What do Scrooge McDuck and Amy Grant have in common?
Is Amy Grant Uncle Scrooge’s long-lost niece? Did Scrooge McDuck dethrone Grant as the “Queen of Christian Pop”? Find out below!
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This morning, I woke up with a song in my head. The theme to the 80s TV show The Hogan Family (originally called Valerie, starring Mary Tyler Moore Show star Valerie Harper until she left the show). It’s a good song, and the show wasn’t bad either for an 80s show.
Thinking of an 80s theme song reminded me of something I think is interesting, which is completely unrelated to The Hogan Family (as far as I can tell) but is related to TV show theme songs and hit music.
Mark Mueller — the guy who wrote the theme to cartoon DuckTales — also wrote the theme to cartoon Chip n Dale Rescue Rangers. DuckTales is still popular today, including a reboot and the classic “Woo - hoo” from the that’s instantly recognizable. Here are both theme songs below. Not too surprising so far…
But what’s more surprising is that Mark Mueller also wrote the music to the huge 90s hit “That’s What Love Is For” by Christian-country-crossover artist Amy Grant. I’m not Christian, but the song was a mainstream hit and doesn’t have religious themes in it. I do remember the song and am glad I rediscovered it.
So Scrooge McDuck and Amy Grant both had Mark Mueller to thank for the music that millions of people listed to and associated with them to this day.
It turns out Mueller is a hugely successful songwriter who’s written Top 10 hits and songs that have earned him gold and platinum records for each of the past four decades. And I had never heard of him.
I would have never guessed the music for “That’s What Love Is For” was written by the same composer as the DuckTales and Rescue Ranger themes (he also wrote the words for the two themes).
Here’s the Amy Grant song in case you haven’t heard it before or want to hear it again.
I found this out recently when I was trying to figure out who wrote DuckTales. That’s really versatile, to say the least! One of the best selling songwriters you’ve probably never heard of.
One thing the three songs have in common are great chord changes that grab your attention, but I don’t think you could guess it was the same composer just by that. Here’s more info from Mueller’s Wikipedia page. An impressive career, to say the least.
So the next time you think of Scrooge McDuck diving into his pool of gold, or find yourself humming of the DuckTales theme, you know that the guy who wrote it is actually a songwriter who’s had Top 10 hits over four decades. “Woo - hoo!”
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