The Disney Song Encyclopedia - fieldi

“LIGHT MAGIC THEME” 119
The Disney studio’s experiments with mixing live action and animation culminated in the very
popular Mary Poppins (1964). Before the use of computers, the artists and cinematographers
worked together tirelessly to create such delightful scenes as “Jolly Holiday” in which Bert (Dick
Van Dyke) and some penguin waiters entertain Mary (Julie Andrews). (Walt Disney/Photofest)
Casey MacDonald (Ashley Leggat), who sings about how simple life was
before her stepbrother Derek came into her life.
“The Light in the Forest” is the title ballad for the 1958 film about a
white youth kidnapped and raised by Native Americans who must learn
how to adjust to adult life in white society. Paul J. Smith wrote the sweeping
melody and Gil George (pseudonym for Hazel George) penned the knowing
lyric, which is a poetic assessment of a boy who is trapped between two
worlds. A studio chorus sings the evocative ballad over the opening credits
of the movie.
“Light Magic Theme” is the electronic-rock song, flavored with a Scottish
folk sound, featured in the 1997 parade at Disneyland that was termed
a “streetacular” by the Disney imagineers but ended up being one of the
most costly failures in the history of the park. As four eighty-foot-long
floating stages moved through Fantasyland carrying hundreds of pixies and