Walt Disney Records in the late 1980s, but they also had this side label, Buena Vista Recordings, that did a lot of Annette Funicello's records. It was basically they spun it off to release things that were not specifically connected to Disneyland or the animated features. So this is distributed through it has the Buena Vista Records logo on the label, but it also has the Alcoa Rap logo on the label. The esteemed ANR folks at Alcoa Rap really got this one. But the connection here being, as you've discussed in the past, that there is a hidden backstory to the emporium on Main Street USA that connects to a burlive's character in Summer Magic. So that's just a little bit of extra record Ephemera record oddities that I have for you today. [01:18:53] - Lou Mongello Well, it's not an oddity, right? Because I think we all have certain songs, certain attractions. You who might be listening is saying, well, this is the thing that I love. This is the one that means something to me because I got it with my mom and dad, because this attraction holds special meaning for me because I don't have this song anymore, but I still get to hear Making Memories whenever I Want. But what I love, and just to sort of tie this up in a bow, is I think that the Disney Parks, specifically the soundtracks, have they've evolved, right? They've evolved alongside the growth and the innovation and expansion of the Disney Parks. So going from some of those early narrated tours to these very comprehensive compilations and the attraction specific releases, they have become building physical as well as emotional keepsakes for us who are Disney theme park fans. They allow us to relive that magic whenever we want and transport us back to some of our favorite Disney Park moments. I would love to know from you, our friend, the listener, do you have any did you ever collect any do you still have any of the attraction specific records? Which one is your favorite? Which one is on your Holy Grail? As I see all the time on social media, people posting that they went to a flea market or they went to one of these somebody's garage sale and they found one of these old records for a couple of dollars. And they love it because there's this wonderful sense of tactile ownership of the thing or seeing something that they hadn't seen since they were a kid, since they were a child, maybe owning those when they bought those from the parks. What are some of your favorite Disney Park compilation records? CDs? What did we miss? What is something that maybe we didn't talk about that you love or you have? I'd love for you to share that in the clubhouse over at WW radio. Comclubhouse. Or if you want to share it on Social, you can post a picture or a story or a reel or a thread or a MySpace, whatever it is, just tag me at Lou Mongello to make sure that I see it and I'll repost it for you. Eric, thank you so much for taking the time and sharing your expertise and some of that shared nostalgia that we have. If anybody wants to connect with you, where would they find you on Social? [01:21:35] - Eric Schuman Sure. You can find me online at the Eric Schuman at T-H-E-R-I-C-S-C-H-U-M-A-N. Instagram is mostly where I am posting pictures of records and my cat and seltzer and tiki things and all kinds of fun stuff. You can also find the radio station that I work at, WXPN Onlinexpn.org. You can stream the station wherever I'm on Friday nights locally here in Philadelphia and you can find some of the bands and other things that I've recorded and produced over the years. Not a ton of Disney stuff. We do have a program that is on Nightly called Kids Corner that I have contributed to. We have had some conversations about Disney Parks music in the Disney Parks in the past, but you can find all of those@xpn.org. We're also a member supported radio station, so do with that information what you will. If you like what you hear, you can become a member. The good thing about these records, too, Lou, is that Disney made so many of them. They are not too difficult to find either in, like you said, somebody's garage sale, yard sale or on Discogs, a very popular record buying, selling, trading website. They made so many of these and there is not a huge collector's market for these just because they are so common. There's not a ton of rarities or variants or things like that. So if you are looking to start your own collection of souvenir albums from the Disney Parks, it's pretty low overhead, although I am not personally willing to part with any of mine, so don't bother asking. [01:23:20] - Lou Mongello Awesome. Well, again, I appreciate it. Last question for you. You're firing up four parks, one World. What is your go to Disney theme park track? [01:23:28] - Eric Schuman Go is Making Memories on there because that's the one I really want to hear. Someday there's diehard Simpsons fans who want the Dapper Dans to sing Baby on Board. But I really want to hear the Dapper Dans singing Making Memories. It that'll take me back. [01:23:47] - Lou Mongello I like the baby on board reference. I'm going to ask you in the clubhouse as well, what is your Go to Disney theme park music tracks? Eric Schuman, thank you again so very much. [01:23:57] - Eric Schuman Thank you so much, Lou.
