The Unofficial Disney Soundtrack Project
I’ve been considering a dedicated discussion thread for Dream Collection information, updates, etc. for a while now. Finally, I’ve decided to take the plunge! This thread will largely be relegated to updates for previous Dream Collection sets, such as re-remasters, small corrections in editing mistakes, and other little things. It will also serve as a little FAQ for some questions I get asked rather often, and to establish the titular "How YOU Can Help" element as a serious factor in the future of The Dream Collection. Cheers, and thanks for sticking with me throughout the recent hiatus!
P.S.: Ichabod and Mr. Toad is my next project!
What is The Dream Collection?
The Dream Collection is an unofficial, non-commercial series of soundtrack albums covering Disney’s older and more forgotten films, produced entirely by myself — made by fans, for fans. It is an answer to Walt Disney Records’ own Legacy Collection and all of the scores which Disney has proven themselves uninterested in releasing. My top priority is to make these sound as good as possible, all while staying true to the era in which they were recorded and the limitations inherent to that.
OK, but… How do you make them? Do you have access to the Disney Vaults?
No (but oh, how I wish that was the case!). Instead, my methods lie in these two words: DVD ripping. DVD ripping is a process by which one extracts the 5.1 track (AKA "Surround Sound") from a DVD or Blu-ray disc and edits it within an audio workstation, isolating certain channels which may or may not contain the raw underscore/instrumental music.
I’m sure anyone who’s familiar with this website has heard the term before; most of whom will turn their nose up at the notion of DVD rips, which are often low-quality hack jobs plagued with sound effects, dialogue, and other noise. However, I believe DVD ripping is — if handled properly — a relatively unexplored avenue which boasts great potential as a substitute for official, commercial film soundtracks. With some digital manipulation and careful editing, I’ve managed to piece together several complete soundtrack sets for classic Disney films such as The Sword in the Stone (George Bruns) and The Rescuers (Artie Butler), among others.
Where do I download these?
All Dream Collection sets have their own dedicated thread, wherein the download links are located:
The Rescuers (Thread 219789)
The Fox and the Hound (Thread 220224)
The Sword in the Stone (Thread 220952)
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (Thread 223488)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (Thread 224415)
The Jungle Book (Thread 227361)
(This list will be updated with any future additions)
Do you take requests?
No, not typically. I receive messages from people every week, asking me to wave my magic wand and make their favorite films into perfect, complete soundtracks for their listening pleasure. The problem is, I don’t have a magic wand; these things take many, many hours to produce. And it’s not a mere matter of time, either; a good 75% of the time, said requests are simply impossible. You see, DVD ripping is a tricky business which requires that several technical variables be just right, so that it is possible to isolate the music for further editing and restoration. That this "rip-friendly" setup is uncommon would be an understatement, especially in the case of any films past the age of about 30 years or more. Disney’s high-quality DVD and Blu-ray releases are generally a big exception to this rule; a black sheep to the standard, if you will. And even then, some Disney DVDs still aren’t rip-friendly.
Furthermore, I need to make one thing very, very clear for anyone who’s still confused: The Dream Collection is a Disney-exclusive soundtrack project. Some folks hit me up asking me to "make a Dream Collection soundtrack" for things that are completely unrelated to Disney. Do understand that if I produce a non-Disney rip, it’s a small side-project which bears no relation to my Disney work. So, please, don’t inquire about things that aren’t Disney property.
If, however, your request is for a theatrical Disney film released prior to 1990/the "Disney renaissance" era, it is most likely going to be covered in The Dream Collection at some point anyway (though there is still a possibility that the DVD/Blu-ray won’t be rip-friendly, so don’t get your hopes up too high). Patience is key.
Please read the list at the bottom of this post and see if your film in question is planned as a future Dream Collection and/or is rip-friendly.
How can I help?
This is a rather serious topic I want to discuss:
Those of whom that have been following my rips and this series for a while will know that my financial situation hasn’t been very stable lately, and, as a result, I’ve had trouble getting my hands on a reliable Blu-ray player for my computer. As such, I’ve not been able to use Blu-rays in any of my rips (with the exception of The Rescuers, though that was only due to special circumstances which I’ll spare you the details of) — this is a very big problem. Many films whose DVDs aren’t rip-friendly have been released on Blu-ray, and those are generally more likely to be rip-friendly than an older, lossy-quality DVD.
So, how can you assist me in this regard? Well, dear reader, it’s simpler than it may seem on the surface:
If you own a DVD or Blu-ray of one of the films listed in the "DON’T OWN/HIGHEST DEMAND" section in the below list, and a computer with a disc drive (or an external drive which can connect to your computer), you have the ability to make a great contribution to the Dream Collection project. Simply rip the raw 5.1 audio track(s) from your Blu-ray or DVD (lossy is acceptable, though lossless is obviously preferable) and send it to me so that I may then acquire the audio and use it to build a Dream Collection set for that particular film. In advance, I would recommend uploading the raw audio to either Dropbox or your Google Drive rather than MEGA, as those are both a tad more private, from my understanding.
