Theme and Variations as Figurative and Literal Travel: Music in “it’s a small world”
Location
Rosen Classroom 111
Start Date
21-6-2024 9:00 AM
About the Presenters
James Bohn is a music maker and scholar on the faculty of Stonehill College, where he is the director of the music program. His music has been performed internationally as well as throughout the United States and has appeared on several recording labels. In addition to “Music in Disney’s Animated Features: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to The Jungle Book,” he wrote a book about composer Lejaren Hiller.
Description
There is arguably no greater period of growth of Disney attractions than the period leading up to the 1964 World’s Fair. In terms of music, the most important development was the theme and variations attraction. At the Fair, this approach was used in both “it’s a small world” and the Carousel of Progress.
The concept involves dubbing synchronized musical variations on multichannel tape in the same tempo and the same key. In practice, each variation can be sent to a different set of speakers, each of which is associated with an individual scene or area of an attraction. Ultimately, guests experience these variations by travelling through space, rather than having the variations presented in linear time. This use of spatial theme and variations was so successful, it became one of the most common musical approaches in Disney Imagineered dark rides for decades, being used in: The Haunted Mansion, If You Had Wings, “it’s a small world,” Journey into Imagination, Pirates of the Caribbean, El Rio del Tiempo, Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress, and The World of Motion.
Investigating the thirty arrangements of the song for the original version of the attraction lends an opportunity to appreciate Bobby Hammack’s orchestrations. Through this we can hear how a simple 32 measure theme can be drawn out into a sophisticated, intricate musical experience that allows the music to change in a seamless and nearly subliminal fashion as we travel through three-dimensional space.
Recommended Citation
Bohn, James, "Theme and Variations as Figurative and Literal Travel: Music in “it’s a small world”" (2024). Theme Park Music and Sound. 1.
https://stars.library.ucf.edu/tpms/2024/friday/1
Theme and Variations as Figurative and Literal Travel: Music in “it’s a small world”
Rosen Classroom 111
There is arguably no greater period of growth of Disney attractions than the period leading up to the 1964 World’s Fair. In terms of music, the most important development was the theme and variations attraction. At the Fair, this approach was used in both “it’s a small world” and the Carousel of Progress.
The concept involves dubbing synchronized musical variations on multichannel tape in the same tempo and the same key. In practice, each variation can be sent to a different set of speakers, each of which is associated with an individual scene or area of an attraction. Ultimately, guests experience these variations by travelling through space, rather than having the variations presented in linear time. This use of spatial theme and variations was so successful, it became one of the most common musical approaches in Disney Imagineered dark rides for decades, being used in: The Haunted Mansion, If You Had Wings, “it’s a small world,” Journey into Imagination, Pirates of the Caribbean, El Rio del Tiempo, Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress, and The World of Motion.
Investigating the thirty arrangements of the song for the original version of the attraction lends an opportunity to appreciate Bobby Hammack’s orchestrations. Through this we can hear how a simple 32 measure theme can be drawn out into a sophisticated, intricate musical experience that allows the music to change in a seamless and nearly subliminal fashion as we travel through three-dimensional space.