Melville A. "Mel" Leven was an American composer and lyricist, who had a long association with The Walt Disney Company, most notably writing the song "Cruella de Vil" from One Hundred and One Dalmatians and wrote the story to Babes in Toyland. He also wrote the Little Ranger Nature series for Disney in the 1960s.
Background[]
Born in Chicago, Illinois; Leven began writing songs at an early age, but took a break in 1941 to serve in the U.S. Air Corps. One of Leven's assignments was in Nome, Alaska, teaching Russian pilots from Siberia about the instruments on P39 fighter planes. After World War II, Leven settled in Los Angeles and returned to songwriting.
During the 1950s, he wrote songs for the small animations studio, United Productions of America (UPA), as well as films, such as The Lady Says No, The Girl Can't Help It ("Every Time"), Sing Boy Sing ("People in Love"), and the short Trees and Jamaica Daddy ("Trees" and "Jamaica Daddy"). His other songs, which included "Commoners Boogy", "Are My Ears on Straight?", and "Willy Claus", were recorded and written for artists, like Peggy Lee, The Andrews Sisters, Nat King Cole, Dean Martin, and Les Brown.
Taking notice of Leven's work, Walt Disney invited him to become part of his writing staff, Often collaborating with composer George Bruns. When writing "Cruella de Vil", he claimed to have been written in homage to Thelonious Monk's "Ba-Lue Bolivar Ba-Lues-Are" and it was composed a few minutes before a meeting with Disney on what music genres to use. That same year, he wrote the story and new lyrics to the operetta Babes in Toyland, which was nominated for an Academy Award and helped popularize the all-music picture. He later worked with producer Ward Kimball for the part animation, part documentary film It's Tough to Be a Bird, which won the 1969 Academy Award for Best Short Subject.
In later years, Leven wrote songs, stories, ukulele, and did voice-over work for the PBS children's series Big Blue Marble, as well as working on a number of projects for television commercials, such as the tune for Butternut/Weber's Bread and voices of the Folgers coffee bean, Creepy Crawlers"!, and Crackle from Kellogs® Rice Crispies. His work has won two Emmy Awards, two Peabody Awards, and Cannes Film Festival Awards.
Leven died on December 17, 2007.
Filmography[]
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