Monday, March 28, 2011

My Unexpected Post

I was stumbling around the internet when I came across this video. Nick Pitera, a Pixar animator, created a One man Disney Movie using songs from several different disney movies and singing the parts of the heroine, hero, sidekick, villian, and chorus. He sings the the female roles with startling skill (apparently, he has been featured on Ellen), and startling is the word for it; it is disconcerting. Now, I really liked it just because it entertained me. Then I found myself wondering what you guys might think about his presentation of these disney songs so here is the link: One Man Disney Movie http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zp1BYzIVi0U&feature=player_embedded

8 comments:

Kami said...

This was a very entertaining video. I especially loved his prop additions : )
At first I didn't believe that it was really him singing the female parts, but as it went on, his tone sounded slightly more masculine. Then I became a believer.
My favorite part was "When You Wish Upon a Star". The fact that he could sing all of the different harmonic parts was EXTREMELY impressive.

As I mentioned in class yesterday, four or so of songs from Phantom of the Opera sound very similarly in their musical composition. In this video, he sings "Reflection" from Mulan and "I Can Go the Distance" from Hercules during the same section. This shows that these two songs have a similar musical composition. So I ask this, how original can music really be? There are only so many notes you can play and in so many particular orders without it sounding completely awful. So is all music just a variation of something that has already been created?

Perla said...

I was truly fascinated by this video. Nick Pitera is very talented. The way he changes his voice from one character to the other is amazing. I was especially impressed when he sang the heroine part. It’s amazing how he can make his voice go from low with the villain, to high with the heroine, and to all the in-between pitches. It’s hard to believe that this one guy is doing all the singing. Kami has a very interesting point about the different songs having "similar music composition." I didn't recognize any of the songs and thought it was the same song throughout the whole thing.

I don't really know a whole lot about music, but just thinking about the hundreds of different instruments out there and the many notes that they each have, makes it hard to believe that all music has already been created. However, thinking back on all the different musicians that have existed and are out there, it could be very possible.

Aubs said...

WOW! How is it that this guy can sing higher pitched than me?! That video was awesome he sang all of my favorite disney songs and it sounded amazing! The presentation was neat having the choruses, heroine, hero, and villain interacting throughout. We see that he translated well known disney songs into a flowing collage where he sang all the parts. This was very intuitive especially as translating songs is much different than books where a different plot can be used.

When I think of translating music I think of instruments and the beat. These are a couple things that someone could manipulate while still keeping the same lyrics. I noticed that Nick pretty much kept to the same music theme for the songs so that viewers would recognize what song he was singing. This may be due to his wanting the viewer to compare his voice and tone with the originals. Regardless, it's impressive how diverse he is able to make himself from feminine to villainous with a deep voice like scar to french such as the candlestick from Beauty and the Beast. I thought it was super cool when he harmonized with himself playing both the heroine and hero!

hjm said...

This is actually not the first time I've seen this guy, and he is quite impressive. I don't think he should have put in the King Louis song because he doesn't do jazz very well, but his range is truly impressive.

It's funny what Kami said about music having the same composition. I've seen a hoax song made from this other band, where they were lamenting the fact that they've never made a hit song. One member of the band jokes that it is because they have never made a 'four chord song.' They then start playing the same four chords and manage to sing the choruses of over 40 big hit songs without changing the chords, which is hilarious because you realize all of these hit songs are made with the same 4 chords on the guitar.

The other comment I had is that many Disney songs are inspired directly from classical music. I found a website listing Disney songs with the classical music composers they were made from. I discovered this after learning to play Rachmaninov's "Prelude in C# Minor" and realizing it sounds exactly like the song of the bells from Disney's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." Funny stuff, huh?

Kristie said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Kristie said...

Haha! This is great! Truly a great find! I've actually seen this guy before in another video where he sings "A Whole New World" doing both Aladdin and Jasmine's parts.
I read the little comment area under his video, and he says that Disney movies has inspired him since he was 5 years old, that he's always wanted to voice a Disney character.
I think Nick does a great job in representing the different Disney movies. He stays true to the magic and beauty of some songs while pay homage to the darkness and mystery of others.
I don't know if I'd call this an adaptation of the songs themselves though. It's more of a compilation. He uses the same music, stays true to the character singing the song (like how he uses a female voice for Mulan) and even includes props from each movie.
The only problem I have is that his music is on itunes to buy... They're not his songs... But, that's not to say that I won't buy it ^_^

Priscilla Grace said...

Great video! I agree with Kami that is prop additions are a nice touch! I think that it is crazy how these traditional female roles are "translated" by a male singer. He honestly does them justice. I agree with Aubs that he does a good job of creating a fluid collage of music so to speak. It is interesting to me how many of the themes in Disney films overlap similarly to the overlap in their musical scores/themes. For instance the general arch is of a misfit becoming appreciated/loved/etc. (examples: Hercules, Pinocchio, Cinderella, Aladdin, the list could go on forever).

I agree with Perla that there seems to be so much potential for musical arrangements, especially as we get into the range of computer generated sound and post-modern music, the latter of which often defies what we would traditionally say "sounds right".

I tried to look up Nick Pitera on wikipedia and his name came as having done a cover of "For Good" from Wicked. I think it is a pretty decent version! Anyways the first link is for his cover and the second link is for a Chenowith and Menzel version of the song. Hope you enjoy contrasting them!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IX1LdLv00aA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4BjwTzEZw8&feature=related

Marissa said...

I was really impressed by this video, not only because of the performance, but also by the video itself. He must have put a crazy amount of planning to create it. There were six clips, and I didn’t notice any cuts in any of them (even if he did leave the frame occasionally). I was impressed by the way he kept each song recognizable, even with the minor changes that made them all flow together. I really liked it.

Priscilla, Thanks for the links! I hadn’t seen that cover before (I did, however see his version of “A Whole New World”). I really did like his version! However, I must admit that for some reason, I almost feel that the switching between male and female voices gives off a less successful effect in “For Good”, where it seems like it was added simply as on oddity, to make it stand out. In his “One Man Disney Movie”, although my previous oddity statement is just as valid, I guess I feel that it fits with the mood of clearly defined character differences.

Kristie, I was thinking about what you said about him not actually adapting the songs, and have decided I disagree, to an extent. When I posted this video, I had carefully tried to word what he had done here as his “presentation” of the songs, but now that I have thought about it, I would have to say he did adapt things to suit his purpose. There were some minor word changes and some small changes to the music itself, to make each piece flow together, only using pertinent clips from each song. He made “Go the Distance” and “Reflection” into a duet, which certainly is a change as the songs come from different movies. He added some use of props to represent the scenes, and the order of the songs worked together to follow the basic structure of most Disney movies (introduce hero/heroine, villain song, love song, interspersed entertaining songs, with a sappy concluding song).