The Bells of Notre Dame" is a song from the 1996 Disney film, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, composed by Alan Menken and Stephen Schwartz. It is sung at the beginning of the film by the clown-like gypsy, Clopin.
The song details about Quasimodo's origin and is the film's opening credits. During the song, Clopin tells young children about the mysterious bell-ringer of Notre Dame. He then talks about a story that goes back twenty years where a group of gypsies attempted to ferry their way into Paris, but a trap had been laid and they are captured by Judge Claude Frollo and several soldiers. When Quasimodo's mother amongst gypsies is seen carrying a bundle, a guard attempts to confiscate it, prompting her to flee.
Frollo pursues her on his horse, believing her to have stolen goods, in a brutal chase that comes to a head on the steps of Notre Dame cathedral. Here, Frollo takes the bundle out of her hands but, in doing so, strikes a blow to her head with his boot, causing her to fall down onto the stone steps, breaking her neck and killing her. Frollo then learns that the bundle is actually a deformed baby. He sees a well and attempts to drown the baby, as he believes it is a demon from Hell, but is stopped by the Archdeacon, who tells Frollo that he has killed an innocent woman and that, if he wishes for the survival of his immortal soul, he must raise the child as his own. Frollo reluctantly does so and raises the baby in the bell tower of Notre Dame and gives him a cruel name; Quasimodo, which, according to Clopin, means "half-formed". It is quickly learned that Quasimodo is the mysterious bell-ringer.
It is a grand, atmospheric way to open one of Disney's darker and more dramatic animated films.
Lyrics
Clopin: Morning in Paris, the city awakes
To the bells of Notre Dame
The fisherman fishes, the bakerman bakes
To the bells of Notre Dame
To the big bells as loud as the thunder
To the little bells soft as a psalm
And some say the soul of the city's
The toll of the bells
The bells of Notre Dame
(song stops; speaking segment begins)
Listen, they're beautiful, no?
So many colors of sound, so many changing moods
Because you know, they don't ring all by themselves
Clopin puppet: They don't?
Clopin: No, silly boy.
Up there, high, high in the dark bell tower
lives the mysterious bell ringer.
Who is this creature?
Clopin puppet: Who?
Clopin: What is he?
Clopin puppet: What?
Clopin: How did he come to be there?
Clopin puppet: How?
Clopin: Hush... (bonks puppet on the head)
Clopin puppet: Ow!
Clopin: and Clopin will tell you.
It is a tale, a tale of a man and a monster.
(song resumes. scene changes to flashback)
Clopin: Dark was the night when our tale was begun
On the docks near Notre Dame
Man #1: Shup it up, will you!
Man #2: We'll be spotted!
Quasimodo's mother: Hush, little one.
Clopin: Four frightened gypsies slid silently under
The docks near Notre Dame
Man #3: Four guilders for safe passage into Paris
Clopin: But a trap had been laid for the gypsies
And they gazed up in fear and alarm
At a figure whose clutches
Were iron as much as the bells
Quasimoldo's father: Judge Claude Frollo.
Clopin: The bells of Notre Dame
Chorus: Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy)
Clopin: Judge Claude Frollo longed
To purge the world
Of vice and sin
Chorus: Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy)
Clopin: And he saw corruption
Everywhere
Except within
Frollo: (speaking) Bring these gypsy vermin to the palace of justice.
Guard: You there, what are you hiding?
Frollo: Stolen goods, no doubt. Take them from her
Clopin: (speaking) She ran.
Chorus: Dies irae, dies illa (Day of wrath, that day)
Solvet saeclum in favilla (Shall consume the world in ashes)
Teste David cum sibylla (As prophesied by David and the sibyl)
Quantus tremor est futurus (What trembling is to be)
Quando Judex est venturus (When the Judge is come)
Quasimodo's mother: Sanctuary, please give us sanctuary!
Frollo: A baby? A monster!
Archdeacon: Stop!
Clopin: Cried the Archdeacon
Frollo: This is an unholy demon.
I'm sending it back to Hell, where it belongs.
Archdeacon: (singing) See there the innocent blood you have spilt
On the steps of Notre Dame
Frollo: (speaking) I am guiltless; she ran, I pursued.
Archdeacon: Now you would add this child's blood to your guilt
On the steps of Notre Dame?
Frollo: (speaking) My conscience is clear
Archdeacon: You can lie to yourself and your minions
You can claim that you haven't a qualm
But you never can run from
Nor hide what you've done from the eyes
The very eyes of Notre Dame
Chorus: Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy)
Clopin: And for one time in his life
Of power and control
Chorus: Kyrie Eleison (Lord have mercy)
Clopin: Frollo felt a twinge of fear
For his immortal soul
Frollo: What must I do?
Archdeacon: (speaking) Care for the child, and raise it as your own
Frollo: What? I'm to be settled with this misshapen...?
Very well. Let him live with you, in your church.
Archdeacon: Live here? Where?
Frollo: Anywhere
(singing) Just so he's kept locked away
Where no one else can see
(speaking) The bell tower, perhaps
And who knows, our Lord works in mysterious ways
(singing resumes) Even this foul creature may
Yet prove one day to be
Of use to me
(scene changes to puppet show)
Clopin: And Frollo gave the child a cruel name
A name that means half-formed, Quasimodo
Now here is a riddle to guess if you can
Sing the bells of Notre Dame
Who is the monster and who is the man?
Clopin and Chorus: Sing the bells, bells, bells, bells
Bells, bells, bells, bells
Bells of Notre Dame!
Lyrics to Finale/reprise
Clopin: So here is a riddle to guess if you can
Sing the bells of Notre Dame
What makes a monster and what makes a man?
Chorus: Sing the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells,...
Clopin: Whatever their pitch,
You can feel them bewitch you
The rich and the ritual knells
Of the bells of Notre Dame
