Guillaume, how important do you think music is in Disneyland Paris shows?
For me, music is central to all our shows. It’s not just background music: it’s the main emotional driving force behind the story. Music also helps create the immersive atmosphere, because it surrounds us, envelops us. It’s all around us, no matter how it’s played. Each note, each melody, each harmony reinforces the specific atmosphere of a show and immerses the audience in a very special world. Take “The Lion King: Rhythm of the Pride Lands”. Right from the start, with the percussion instruments and ensembles, you know you’re in for an incredible journey into the heart of Africa.
How is the music for a show conceived?
It really depends on the type of project. In some cases, the music department is involved from the very first drafts, even before the script is written. In other cases, we will step in a little later. It’s difficult to give a single method, and I think that’s important. You can’t lock yourself into a specific method. Each project will require a specific, particular and unique approach. What’s important is that in every case there will be a musical vision that will feed the story.
How many people does it take to create the music for a show?
Internally, we’re a small team, but as soon as a project is launched, staff numbers soar. We need composers, arrangers, orchestrators, copyists, studio staff, sound engineers, not to mention coordinators. So it’s impossible to tell you exactly how many people are involved, especially as this varies for each project, but over the course of a year it can easily amount to several hundred.
And what about the live musicians at the destination?
Here again, it is difficult to give an exact number. By 2024, we had recruited around 80 singers, forty musicians and ten percussionists.
And this year, the Disney Music Festival is blowing all the statistics out of the water, with over 50 singers and musicians performing daily throughout the summer at Disneyland Park.
We’re extremely lucky to be able to bring in so many live musicians, and to be able to share all this lively music with our visitors.
Music at Disneyland Paris also requires international collaboration.
When we choose to work with European partners, to record in London, Budapest, Bratislava or the United States, for example, it is for very specific reasons, particularly related to the musical culture of each place. An orchestra in Budapest doesn’t sound like an orchestra in London. Depending on the aesthetic we want, we will look for collaborators who can make proposals as close as possible to what we want to find. As far as I’m concerned, it’s very important to prioritise European proposals. They have a very specific artistic sensibility that is extremely complementary to Disney’s own American music structure.
This mix of inspirations is key to the musical identity of Disneyland Paris.
That’s exactly right. We take the best of both worlds: the American musical material, structures and working methods, and we add another way of seeing things, of approaching music, of singing, phrasing, arranging, writing and working with the orchestra. European music alone or American music alone is exciting enough, but when you mix two colours together, you get a third, and that’s what’s so amazing!
What is your fondest musical memory of Disneyland Paris?
I discovered the world of The Lion King and the power of African music in the 2000s, when I was working as the vocal director for the musical at the Mogador, and I’ve had a very special attachment to this music ever since. When we launched the production of “The Lion King: Rhythms of the Pride Lands” at Disneyland Paris, it was a fantastic moment. We had a promotional event at the Gare de Lyon, renamed “Gare du Lion”, where we gathered around one of the station’s pianos and sang “Circle of Life”. It was a very powerful moment and one of my fondest memories.
There was also the moment when we recorded the music for “Alice and the Queen of Hearts: Back to Wonderland” in Nashville last year. When we work in the studio, most of the time we record the instruments separately. This makes mixing easier. But here we decided to record the entire rhythm section together. It was like having a live band in front of us, and it perfectly matched the pop rock colour we were looking for, with an incredible intensity in the interpretation. For me, it was a return to my roots, because I come from a very musical world. To experience this, with these incredible musicians, right in the heart of one of the world’s music capitals, was just amazing!