[Inauguration] Hollywood Tower Hotel - Disneyland Paris

April 06, 2008

Behind The Scenes: Main Street Electrical Parade Returns To Walt Disney World in 2010

Behind The Scenes: Float Driving in the Main Street Electrical Parade

‘World of Color’ – Behind the H2O – Making the Fountains Dance

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posted at the official Disney Parks Blog on May 24th, 2010 by Steven Davison, Imagineer, Walt Disney Imagineering Creative Entertainment

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I can’t believe how close we are to the opening! It’s been a crazy few months, but I’m having a great time putting together this show.

Today I’m sharing a first look at how we’re getting the fountains to “dance.” Since “World of Color” doesn’t have any live performers, the fountains will become our dancers and actors. To help with staging the fountains, we brought in Joshua Horner.

Josh is a fantastic choreographer from Australia. One of his dreams was to work with Walt Disney Imagineering on a show. Well, I am glad we were able to make his dream come true!

We asked Josh to take the musical score for the show and create a style and choreographic point of view for each number. Whether it was the signature look to the show’s theme, or the lush balletic moves in “Part of Your World,” Josh put his heart and soul into the movement of each piece.

The end result of his work was inspiring. We brought the creative team together and had Josh present his ideas. For each of us it became a wonderful fount of inspiration that sparked new ideas and really helped shaped the show.

Today we’ll give you a glimpse into the process.

First "World of Color" TV Spot

Your Favorite Time to Visit Walt Disney World is…

Park Balloons: There’s a Skill To This Inflated Fun

Making Minnie Mouse Candy Apples at Marceline’s Confectionary

Behind the Scenes: Disneyland Performers Prepare for Celebrate! A Street Party

Denny Newell, senior show director and creator of Celebrate! A Street Party, takes us behind the scenes and shows us what it takes to get ready for a Disney parade.

These wanna-be dancers must go through auditions, rehearsals, conditioning and more to appear in a parade. I guess it never occurred to me, but Denny points out that the crew in Celebrate! A Street Party must perform on-stage for a full hour on the parade route!

Behind-the-Scenes: Topiaries at ‘it’s a small world’

Here are some additional fun facts about topiaries:

• There were 24 original Disneyland Park topiaries premiering in 1963. They included a waltzing hippo, a poodle, a pig, bears, elephants, seals, and giraffes. In 1966, they were permanently planted at “it’s a small world.”
• Growing a typical shrub Character Topiary can take from 3-10 years for completion, depending on the size and complexity of the shape.
• Walt Disney got the idea of creating “living” topiaries by seeing traditional topiary gardening in Europe. He asked his film animators and Disneyland landscape team to work together to create the first living sculptures for Disneyland in 1963. They came up with several and one of those included Dumbo making his debut in Fantasyland.

The Disneyland Band since 1950

"Walt Disney loved music and he believed it had an important role to play in the experience at Disneyland park, so for opening day he hired a group of musicians to play band concerts in Town Square. He called the group the Disneyland Band. While the original run was only supposed to last two weeks, the band has performed for hundreds of millions of guests and the group is still playing 55 years later.

The Disneyland Band has logged more than 3,500 marching miles since opening day and has traveled to dozens of cities as a representative of the Resort."

- Heather Hust Rivera, Manager, Social Media, Disneyland Resort

Meet the Disneyland Resort Sign Shop Cast

The Music Behind The Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Undersea Adventure

posted on April 11th, 2011 by Valarie Sukovaty, Disneyland Public Relations

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For those who saw “The Little Mermaid” back in 1989, you know the music in the movie was just as magical as a mermaid falling in love with a prince and living happily ever after. Remember “Part of Your World,” “Under the Sea,” “Poor Unfortunate Souls” and “Kiss the Girl”? You’ll hear all these classics throughout the new attraction, The Little Mermaid ~ Ariel’s Undersea Adventure, set to open at Disney California Adventure park in June.

More than 20 years ago Alan Menken wrote the movie score that won an Academy Award, and he collaborated with Howard Ashman on the songs. For the attraction, the music needed to be arranged somewhat differently, so well-known musical arranger and orchestrator Danny Troob, who has worked often with Menken, took on the challenge. In this video, we go into the music studio and give you a front row seat in a session with Troob and a 65-piece orchestra, as they recreate the amazing Little Mermaid music we all know and love.