Lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken intended for the songs in
Beauty and the Beast to serve as
plot devices and assist in the telling of its story. According to Menken, the film's songs grew out of the fact that the film was written to "almost ... exist as a stage musical." Stylistically, Ashman and Menken drew creative influence from several musical styles and genres, including
French,
classical and
Broadway music, using them as reference and inspiration when composing the film's songs. Menken also revealed that the film's songs and score tend to convey a wide variety of emotions, ranging from poignancy to humor and joy. While composing the orchestral score that accompanies the film's
prologue, Menken was inspired by the French
suite The Carnival of the Animals by
Camille Saint-Saëns, referring to it as his own version of Saint-Saëns' composition. "
Belle", the film's opening number, is an "orchestra-driven", Musically, Menken based "Belle" on the narrative style of a traditional
operetta, describing it as "something to portray
Belle in a world that is so protected and safe." Menken described the film's following musical number, "
Gaston", as a hilarious "drinking song sung by basically a group of
Neanderthal level guys in praise of a complete lug-head", referring to Ashman's choice of song lyrics as humorous and "
tongue in cheek". musical number "
Be Our Guest", Menken originally composed and provided Ashman with a simple melody that was initially intended for temporary use only, simply for the purpose of allowing his co-writer to start developing the song's lyrics. He labeled the rough composition "the dummy". However, Menken eventually gave up on his attempt to improve upon the song's simple melody, and it ultimately became the version to which Ashman wrote his lyrics. Originally, Ashman and Menken had written a rather lengthy, large-scale musical number for the film called "Human Again". However, when it was deemed "too ambitious", they swiftly wrote and replaced it with a smaller-scale musical number entitled "Something There". When "Beauty and the Beast" was written, it was composed with the potential of having "half a life outside the movie." Menken recruited musician Robbie Buchanan to arrange "Beauty and the Beast" into the form of a pop duet while
Walter Afanasieff was responsible for producing the track. Afanasieff also assisted Buchanan in the arranging of the song. Menken was ultimately pleased with Afanasieff's production, explaining, "Walter Afanasieff ... took it and really molded it into something very different than I ever intended and I grew to love it. In a way, Walter made it his own, and I love that." ==Reception==