January 22, 2015
REVIEW: Dave Digs Disney
By Justin J. Smith
When one thinks of "Disney
music" there's a good chance that jazz isn't the
first genre that pops into your head.
Nonetheless, jazz has perhaps the most
interesting of connections to Disney. And
there's no better place to start the connection
of Disney and jazz than with the album Dave Digs
Disney by the Dave Brubeck Quartet.
If you're unfamiliar with Dave
Brubeck, he was a jazz legend. A giant in the
art-form, he was infamous for inventive
improvisational solos and his unusual time
signatures. His biggest claim to fame is perhaps
"Take Five," written in 5/4 time, as it became
the highest-selling jazz single of all time,
certainly one of the few jazz pieces to ever
reach mainstream status. Its one of those songs
where you might not know the name but will
immediately recognize it once you hear the
melody, likely having heard it multiple times
before.
Having always been fascinated
when two larger than life figures from different
fields collaborate, Dave Digs Disney, which
predates "Take Five" by two years, has always
been a great interest of mine. It speaks wonders
of how monumentally vast the Disney empire is
when even someone as unique and distinctive as
Dave Brubeck has collaborated with the company;
or for that matters his quartet (which shifted
between different members through-out the
decades, for this album Paul Desmond played the
alto saxophone, Joe Morello played the drums,
Norman Bates played the bass, while Brubeck
arranged the compositions and played the piano).

On the the surface, the album looks slight. It
features only a mere eight songs(originally six
songs but two bonus track were added in a
reissue) from four Disney movies: Snow White and
The Seven Dwarfs, Pinocchio,
Cinderella, and Alice In Wonderland.
Those songs being:
1. Alice In Wonderland
2. Give A Little Whistle
3. Heigh-Ho
4. When You Wish Upon A Star
5. Some Day My Prince Will Come
6. One Song
7. Very Good Advice
8. So This Love
And yet�in total these songs clock up to a total
of 50 minutes! Gotta love Brubeck's
improvisations making some of these songs clock
quite a bit longer than their original
counterparts!
Being Disney's national anthem, the rendition of
"When You Wish Upon A Star" is certainly a
highlight. Brubeck's arrangement give a very
interesting upbeat and soothing quality to a
song that tends be rather sober and borderline
melancholy. It tends to be a favorite of several
podcasters. It's been played on commercials, it
was even was featured on a Disney College
Program Orientation video from the '90s.
The other tracks are quite iconic too, though,
as I've heard a few of these instrumentations
play through-out the parks (my ear couldn't help
but catch this version of "Heigh-Ho" when
drawing at the Animation Academy in September).

The most intriguing thing to me about this
album, though, is Brubeck's interest in Alice In
Wonderland. The title song itself clocks in at 9
minutes and 24 seconds (the longest track on the
album) and he even manages to give attention to
"Very Good Advice" (a song not put in much
regard). He clearly loved the film, which was
quite uncommon for 1957 (let alone 1952, the
year after the film was released and when Brubeck
first adapted the title song as a jazz single,
five years before this album). Back then,
Disney's Alice was disliked by critics, the
audience didn't respond to it much with it
receiving lower bow office numbers than other
Disney movies, even Walt himself expressed
disappointment in the final project. It wasn't
until decades later, starting in the 70s
(coinciding with the drug culture of the time)
that the movie's reputation started to come
around until we eventually reach today where
Alice is considered as iconic and beloved as any
other animated film Disney has released. The fact
Dave was a fan of this film from the beginning
speaks volumes oft the guy: always ahead of his
time, which is what precisely what made him a
great fit with Disney.
That opening credit song, "Alice In Wonderland,"
became an unlikely iconic jazz standard, having
been adapted by other legends in the field of
jazz such as Bill Evans and Oscar Peterson, all
due to Dave Brubeck! I'm sure Brubeck has
influenced pretty much anyone who has done jazz
renditions of Disney songs following him though
(Miles Davis has even been accused of
practically stealing his rendition of "Someday
My Prince Will Come").
My favorite track from this album though is
easily "Give a Little Whistle." The song itself
has always been one of my favorites, and his
rendition is just so zippy and catchy that I
can't even tell you the amount of time I brought
it up to listen in the background while doing
other stuff such as homework, cleaning, or even
writing this article.
Despite Dave Brubeck having nearly lived to 92
years old, he never did make a follow-up Disney
album, which I think is a bit of a shame. Just
imagine what "Zip A Dee Doo Dah" or your pick of
any Sherman Brothers song would've sounded like
as jazz standards! None the less, it still is
somewhat of a minor miracle that this
collaboration ever happened in the first place,
and I for one am grateful that it did.


The entire album can be purchased on iTunes for
a mere $7.92. The legacy collection, which has
the songs in both mono and stereo (as well as
some alternate takes) can be bought for $14.99.
You can also find a couple of Brubeck's tracks on
a few other Disney jazz albums, such as
"Everybody Wants to Be A Cat: Disney Jazz, Vol
1."
Speaking of other jazz albums, there are other
CDs of Disney songs turned to 'jazz' such as
"The Circle Sessions (The Music Carthay Circle)"
but that's perhaps another article.