A MOUSE CLUBHOUSE EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
RANDY THORNTON
talks about producing the first "Mary Poppins" CD

by Scott Wolf

For me, one of the best things about working for Disney was getting to meet some great people and learning about what they do.

Back in the early '90s I was working in the same building and on the same floor as Walt Disney Records and I spent many memorable hours with Randy Thornton, talking about our shared love of Disney, getting tips about audio and editing, and observing him at his craft while he was working on some of my favorite CD's to ever come out of Walt Disney Records.

Although I never officially interviewed Randy, this day felt like a throwback to some great old times, and I'm so happy to be able to share these interviews with you.

Randy Thornton: One of my first jobs here... they were beginning to work on our second and third CD releases. The first one being the Irwin Kostal “Fantasia” digital recording and that was done in ’86 I believe so it was before I was here. CD’s were brand new and that was the only one we had done and they were going to be putting together the Disney collections volume 1 & 2.

Scott Wolf: Those are collections of classic Disney songs?

RT: Right, our first greatest hits on CD.

I was assigned to go thru and make a list of all the defects that I heard. So I sat there and I listened and I made notes of all the things that I heard and I came back with a big stack of notes. They took that stuff with my notes and they denoised everything and cleaned everything up and it was a very long, labor intensive process at the time.

After the CD’s were done I was really blown away by how great “Mary Poppins” sounded (some songs from that film that were on this collection). "Poppins" had always been one of my absolute favorites, and the "Poppins" stuff just really sounded great so I asked, “What are the chances of actually doing a “Mary Poppins” soundtrack, remastered from the original sources?” Nobody had done a remastered soundtrack. CD’s were still coming out and they were just transferring their album masters onto CD. Nobody’s gone back to the original elements and completely remixed it for CD.

And he goes, “Well, I’d love to but we just put “Mary Poppins” out on vinyl.” And I said, “No, I mean go back to the original sources.” And he said, “I’d love to, it’s one of my favorites, too, but this version isn’t doing very well and CD’s are still kind of new. We would need something really special to get it pulled over with the administration.”

And while I was the clerk I’d be going out and be playing tapes all the time and I came across this one tape that said “Mary Poppins pre-demo.” I played it and it was just these two guys singing songs.

SW: You’ve let me hear that and it was the Sherman brothers (the composers). Did you know who they were?

RT: I knew who the Sherman brothers were but I didn’t know that that was them. I’m hearing this and going, “Wow, I hope that’s not a finished product.”

SW: And of course it was never intended to be heard by the public, it was intended to be heard by Walt.

RT: Right. So he can get the idea of the songs. Some of the lyrics were different, some of the songs weren’t there. There was no “Spoonful of Sugar.” There were other songs like “Tiki Town” and several of the others. And I played it and go, “That’s kind of interesting.” And I just put it back on the shelf again.

Later I discovered that it said “R & B Sherman” up in the corner just written in pencil and I thought it must be the Sherman brothers, and “pre-demo...” it all made sense. When Ron said we would need something really special and I pulled this tape out and I said, “Do people know that this is here?” and Ron’s jaw dropped and he calls the Sherman brothers, they thought the tape was lost 25 years earlier. They thought it was gone. So that sort of got the whole ball rolling into getting the “Mary Poppins” stuff.

Then Ron calls me and says, “I’ve got some good news and I’ve got some bad news. The good news is they’re going to let us put “Mary Poppins” out on CD, and with your demo that you found we’re going to interview the Sherman brothers and have them talk about these songs. The bad news is we have to use the original album master.”

So I pulled the master again and was thinking, “It’s just not right. They should just go back to the original elements.”

SW: Had that ever been done on any album before?

RT: No. Nobody had ever done it which was part of the reason why there was a little bit of trepidation. We only had three CD’s at the point, “Fantasia” and the two Disney Collections and those had just come out so they didn’t know whether CD’s were going to take off and we were a very very tiny company. There were only thirty people in all of the music company so it was a very very small company so a risk like that is pretty big particularly on an untried technology at that point.

I thought, “If you only get one shot to do it, you’ve got to do it right. Nobody’s ever gonna let you do it again because say you put that “Mary Poppins” out there and it does okay. Well, if it doesn’t do okay it’s going to kill any other title. If it does marginally then nobody’s going to be interested and if you want to do it again and do it the right way they’ll never let you because it’s already been done.”

SW: You were still a clerk at that time?

RT: Yeah, this is about 1989 now. When a master is made there’s a protection copy and the master. The protection copy was kept in a separate location just in case anything happened to the one, there’d always be this other one to go to, and that was a generation down. So I took the master and put it in the protection copy box, I took the protection copy and put it in the master box. And, I don’t know how it happened (he says with a big smirk on his face) but the tape got a little too close to a magnet (I laugh) and I took it back because I figured if I have to follow my sword I follow my sword.

It’s been a cool little run here and I was only 29. So Ron takes this jerry-rigged “protection” copy and Ron plays it for the bosses and it’s just (makes distorted sounds). Now, keep in mind the master is still in perfect condition. I did not touch the master this is a copy of the master. That shouldn’t be done either, I acknowledge that.

He calls me up and he says, “You can take the tape back now. Hmm, I don’t remember it sounding that badly before… and I could have sworn there was leader in between the tracks. But… the good news is they were so disappointed with the sound quality of this and we’ve already committed to doing it that they’re going to let me go back to the original elements and let me remix it.” And I go, “(casually) Oh, that’s really good.” And he goes, “Yeah… (a long pause) I’m watching you.” (we laugh)

It was all in good fun because we ended up getting what we wanted from the beginning, but I still to this day have never really told him exactly what I did. He knows I did something, but I’m sure he knows now that I also would never really destroy a master either and we have since transferred that master again recently, with digital technology so it is saved forever.

Anyway, while Ron was in the studio working on it I get this phone call that he wanted me to drop off something at CBS Television City where they were mixing it. I thought, “Oh, he asked me to put that back in the… well, I don’t care. I’ll drive out there.” All it was was an excuse to get me out there because sitting in the studio was Irwin Kostal and Bob Sherman (who composed the songs with his brother Richard) and I was introduced as the guy who found the long lost “Mary Poppins” demo tape and that’s when I met Bob for the first time and shortly after I met Dick.

SW: And Irwin wrote the whole score for “Mary Poppins” and then “The Sound of Music.”

RT: Oh, “Sound of Music,” “West Side Story,” it just goes on and on, he did “Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” with the Sherman brothers later on.
(Photo above, Richard M. Sherman, Randy Thornton, Robert B. Sherman)

(In 2004, Randy did a new "Mary Poppins" album filled with even more of the score and a complete second bonus disc with great interviews and actual recordings of the original story sessions with the composers and Irwin Kostal, and Mary Poppins' author P.L. Travers.)

More from Randy:
His start with Disney

See other interviews

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed by the participants in the interviews are solely those of the interviewee and do not necessarily reflect the views of Mouse Clubhouse. Mouse Clubhouse accepts no legal liability or responsibility for any claims made or opinions expressed within.