If you are already acquainted with the ins and outs of DVD/Blu-ray audio ripping, then I needn’t explain anything beyond this point.
If not, then allow me to suggest a free, simple program for you:
"Pavtube BDmagic (http://www.pavtube.cn/blu-ray-ripper/)" is the best that I could find in one night, though I’m sure there is better out there. Nevertheless, it can rip in a multitude of formats and boasts both DVD and Blu-ray compatibility. The only problem is that I couldn’t seem to rip anything in true, multi-channel 5.1 without selecting a lossy quality such as AC3 or OGG, as the FLAC option mixes the 5.1 down into stereo.
I presume that the process of using the program should be quite straightforward (insert a disc, boot up BDmagic, select format to rip to), though if anyone needs help, I’d be glad to lend some answers. And, to clarify, yes, all you must download is the trial. Don’t squander your money on some program just for my sake!
Frankly, I will be surprised if anyone proves themselves generous enough to rip some of their DVD collection audio and send it to me. But please, do bear in mind that it would make things move along MUCH more quickly as a result, and would save me from further financial strain — especially in the case of rarer DVDs and Blu-rays, such as the Disney Rewards Club exclusives (Swiss Family Robinson Blu-ray, anyone?) or anything from the Vault Disney DVD collection. You would have my sincerest gratitude for contributing to the project.
"The List"
An Ongoing Documentation of my DVD Collection / Which Films are "Rip-Friendly"
The following is a complete list of pre-renaissance Disney DVDs covering what I own, what I don’t yet own, and whether or not it’s "rip-friendly" (hereon abbreviated as "RF").
NOTE: Only DVDs and Blu-rays confirmed to have 5.1 tracks are listed.
OWN:
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (OWN: Diamond Edition DVD — RF: Yes, English track is mostly RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Pinocchio (OWN: Platinum Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Fantasia (OWN: 2-Movie DVD — RF: Yes, the film is nothing but music — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Dumbo (OWN: 70th Anniversary Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Bambi (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Saludos Amigos (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: No — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
The Three Caballeros (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: No — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Fun and Fancy Free (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: No — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (OWN: Blu-ray & Gold Collection Edition — RF: On DVD, yes, English track is mostly RF; Blu-ray is identical to DVD — DREAM COLLECTION: Yes)
Treasure Island (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Cinderella (OWN: Platinum Edition — RF: Yes, English track is completely RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Alice in Wonderland (OWN: Un-Anniversary Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Peter Pan (OWN: Special Edition — RF: English track isn’t RF, Spanish and French might be — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (OWN: Special Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Lady and the Tramp (OWN: Diamond Edition DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Old Yeller (OWN: Vault Disney Collection Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Sleeping Beauty (OWN: Platinum Edition DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Pollyanna (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Swiss Family Robinson (OWN: Vault Disney Collection — RF: No, mostly not RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Parent Trap (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Savage Sam (OWN: Vault Disney Collection — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Sword in the Stone (OWN: 45th Anniversary Edition — RF: Yes, English track is mostly RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Yes)
Mary Poppins (OWN: 45th Anniversary Edition — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
The Love Bug (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Jungle Book (OWN: Platinum Edition — RF: Yes, English track is completely RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Yes)
Bedknobs and Broomsticks (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Robin Hood (OWN: Most Wanted DVD — RF: No — DREAM COLLECTION: No)
Herbie Rides Again (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Apple Dumpling Gang (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Escape to Witch Mountain (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
Freaky Friday (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknkown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (OWN: Blu-ray & Friendship Edition — RF: On DVD, English track isn’t RF, Spanish and French might be; Blu-ray is RF — DREAM COLLECTION: Yes)
Pete’s Dragon (OWN: Blu-ray — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Rescuers (OWN: 2003 DVD — RF: English and French tracks aren’t RF, Spanish is — DREAM COLLECTION: Yes)
Return from Witch Mountain (OWN: DVD — RF: Unknown — DREAM COLLECTION: Planned)
The Fox and the Hound (OWN: 25th Anniversary Edition — RF: Yes, English track is mostly RF — Dream Collection: Yes)
DON’T OWN:
Third Man on the Mountain (DVD; William Alwyn)
Thank you for your time. Have a nice day, and please enjoy The Dream Collection!
And, regardless of those facts, I already stated on several occasions that I’ll only be doing Disney’s older films, rather than the much more recent ’90s pictures which I’m positive are already slated for Disney’s Legacy Collection.
