Zooey Deschanel Reveals Pressures Of Recording Disney Theme For Pooh
The actress Zooey Deschanel has been talking to TheWrap about the pressures associated with writing a theme tune for a Disney soundtrack. She was initially asked to record a new version of 'Pooh'. The original theme tune to the adaptations of A.A. Milne's popular children's stories was written by the Sherman brothers (who were also responsible for writing 'I Wanna Be like You' and 'Chim Chim Cher-ee').
Disney songs have a long history of becoming both popular and legendary compositions; a pedigree that dates back to 1940, with 'When You Wish Upon A Star.' Deschanel stated that she tried not to let that distract her from the job at hand: "I tried not to think about it, because I might be overwhelmed if I did." After recording her version of the theme tune, the filmmakers were impressed enough to ask her to write and record a song for the end-credits. The song that resulted turned out to be 'So Long', which became one of the film's two Oscar entries. She was then asked to contribute vocals to other songs on the film's soundtrack. Deschanel said that the process of recording for the film took part in stages, over the course of a year.
The theme tune, recorded by Zooey Deschanel, was produced by M. Ward, her fellow band mate in the band SHE & Him. Zooey also said that she called on influences such as Carole King and Harry Nilsson when writing and recording the tracks.
