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"Whole New Worlds": Music and the Disney Theme Park Experience
Author(s): Charles Carson
Source: Ethnomusicology Forum, Vol. 13, No. 2 (Nov., 2004), pp. 228-235
Published by: Taylor & Francis, Ltd. on behalf of the British Forum for Ethnomusicology
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Ethnomusicology Forum
Il Routledge
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One can easily discover the value of music in the "Disney Experience" by tracing its role
throughout the history of the company, from its early use in cartoons to its current
incarnation as a stand-alone product (for example, soundtrack recordings). In this paper,
I explore some of the ways in which music operates in the Disney theme park experience.
In the context of Walt Disney World, my belief is that music functions in at least three
specific capacities: 1) music links current Disney experiences to (often romanticized)
experiences of the past through nostalgia; 2) music defines the boundaries which separate
"same" from "other" in terms of both geography and, ultimately, identity; 3) and music
serves as an index for the "Disney Experience" in general; an experience which itself is
built upon a commixture of the aforementioned modes of identity and nostalgia.
In a recent commercial for the Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, Florida, Disney
pointedly elucidates the role of music in its project. A young girl in an elementary
school spelling bee attempting to spell "microphone" gets only as far as "M-I-C"
when she is interrupted by an older audience member's interjection of "K-E-Y".
Immediately, the audience of parents and grandparents bursts forth in song, dancing
around the auditorium while singing the "Mickey Mouse Club Theme" - much to
the confusion of the children on stage. It is no surprise that this commercial
references the "Mickey Mouse Club Theme", a song that marks what is perhaps
Disney's first use of music as a consciously self-referential device. Through its
connection with the 1950s television show, this music is clearly intended to remind
Charles Carson is a PhD student in music history at the University of Pennsylvania. His research interests
include twentieth-century art music; jazz and popular music, including issues of analysis and performance;
anthropology of music; film music; the construction and representation of race, class and gender in American
concert and popular musics; and American musical subcultures. He is currently at work on his dissertation,
which explores the ideas of blackness and masculinity in the Hard Bop idiom. Correspondence to: The
University of Pennsylvania Department of Music, 201 South 34th Street, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA. Email:
ccarson@sas.upenn.edu
ISSN 1741-1912 (print)/ISSN 1741-1920 (online) ? 2004 Taylor & Francis Ltd
DOI: 10.1080/1741191042000286220
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Ethnomusicology Forum 229
the "first generation to grow up with Disney" of their childhood dependence upon
the complex and self-reflexive simulacrum that can be labelled simply the "Disney
Experience".
As Buckingham points out, Disney's success rests in its "dual address.. .Disney
both constructs and speaks to elements of children's lived experiences, while
providing adults with opportunities for nostalgic fantasies about their own past"
(1997, 286). I would add that the two aspects of Disney's "dual address" have become
somewhat conflated, for, as the "first generation to grow up with Disney" moniker
implies, the "nostalgic fantasies" these adults are hoping to recapture were, in fact,
originally constructed by Disney. Instead of simply referencing abstract images of
princesses, fairy tales and fantastic animals, the "Disney Experience" now references
its own versions of these tales, versions that have been seamlessly integrated into the
consumers' own constructed nostalgic narratives. As the use of the theme song in this
commercial suggests, music plays a central role in this circular construction.
This circularity does not end at the park's gates. Once inside, the "guest" (as Disney
calls its resort customers) continues to be bombarded by innumerable musical events
that simultaneously refer to earlier Disney experiences and create new ones. There are
essentially three types of musical events on display in the Disney parks: 1) "piped in"
background music (in the form of themed "area" music, but also the theme music for
individual rides and attractions); 2) live music (including music performed by roving
musicians, as well as certain live music performances on stage); and 3) pre-recorded
performances which may or may not include a live element (such as parades,
character-based shows, filmed attractions or "special effect" shows).
Exhibiting all three of these uses is Main Street USA, a re-creation of a circa-1900
pre-industrialized American town square. This avenue serves as the gateway for the
Magic Kingdom park in Florida (as well as Disneyland in California and, interestingly
enough, Disneyland Paris), and is an "experience.. .designed to evoke nostalgia for an
Age of Innocence" (Salamone and Salamone 1999, 85). Broadcast from hidden
speakers is a generic ragtime march, played by a turn-of-the-previous-century
"Dixieland" band, complete with "tailgate" trombone. Serving to delineate the
boundaries of the area while contributing to its general theme, this is similar in
function to the "background" music in the park's other "-lands". The styles of these
background musics are generally immediately recognizable; their generic traits
operate as a signifier for their corresponding areas.
As with most areas of the park, the background music of Main Street USA is
generally kept at a modest volume so as not to interfere with the various live music
performances taking place. Along this short stretch of road, the visitor is able to
observe, for example, a ragtime piano player inside the corner restaurant, a
barbershop quartet at the barbershop and - completing this early American
soundscape - a strolling Dixieland band. The presence and high level of musicianship
of the musicians attests to the attention to detail many come to expect from the
"Disney Experience", and this detail is not wasted on Main Street audiences. People
regularly approach the performers, surprised by the fact that they are "really" singing
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230 C. Carson
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Ethnomusicology Forum 231
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232 C. Carson
represent the guests' idealized visions of other cultures cultivated and reinforced by
endless popular media representations - including Disney's.3
On another level, however, they also represent idealized visions of guests' vacation
experiences of those cultures. It is not enough that a visitor to a Disney theme park
should experience (what s/he believes to be) a foreign "land"; Disney ensures that
what visitors see of that land is what they would want to see on an actual vacation
there. For example, many vacations in Germany would not centre on the experience
of going to the symphony; they would more likely centre on a more festive Biergarten
experience. Here, it seems another level has been added to the illusion - the tourist
experience of another culture has become a tourist experience in itself.
