Disney’s ‘For Scores’ Podcast Features Oscar-Winning Composer Alan Menken

Disney Music Group’s podcast series, Disney’s For Scores, has released the first episode of a special two-part interview with eight-time Oscar winning composer Alan Menken. Hosted by Variety’s Jon Burlingame, the series gives voice to award-winning visionary composers, exploring the challenges and emotional journeys of these musical storytellers.

In Part 1, Alan Menken discusses his career and takes the audience back to his beginnings as a musician in a family of dentists, his love of “Fantasia,” and his life-changing writing partnership with Howard Ashman. The collaboration would skyrocket them both to Off-Broadway success with Little Shop of Horrors and eventually to the Disney Animation Renaissance with The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin.

Part 2 will be released on September 22. Menken discusses the transition to new writing partners after Howard Ashman’s early death, Disney’s Broadway takeover, and other favorite projects such as The Hunchback of Notre Dame.

Now in its third year, For Scores has released 26 episodes including Oscar-winning composers Ludwig Göransson, Randy Newman, Rachel Portman, plus Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez.

Jon Burlingame is the nation’s leading writer on the subject of music for films and television. He writes regularly for Variety and, over the past 30 years, has also written on the topic for leading newspapers such as The New York Times, Los Angeles Times and the Washington Post. He is the author of four books including “The Music of James Bond” and “Sound and Vision: 60 Years of Motion Picture Soundtracks,” and he teaches film-music history at the University of Southern California.

The ‘For Scores’ podcast series is produced by Maria Kleinman for Disney Music Group in association with Treefort Media, an LA-based podcast company with a mission to expand imagination through premium audio storytelling. The episodes are available to download everywhere podcasts are enjoyed.