What Makes Encanto Music So Great? by Zander Greco, 805 Encanto is an amazing movie. From start to finish it reminded me of other times when Disney was bold enough to embark on new creative projects. An example of this was Moana. Because of its success and size, unfortunately, Disney doesn’t need to innovate anymore. They can release uninspired remake after remake, and general audiences wouldn’t bat an eye. Disney is too big to fail. But that’s not to say that Disney can’t release beautiful masterpieces anymore because they certainly can—from Soul to Luca, to the subject of this article: Encanto. Encanto is great because of its willingness to root itself in Colombian culture through songs and visual representation. Today, I would like to examine the musical and cultural reasons why Encanto’s soundtrack became such a hit. Our examination begins in late-19thcentury Germany. Opera was one of the main components of the upperclass society in Europe. Theatre director and composer Richard Wagner had a new approach to opera: the “light motif” or Leitmotif. A Leitmotif is a short and repeated phrase of music that is closely related to a particular person, place, or idea. Leitmotifs are extremely common in western film. Often what filmmakers will do is play certain phrases as characters appear on screen the first time, presenting them together. An example of this is in Star Wars—whenever Darth Vader enters the frame, the “Imperial March” theme will play. This makes audiences aware that this music is associated with Darth Vader. Afterwards, even without seeing Darth Vader, when we hear the theme, we are reminded of Darth
Vader. But how does this tie into Encanto? Encanto has a lot of leitmotifs. For example, “The Ultimate Vision” and “La Candela” share a leitmotif, associating Bruno’s vision with the actual moment that it comes to pass. The leitmotifs in Encanto usually represent the idea of the miracle that gives the family their unique abilities. As context for those who haven’t watched the movie, the family has supernatural gifts they get from a magical candle to protect the people who live in the village below. Mirabel (the main protagonist) gets into conflict with Abuela (the head of the family), which divides the family, but they eventually reunite.
admits that from the start of the project, he didn’t know much about Colombian music or as he put it “a layman's understanding”. His solution to this was a two-week trip to Colombia, in which we visited various regions of the country and got a taste of Colombian music. As he stated in an interview with the press, “there are things that are really similar to rhythms in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, and there are things that are totally distinct about Colombia and that part of the world.” Lin-Manuel Miranda was also the musical director of the movie, Moana. He noted that he went through a similar process with Polynesian culture and music. In another interview with the press, he said “that was a part of the world I really knew nothing about. […] The fun is falling in love with this culture, falling in love with the rhythms, and then writing as you’re falling in love. And that was exactly what happened with Colombia too.”
In summary, what makes the Encanto soundtrack so great is the devotion The second reason Encanto’s music to being culturally accurate while became so popular is because of adding a flair of creativity, using tradiwestern culture’s fascination with Latin pop music. This craving was am- tional staples of music like leitmotifs and syncopation, all while tapping plified in 2017, after the making of “Despacito” by Luis Fonsi and Daddy into a rapidly-growing genre of music. Yankee. As Billboard Vice-President put it, “I don’t think this song [We Don’t Talk About Bruno] could have Sources: been No. 1 six years ago, pre‘Despacito’”. The post-Despacito scehttps://www.rollingstone.com/music/ ne has been filled with hits such as music-latin/encanto-music-creativeCamillo Cabello’s “Havana” and process-1301928/ “Pepas” by Puerto Rican pop artist Farruko. The amazing harmonies, syncopation, and tempo of Latino music https://www.theatlantic.com/culture/ combined with the touch of personal- archive/2022/02/encanto-disneyity from the character’s traits add to music/621475/ the catchiness of this song. https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/ The final factor in Encanto’s great mu- what-is-a-leitmotif-definition/ sic is the obligation to the source. Musical director Lin-Manuel Miranda @theHelm ~ page 5
