excerpts from
LA Times article
Disney instructed Menken to depart from the heavy Broadway musical-type scoring he made famous in "The Little Mermaid" and "Beauty and the Beast." So the composer borrowed from leaner singer-songwriters of the late 1960s, including Joni Mitchell.
"It's more like handmade music rather than too over-produced," Howard said. "You'll hear a lot of guitar music, especially when Rapunzel is singing.... That was a nice way to break away from what [Menken] had done."
Not into musicals, but haven't several Disney movies became successful shows on Broadway. Though noticed a trend in animated movies, which they mostly feature more contemporary pop songs.
Also can't picture characters from the medieval setting acting out as 20th century rock/pop musicians without looking like a parody or "Shrek".
Over the decades, Disney has benefited from the ticket sales and licensing revenue generated by such princess-driven properties as "The Little Mermaid," "Beauty and the Beast" and "Aladdin." The studio's most recent offering, however, was a clear disappointment. Although critically acclaimed, last year's "The Princess and the Frog" was the most poorly performing of Disney's recent fairy tales.
In the age of mega-franchises when movies need to appeal to a broad audience to justify a sizable investment, Disney discovered too late that "Princess and the Frog" appealed to too narrow an audience: little girls. This prompted the studio to change the name of its Rapunzel movie to the gender-neutral "Tangled" and shift the lens of its marketing to the film's swashbuckling male costar, Flynn Rider.
"Princess & The Frog" wasn't a major flop and it was even nominated for an Oscar. Overhyped mega-franchises doesn't mean... then again Disney is a mega-corperation.