User Truegatorguy (http://forums.ffshrine.org/member.php?u=1110345) and a Louis-Phillipe have very generously answered my call for help by sending me several titles in the "DON’T OWN" section, including The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (Blu-ray), Fun and Fancy Free (Blu-ray), Saludos Amigos (Blu-ray), The Three Caballeros (Blu-ray), The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh (Blu-ray), Bedknobs and Broomsticks (Blu-ray), Pete’s Dragon (Blu-ray) and The Love Bug (Blu-ray).
Truegatorguy also informed me that he has several other titles which he will continue to send me over time, which include Treasure Island (DVD), Savage Sam (DVD), Bambi (Blu-ray) and Old Yeller (DVD). They will remain in the "DON’T OWN" section of the list until I recieve them officially, but please don’t waste your time sending me any of those, since I’m already going to recieve them from Truegatorguy.
———- Post added at 07:33 PM ———- Previous post was at 07:33 PM ———-
cool
How nice to see you also plan to do "Bedknobs and Broomsticks" and "Pete’s Dragon".
Fantastic! I can’t wait. 🙂
Bless you and everyone involved! I truly love your "Dream Collections". <3
I personally am pretty excited for Pete’s Dragon!
will be checking out the Rescuers tonight!
cheers
Johnny
rep added of course!
Excited for the rest of your projects!
Both PigmaskCol and I had made the same comments for "Swiss Family Robinson" and "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea"…. If ONLY Disney could hear our pleas (he sighed, wishing on a star…)
It’s happened again, folks! Yesterday, a kind user by the name of "luezuve" fulfilled no less than eight of my requests, including Treasure Island (Clifton Parker), Pollyanna (Paul J. Smith), The Parent Trap (also Smith), Herbie Rides Again (George Bruns), The Apple Dumpling Gang (Buddy Baker), Escape to Witch Mountain (Johnny Mandel), Freaky Friday (also Mandel), and finally Return from Witch Mountain (Lalo Schifrin). This leaves only one more title which remains out of my reach: Third Man on the Mountain (William Alwyn). Of course, considering the monstrous pile of titles I now have to work with, it’ll likely be a year or two before I’ll even be thinking about "Third Man", so it’s no rush at all. I’ve got my work cut out for me, that’s for certain… Oh, and "The List" at the top of the thread has been updated accordingly, by the way.
While I’m on the subject, I’d like to confirm that my current project and the next entry in The Dream Collection is Buddy Baker and the Sherman Brothers’ The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, a project which would not have been at all possible without the help of TrueGatorGuy’s Blu-ray donation! While there is some slight distortion present in the audio (which appears to have been a deliberate decision made by the film’s restoration team, oddly), the sound quality is nonetheless very nice, and presented in true stereo. The only downside is that I wasn’t able to extract instrumental versions of the songs this time around, due to the fact that the vocals are spread across all channels whenever a musical number pops up, even though most vocals were clearly recorded in mono. As a result, this Dream Collection set will completely lack score-only versions of songs. I’m sorry that I couldn’t do more to fix this problem.
Lastly, I’d like to give a warm, proper thanks to all three of the people who collectively donated those 5.1 tracks. Your contributions have not and will not go unnoticed — I’m giving special thanks to these generous souls in the liner notes of every future Dream Collection set (and will update all previous entries with these credits once I get around to re-doing the liner notes for my first three Dream Collection projects). It may not be much, but consider it a little tip of the hat from one fellow to another. Thank you for making this crazy project possible!
The Fox & the Hound
https://s31.postimg.cc/fvhuyezs7/Disney_Fox_the_Hound_Pigmask_Col_s_Dream_Collectio n_copy.jpg (https://postimg.cc/image/fvhuyezs7/)
The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr Toad
(https://postimg.cc/image/lftvp925j/)
The Sowrd in the Stone
(https://postimg.cc/image/poylrh2uv/)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
(https://postimg.cc/image/pc77lbuvr/)
The Fox & the Hound
(https://postimg.cc/image/hi6m0dxhz/)
The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr Toad
(https://postimg.cc/image/lftvp925j/)
The Sowrd in the Stone
(https://postimg.cc/image/poylrh2uv/)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
(https://postimg.cc/image/pc77lbuvr/)
Very nice, James. I love them all! :love:
Will you also create some covers for the following treasures of the "Dream Collection"?
The Fox & the Hound
(https://postimg.cc/image/hi6m0dxhz/)
The Adventures of Ichabod & Mr Toad
(https://postimg.cc/image/lftvp925j/)
The Sowrd in the Stone
(https://postimg.cc/image/poylrh2uv/)
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
(https://postimg.cc/image/pc77lbuvr/)
Great work!