For me, the situation described above - where my idea of a culture conflicts with
Disney's portrayal of it - fractures my experience. Because of my level of familiarity
with this culture, I am hypercritical of its representation. However, this knowledge
has unsettled me. My initial reaction upon encountering this scene was that I had
been "lucky" this time; I had spotted the "mistake". But, then, I ask myself: what am I
not catching? What "mistakes" am I missing in the other pavilions due to my
unfamiliarity with their cultures (or worse, because o? my familiarity with the Disney
versions)? Ultimately, the success of the "Disney Experience" depends upon these
questions not being asked in the first place.
By the time I arrive at the German Pavilion, I have unquestionably accepted the
manner in which several other cultures were depicted in the park. Why? Perhaps
because I have less knowledge of, say, Morocco than Germany. And besides, as I noted
above, Disney has made it "believable". The attention to detail - the disorienting
maze of Morocco's bazaar, the aged fa?ade of Venice's St. Mark's in the Italian
Pavilion ? works to convince me of the "truth" of the experience. By painstakingly
reproducing the minutiae of the cultures on display, Disney is able to distract its
guests from problems with the representations. After all, one asks, why would they go
through all of that trouble if it were not true7. Fractured experiences such as mine
enable guests to step outside the illusion and ask themselves, as I did: what am I seeing
and why? Such questions can potentially ruin the "magic"; therefore, the "seams" of
the experiences are carefully concealed by attention to detail and control of the
individual's encounter with the park.
It is this element of control that is central to Ritzer and Liska's view of the tourist
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Ethnomusicology Forum 233
between "same" and "other", highlighting the uniqueness of each cultural experience
while minimizing difference through idealized representations. This reorganization of
the "actual" world into a "virtual" experience of it is problematic in its rehearsal of
colonial power structures, essentially constituting a "safe haven" for the "glorifi[ca
tion of] the colonial adventure" by both Disney and park guests alike (Kirshemblatt
Gimblett 1998, 136). This point is made even clearer when we note the often
essentialist nature of the representations of the various nations.
At several points in the parks, music performance takes on a slightly different guise.
Costumed actors and actresses recreate scenes from Disney movies in live action, lip
synching to recordings of Disney songs extracted from their original context and re
woven into simple plots that are formulaic reductions of the (formulaic) originals.
Many scholars point to Disney's attention to selected details of the "original", as well
as Disney's obsessive need to "improve" upon it, as creating a heightened sense of
reality - or "hyperreality" (Cypher and Higgs 2001, 407). This new sense of reality,
propagated through individual experiences with Disney in the form of commercials,
products and, most importantly, film, is sustained inside the park as scenes are
enacted and re-enacted by cast member and guest alike.4 In this way, real events -
such as an actress dancing and singing or a child hugging a costumed character - are
supplanted by their imaginary predecessors until "reality is changed into image"
(Marin 1984, 245; quoted in Cypher and Higgs 2001, 416). In this setting, music
simply becomes a referent for other modes of the "Disney Experience" (such as a
film), which, as "McDisneyized" versions themselves, refer back to other "Disney
Experiences". Thus, the cycle continues, ad infinitum.
While Cypher and Higgs point out that many - inside and outside their park
experience - are complicit in this process, I believe that guests are far more active
than may at first be apparent. Guests (of all ages) actively seek out opportunities to
interact with the familiar scenes portrayed in the performances. This, I believe, shows
a level of engagement beyond a "willing suspension of disbelief" (Cypher and Higgs
2001, 416); it is more of a willing employment of make-believe. Moreover, the
knowledge demonstrated by acting or singing along can serve as a type of cultural
currency, one which identifies individuals as "insiders" and therefore as deserving of
the status that such a designation brings. For adults, this bid for authenticity has two
sides: by proving to be an "authentic" Disney fan you are attempting to convince
others that you possess a particular (valued) type of middle-class American
upbringing; and, as a parent of an "authentic" Disney fan, you are attempting to
convince others that you are providing your child with a similarly privileged
upbringing.
Ultimately, the Disney theme park experience hopes to create (and re-create) a
whole new world. The individual's ability to participate in this act of creation is
dependent upon his or her active engagement in a complex and circular network of
images, sounds, events and commodities. Music's role in this is made clear through
the millions spent every year by both Disney and the public in the production and
consumption of music-related products. The theme park soundscape is but one
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234 C. Carson
aspect of this, but, judging from the wide circulation of various recordings of music
from the theme parks themselves, a very important one. Through these recordings,
individuals are able to remember (or, more aptly, re-imagine) past trips while
simultaneously imagining future ones. If, as Jeremy MacClancy asserts, today's
tourists have opted to "turn postmodernist" and "become tourists of tourism" (2002,
428), thanks to the connections forged between Disney music and the theme park
experience they are able to re-experience the simulacrum that is WDW simply by
sitting in front of their CD player and pressing "play".
Acknowledgements
An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2003 British Forum for Ethnomusicology
Annual Conference in Bangor, Wales. I am deeply indebted to Caroline Bithell, Janet Topp Fargion
and Laudan Nooshin, as well as the anonymous readers, for their help in preparing this paper for
publication. Furthermore, I am grateful for the comments and suggestions offered by Carol M?ller
and Jennifer Ryan at the University of Pennsylvania throughout my early work on this project.
Special thanks go to Heather Carson for her assistance in the field.
Notes
[1] For a discussion of the realities of turn-of-the-century main streets, see Francaviglia (1981).
[2] On power relationships in tourism, see Cheong and Miller (2000).
[3] For a discussion of the politics of music and tourism, see Hutnyk (1999).
[4] On theme parks as a form of mass media, see Davis (1996).
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