A Gem from the Musical Archives

What I truly love about the various worlds of Disney is that there are so many gems of entertainment that can still be mined from the company’s long and prolific history. I came upon one such example recently from the archives of Walt Disney Records that has proven to be a happy discovery indeed.

Over the past year, Disney has been quietly re-releasing selections from its extensive music library via iTunes, many of which have been out of mainstream distribution for decades. One of these titles, Walt Disney’s Alice in Wonderland: Music form the Score Conducted by Camarata, is the treasure of which I speak. A studio album produced and released six years after its film counterpart, it evolved the original film’s disjointed musical presentation into a more cohesive soundtrack offering. In their excellent and very extensive book Mouse Tracks: The Story of Walt Disney Records, authors Tim Hollis and Greg Ehrbar provide the following explanation as to how the album came about:

For Disneyland Records to produce an Alice soundtrack LP, the company would have to take on substantial performance fees, making the budget unfeasible by 1956. Another difficulty was that in the Alice soundtrack, most of the songs were performed in a fragmentary manner, usually with no defined beginning or end. Some lasted for less than thirty seconds. The solution was to produce an entirely new recording of the Alice score, a type of album sometimes referred to as a "studio cast" or "second cast" album. Second cast versions were handy when a film soundtrack, TV performance, or theme park attraction lacked contractual provisions for recordings. Second casts also added to the product line, even when a soundtrack was available. For example, Sleeping Beauty's film release in 1959 was complemented not only by a soundtrack LP but by a reported fourteen separate Disney record releases. Second cast albums usually sold at lower prices than soundtracks, but again, Alice in Wonderland was an exception. Camarata pulled out all the stops for his version, using a concert-sized orchestra and full chorus. In what many Disney audiophiles regard as her finest work, Mouseketeer Darlene Gillespie sang Alice's three solos with compelling depth. This version of Alice sold consistently even though the film remained out of theatrical release between 1956 and 1974 and received only a few early broadcasts on the Disneyland TV show. The album's success occurred largely independently of its source material.

It was a hearty recommendation from Hollis and Erhbar but one that I pretty much let fade from my memory after I had finished reading Mouse Tracks shortly after it was released last year. Then, even after I had seen a number of hardcore Disney music aficionados passionately endorse the album on various blogs and forums, neither my interest nor curiosity was still sufficiently piqued. While I have always enjoyed Disney’s animated version of Alice in Wonderland, it was never enough of a favorite to entice me to purchase a soundtrack or musical collection.

But a chance exposure to one of Darlene Gillespie’s three performances from the album made me immediately take notice of this endeavor that I had long disregarded. Her rendition of “All in A Golden Afternoon” happened to be included on the recent iTunes-released Walt Disney Records Archive Collection Volume 1 that I did purchase. (An awesome collection by the way; if you use iTunes, definitely check it out.) Camarata’s skillful arrangement combined with Gillespie’s exceptionally rich vocals proved a revelation. It quickly sent me scurrying to purchase and download the complete Alice in Wonderland album.

Being tone deaf and musically dysfunctional, I am particularly unqualified to provide any type of critique or review, other than to say that I really love this album! It is a joyful revisiting of the music from the film, with a sophistication that transcends the material it was derived from. Gillespie’s vocals are particularly inspiring, and it’s a shame that she was never able to fully emerge from fellow Mouseketeer Annette Funicello’s more commercial shadow, because the skill and talent were certainly there. As Hollis and Ehrbar noted, the album was a sleeper hit for many years, and has proven to be a kind of cult hit among current Disney music scholars and enthusiasts.

Alice in Wonderland: Music form the Score Conducted by Camarata is available exclusively through iTunes. Digital downloads appear to be the only distribution method Disney considers viable for this and the other Walt Disney Archive titles they have recently made available again. While many lament this very limited accessibility, any degree of availability for these gems of Disney entertainment is certainly better than nothing at all.