Which Disney cartoon has the most songs?

The jungle Book ? The Lion King ? The little Mermaid ? Snow Queen ? Oh no!

On October 16, 2023, Disney Studios are celebrating their 100th anniversary. One of the studio’s specialties, animated feature films, is a little more recent (the first, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfsdates back to 1936), but it has still been several decades since these animated classics became a reference in their field.

They stood out in particular thanks to the importance of their musical universe. In anticipation of this anniversary, the media Screenrant thus classified the ten Disney films with the most songs, counting only music with lyrics and putting aside instrumental ambient music. It is therefore not a top of the “best Disney songs”nor those that stick the most in the head (you can find our ranking on this subject here).

So who Snow Queenof Lion King or even the Princess and the Frog can be crowned Song Monarch and reign over the musical world of the Disney universe… None of them. To our great astonishment, the vast majority of classics from the turn of the decade 1990-2000, still sung at the top of their lungs by generation Z (“I would like to be king already!”) don’t even appear in the rankings.

The most recent are The little Mermaid (1989 – 9 songs), The beauty and the Beast (1991 – 10 songs), The strange Christmas of Mr. Jack (1993 – 12 songs) tied with Moana (2016 – 12 songs). But none reached the podium!

In third position: The three caballeros (1944 – 14 songs), film created to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the character of Donald Duck and which would be incredibly “canceled” today because of its treatment of racist stereotypes about the Mexican population.

In second place: Mary Poppins (1964 – 16 songs). And no, the vice-champion is not even a proper animated film, even if his character has become cult. And the big winner is…

Alice in Wonderland (1951 – 19 songs). Who would’ve believed that ? So the young girl lost in the world of a late rabbit and a Mad Hatter sings that much?

And strangely enough, yes! A priori, this animated film is not remembered thanks to its songs, which are much less cult than others. Nevertheless, a veritable army set about composing the original soundtrack, headed by Oliver Wallace, also composer of the music for Cinderella, Peter Pan, The Lady and the Tramp And Dumbo.

Under his command, no less than seven lyricists: Bob Hilliard, Sammy Fain, Don Raye, Gene de Paul, Mack David, Jerry Livingston and Al Hoffman, all of whom had already written for other cartoons of the studio. The head writer, Ted Sears (Snow White), even interferes in the musical team.

The history of the film’s album release confirms the singular status ofAlice in Wonderland in the Disney musical universe. In 1951, when the feature film was revealed to the world, an album of the texts of the film had already existed since 1949. Lewis Carroll (the original author of the novel) sung by star Ginger Rogers to music by Frank Luther. It was not until the creation of Disney Records (the studio’s musical subsidiary) in 1956, and the purchase of the rights from Decca Records, to be able to release the official soundtrack ofAlice in Wonderland in 1957.

The Jungle Book in music

In the cartoon, there are indeed 19 songs, plus 8 additional compositions which were not kept in the finished product. Enough to widen the gap between Alice in Wonderland and the rest of the peloton of this top. However, it is important to clarify one thing: the songs are very short. For example, the song “I’m late” (“I’m late”) sung by the famous White Rabbit lasts only 43 seconds and that of the Mad Hatter and the March Hare, “A happy un-birthday” (“The Unbirthday Song”), only 1 minute and 20 seconds.

The vast majority of songs respect this length spectrum, ranging from less than a minute to two minutes and forty-five seconds. The only exception is the song The Walrus and the Carpenter (5 minutes). Let us add that the music is inspired by the musicals of its time, and many dialogue passages are at the heart of the songs. If we were to define the actual length of the singing parts, they would be even shorter.

In comparison, a film like The beauty and the Beast has almost half as many songs, but they are so long that he made more of an impression for his music. The opening title, “Good morning”, was also thought of by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman as a true declaration of love for musical comedies. An operetta responsible for presenting the entire village of Belle, which lasts 7 minutes alone!