You may want to fix the scoring credit for "Fox and the Hound", however. It wasn’t the work of Oliver Wallace, that’s for certain…
Will you also create some covers for the following treasures of the "Dream Collection"?
I can if wanted, i kept my template.
———- Post added at 05:11 PM ———- Previous post was at 05:11 PM ———-
Great work!
You may want to fix the scoring credit for "Fox and the Hound", however. It wasn’t the work of Oliver Wallace, that’s for certain…
Ah damn! Lol, will do
https://s31.postimg.cc/fvhuyezs7/Disney_Fox_the_Hound_Pigmask_Col_s_Dream_Collectio n_copy.jpg (https://postimg.cc/image/fvhuyezs7/)
So, where is The Dream Collection? Well, I’ll give you all the skinny:
Three weeks ago, my PC (an ancient Windows Vista, mind you) went kaput. It began crashing on bootup for seemingly no reason, and I spent days trying to find the root of the problem before giving up altogether. I’ve been in need of a newer, better computer for ages, but my limited funds simply won’t allow it… So, I knew I had to make due with what I had and fix the confounded thing.
Come a few days ago, I finally fixed the crashing problem — but, wouldn’t you believe it, my audio drivers apparently decided to quit on me as well. Of course, without sound, I can’t work on anything Dream Collection-related (or any of my other personal music projects, for that matter!); so, as of now, I’m sorry to say that the project is dead in the water until I can manage to fix my PC’s sound issues.
As such, Bambi is currently on hold… Well, actually, I hate to say it, but Bambi may be on hold indefinitiely. You see, I’ve been deliberating with myself on how I want to handle The Dream Collection in the future, and I’ve decided that, what with my limited time and resources, certain planned Dream Collection projects may end up getting the boot. If I had the time to cover every classic Disney film score under the sun and give it top-notch, deluxe treatment, I would… But, with certain films like Bambi that already have very substantial official releases, I’m afraid I may have to prioritize 100% unreleased scores over those which already have mostly-complete commercial releases — this is especially true in the case of Bambi, since the only real improvement I can make on the official release is the addition of one or two unreleased cues (and they were excluded from the official release for a reason, as the only existing remnants of those missing cues come from the SFX-ridden "music & effects track"), or perhaps an artificial stereo-to-mono conversion, for those who are interested in such a thing… In short, it just seems like a lot of redundant work for something that could be directed towards those more elusive scores which likely won’t recieve an official release any time soon.
However, all is not lost, for I have a compromise in mind; I’m considering producing a special "compilation" Dream Collection set which includes various unreleased material from a wide array of films which already have proper releases, such as Leigh Harline’s unreleased cues for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Edward Plumb’s lost cues on Bambi, the omitted stuff from Pinocchio, etc. I’m not entirely sure how I want to structure it just yet, but I think it could be a great way to cover the unreleased material for a lot of scores that already have largely complete releases, keeping the focus on 100% unreleased things. That way, everyone’s happy!
I don’t have a complete list of titles which I’m going to "downgrade" from the full Dream Collection treatment, but I can say that this will most likely happen to all three of the films mentioned above (Snow White, Bambi, and Pinocchio).
Thank you all for your patience! I don’t know how soon I’ll be able to start working on The Dream Collection again, nor which title I’ll pursue (most likely The Jungle Book, but I’m still waiting to see if Disney’s planning on covering it in their official Dream Collection — I suspect it’s coming soon, since George Bruns has recieved such great treatment from them lately and the current official release is pretty abysmal), but I promise that this project won’t die any time soon.
Also i can understand the reasoning behind stuff like bambi ect.
Still hopefully this is not the last we will hear from you on this sorta stuff.
There is still stuff that would be of interest (make mine music, saludos amigos ect)
But time is a huge factor, either way these collections have become a real treasured and frequent listen in my huge disney collection.
Lots of the tracks are on my favs playlist. So thank you!
Unfortunately, the musical numbers didn’t fare quite as well; the stereo masters for "Trust in Me" and "My Own Home" are the only two that have been preserved here. The rest are strictly mono (and lossy), so tunes such as "Bare Necessities" or "I Wanna Be Like You" are still presented in a single-channel format. However, I can guarantee that — aside from one fanfare — the Bruns score is presented here in true stereo.
Due to the high quality I’ve been able to achieve with this set, lossless FLAC downloads will also be available once "Jungle Book" is ready for release! I’ll try to continue providing this option for any future sets, so long as they’re from a lossless source.
I imagine Hunchback will get the deluxe treatment in Disney’s own Legacy Collection pretty soon. I’m less confident in Hercules, but you never know… Generally, I think most of the 90s feature animation scores will see full release at some point, given that they have wider appeal and sell easily.
Rob
It would be great if more could be flac.
thanks
dR
Thanks!