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High School Musical and the songs
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High School Musical Songs Amazon.com album cover
High School Musical is, as we know, the source of any number of hit songs and they themselves are the destination of who knows how much money from the pocketbooks of our teens. However, worrying about the commercialisation of such teenage dreams is really rather beside the point. Take a decent plot with a goodly amount of dramatic tension, add some catchy tunes and you've got what Disney is rather good at, a huge commercial hit which carries on unto even the fourth generation.
The plot which was used for the original High School Musical is essentially Romeo and Juliet: no, that plot wasn't entirely original to Shakespeare either and it's been used many a time since. West Side Story for example, although to be fair that had rather better songs than High School Musical.
The warring gangs here, replacing the Montagues and the Capulets (or the Greasers and the Puerto Ricans) are the high school jocks and the geeks. The modern twist is that the geek is female and the jock male. They try out for the high school musical, get the lead parts and then spend the rest of the show pointing out how you do not have to conform to the status quo. Indeed, one of the hit songs from High School Musical is "Stick to the Status Quo" which is of course what everyone doesn't.
A full list of the songs from High School Musical is:
| 1. | "Start of Something New" | Zac Efron, (Drew Seeley**), Vanessa Hudgens | 3:17 |
| 2. | "Get'cha Head in the Game" | Efron, (Seeley**) | 2:26 |
| 3. | "What I've Been Looking For" | Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel | 2:04 |
| 4. | "What I've Been Looking For (Reprise)" | Efron, (Seeley**), Hudgens | 1:20 |
| 5. | "Stick to the Status Quo" | High School Musical Cast | 4:28 |
| 6. | "When There Was Me and You" | Hudgens | 3:00 |
| 7. | "Bop to the Top" | Tisdale, Grabeel | 1:47 |
| 8. | "Breaking Free" | Efron, (Seeley**), Hudgens | 3:27 |
| 9. | "We're All in This Together" | High School Musical Cast | 3:51 |
| 10. | "I Can't Take My Eyes Off of You" | Efron, (Seeley**), Hudgens, Tisdale, Grabeel | 2:51 |
| 11. | "Get'cha Head in the Game" | B5 | 2:43 |
| 12. | "Start of Something New" | (Instrumental*) | 3:16 |
| 13. | "Breaking Free" | (Instrumental*) | 3:27 |
High School Musical 2 songs. Amazon.com album cover
High School Musical 2 goes on to major on the songs rather than the plot. One synopsis of the plot is that the Zzach Efron character worries about getting a job where he can earn for college expenses and still stay together with the geek love interest played by Vanessa Hudgens. Ho hum, no one said that you had to mine Shakespeare for every Disney movie plot.
Hish School Musical 2, like the original, was shown on Disney's TV channel in its first outing and has been repeated innumerable times since. However, the runaway success of the first two led to something that's not happened at Disney before, the release of a movie theatre version as a sequel. More normally, Disney operates on the idea that you get a hit movie then release subsequent versions, adapatations and series as TV shows. High School Musical, plus the success the songs were having on the radio and Billboard, meant that this reversed in this instance.
The actual songs in High School Musical 2 were as follows:
| # | Title | Performer(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "What Time Is It?" | High School Musical 2 cast | 3:19 |
| 2. | "Fabulous" | Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel | 3:02 |
| 3. | "Work This Out" | High School Musical 2 cast | 3:03 |
| 4. | "You Are the Music in Me" | Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens | 3:28 |
| 5. | "I Don't Dance" | Corbin Bleu, Grabeel | 3:37 |
| 6. | "You Are the Music in Me (Sharpay version)" | Tisdale, Efron | 2:29 |
| 7. | "Gotta Go My Own Way" | Hudgens, Efron | 3:42 |
| 8. | "Bet on It" | Efron | 3:20 |
| 9. | "Everyday" | Efron, Hudgens | 4:37 |
| 10. | "All for One" | High School Musical 2 cast | 4:13 |
| 11. | "Humuhumunukunukuapua'a" | Tisdale, Grabeel | 3:09 |
High School Musical 3 Songs Amazon.com album cover
High School Musical 3, as above, was released first into movie theatres. There is by now no pretence of really trying too hard to have a plot. It's senior year, soon they'll all be leaving high school, so the plot is about how wonderful it is to be together in high school and how they hope it would never end.
This is in direct (and somewhat amusing) contrast to all other American movies about the teenage years in which it is always the summer immediately after high school and before college which is eulogised as being the summer that should never end.
The songs in High School Musical 3 are however of the usual high Disney standard. No one is ever quite going to rock down to them nor are they likely to start a gang fight and a claim for colors, but they're perfectly professional pastiches of a variety of styles sung by the usual toothsome cast.
The actual list of songs in High School Musical 3 is as follows:
| # | Title | Recording artist(s) | Length |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Now or Never" | High School Musical 3: Senior Year cast | 4:33 |
| 2. | "Right Here, Right Now" | Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens | 3:58 |
| 3. | "I Want It All" | Ashley Tisdale, Lucas Grabeel | 4:39 |
| 4. | "Can I Have This Dance" | Hudgens, Efron | 4:04 |
| 5. | "A Night to Remember" | High School Musical 3: Senior Year cast | 3:58 |
| 6. | "Just Wanna Be with You" | Grabeel, Olesya Rulin, Hudgens, Efron | 2:38 |
| 7. | "The Boys Are Back" | Corbin Bleu, Efron | 3:47 |
| 8. | "Walk Away" | Hudgens | 3:50 |
| 9. | "Scream" | Efron | 3:56 |
| 10. | "Senior Year Spring Musical" | High School Musical 3: Senior Year cast | 7:45 |
| 11. | "We're All in This Together (Graduation Mix)" | High School Musical 3: Senior Year cast | 4:17 |
| 12. | "High School Musical" | High School Musical 3: Senior Year cast | 3:53 |
There is in the works a movie called High School Musical 4 which will be out next year, in 2010. It will no doubt be roughly the same cast with roughly the same love interests and a new set of songs for the gorgeous little muppets to sing. It will also undoubtedly be a hit. Lucky us.
As a final note, here is one selection of the top ten High School Musical songs (so far). The top High School Musical song, you won't be surprised to hear, is a song called "High School Musical".
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