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Richard Sherman, the writer behind songs in classic Disney movies such as “Mary Poppins” and “The Jungle Book” died Saturday at the age of 95, the film and entertainment company said.
He died in Beverly Hills from an age-related illness, Disney said.
Sherman and his brother Robert, who died in 2012, worked as staff composers for Disney between 1960 and 1973, during which time they wrote more than 200 songs for 27 films and two dozen television productions.
Their work was that of another era, with Hollywood magazine Variety describing their roles as “a job that no longer exists: in-house songwriters for a studio.”
“Even when they weren’t working for the Mouse House, their songs carried a Disney sensibility — bouncy and positive, without any of the cynicism so prevalent in creative works (including music) in the late 1960s and 1970s,” the magazine said.
