There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow

"There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" is the theme song to two

History

The song was written by

At Disneyland, the attraction that had replaced the Carousel of Progress, America Sings, closed in 1988. The building, known as the "Carousel Theater," sat empty for ten years, until the new Tomorrowland opened on May 22, 1998. The new occupant of the Carousel Theater building, Innoventions, paid tribute to the older attraction by reviving the 1964 song until it closed in 2015. Tom Morrow (the audio-animatronic host of Innoventions) sang it at the beginning, end, and during transitions of sets. This version of the song featured new lyrics written by the Sherman Brothers in 1998, and was sung by Nathan Lane. The attraction was updated periodically to include newer elements, but still uses the original theme song between each transition. However, the different Tom Morrow scenes are not directly linked in a continuous show as the old attraction was. The original Rex Allen recording was the exit music for the ASIMO show inside Innoventions as well.

Legacy

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Richard Sherman was once quoted saying, "The theme song, 'Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow,' had a wonderful positiveness about it. In a way, it was Walt's theme song, because he was very positive about the future. He really felt that there was a great big beautiful tomorrow shining at the end of every day."^[3]

In an interview, Marty Sklar, the former ambassador for Walt Disney Imagineering, said: "Walt Disney was the eternal optimist, and he really believed that things could be better. And Bob and Dick Sherman wrote that song as a personal ode to Walt. They really meant it... That was Walt's anthem, and they recognized that."^{[4][unreliable source?]}

Other uses

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Walt Disney and the Sherman Brothers sang "There's a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow" together in a short promotional film sent to General Electric before the New York World's Fair. This can be seen in its entirety in an

The band They Might Be Giants recorded a cover of the song which appears as a bonus track on the soundtrack album for the Disney film Meet the Robinsons.^[5][6]

In 2015, ESPN used the song for a commercial featuring the NCAA Football Signing Day. The commercial was for the ESPN-U channel and featured baseball caps of major college football programs.^[7]

It makes an appearance at the end of the short Fun with Mr. Future, sung by the titular character himself. It was also featured in the 2015 Disney movie Tomorrowland during the scene where young Frank is at the 1964 New York World's Fair.

It is featured as the closing theme for every episode of the PRX radio program The Goober Hour.

In the animated series The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse, Mickey sings the song briefly in the episode "House of Tomorrow".

References