page_title: Part of Your World
section_title: Cover versions and use in media
hierarchical_section_title: Part of Your World / Cover versions and use in media
caption_attribution_description: View Large or Original. Carly Rae Jepsen at Canada Place, 2010 Canada Day Celebration View On Black
context_page_description: "Part of Your World" is a song written by lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken for Disney's animated feature film The Little Mermaid. Performed by American actress and singer Jodi Benson in the titular role as Ariel, a mermaid princess, "Part of Your World" is a power ballad in which the main character expresses her strong desire to become human; its lyrics use placeholder names in lieu of several human-related terms that would be unfamiliar to a mermaid. The film's theme song, "Part of Your World" is reprised by Ariel after she rescues Eric, a human prince with whom she has fallen in love, from drowning.
  Directly influenced by Broadway and musical theatre, Ashman strongly believed that The Little Mermaid would benefit from an "I Want" song – a musical number during which the main character sings about what they hope to accomplish by the end of their story. Directors Ron Clements and John Musker originally asked Ashman to write a song for Ariel in which she expresses her romantic feelings for Prince Eric, but the lyricist felt that a song that details the character's fascination with the human world would better serve the film's plot.
context_section_description: "Part of Your World" continues to be covered extensively by various recording artists and musicians, leading some critics to name it one of the most covered Disney songs in recent memory. According to the music database SecondHandSongs, "Part of Your World" is the 10th most covered song released in 1989, with over 45 recognized versions. Although Benson has never been overprotective of the song, she admitted "some of the covers were not necessarily what I think Howard would have liked", particularly "dance versions" of the ballad. In 1996, singer Faith Hill recorded a cover of "Part of Your World" for the country music compilation album The Best of Country Sing the Best of Disney. Chely Wright contributed a rendition to the film's sequel, The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea (2000). Wright also performed "Part of Your World" live at the sequel's Hollywood premiere. Jessica Simpson covered the ballad for the compilation album Disneymania in 2002, one of three The Little Mermaid songs on the album. "Part of Your World" is used as a minigame in the video game Kingdom Hearts II (2005), in which players help Sebastian prepare for a musical showcase. Players are required to achieve five "Excellent" combos while playing "Part of Your World" before advancing to the next level. Miley Cyrus recorded a pop rock version of the song for the compilation album Disneymania 5 (2007), which MTV retrospectively ranked the seventh best track on the album in 2015, criticizing its fast tempo but crowning Cyrus "the Princess Ariel of the OG Disney Channel squad." In 2007, actor Darren Criss uploaded a video of himself performing "Part of Your World" to YouTube. Actress Anna Maria Perez de Tagle recorded a "high energized dance remix" of the song for the compilation album Disneymania 7 (2010), interpreting how Ariel "would sound today". Jack Johnson of E! described Perez de Tagle's cover as "fit for a princess". In 2012, Bruno Mars performed "Part of Your World" at BBC's Live Lounge. Mars introduced the ballad as "the best song ever written", claiming that he has always struggled to sing it without crying. Lyrically, Mars changed Ariel's amount of thingamabobs owned from 20 to 30. Video footage of Mars' performance became very popular on the Internet, which Sally Mercedes of Latina opined "made us love him even more". German opera singer Diana Damrau covered "Part of Your World" in her native language ("Ein Mensch zu sein") for her album Forever (2013). Writing for Opera News, Judith Malafronte dismissed Damrau's rendition as one of the album's "near-misses", accusing her of sounding too "syrupy" and "brassy" on the track. However, Gramophone's Adrian Edwards enjoyed Jason Carr's arrangement.
  In 2013, Carly Rae Jepsen covered "Part of Your World" for The Little Mermaid's Diamond Edition re-release, accompanied by a music video. Buyers of the DVD were issued a download code to obtain the cover free, which was also included on the album The Little Mermaid Greatest Hits (2013). The singer credits "Part of the World" with reintroducing her to her musical theatre background, which she incorporated into her cover. Studying Benson's version for inspiration, Jepsen was initially intimidated by the idea of covering "Part of Your World" before deciding to simply "have fun" and "do it in my own way." Jepsen borrows Ariel's monologue from the original version for her own introduction. The singer portrays a "real life" version of Ariel in the music video, for which she volunteered to dye her hair red. Jepsen also wears a mechanically operated mermaid tail in the video, which she found difficult to both put on and remove. Jepsen's cover has been met with mixed reviews from music critics. Praising both the singer's interpretation and music video, Benson preferred Jepson's rendition over some previous covers because she felt that it focused "on telling the story", which she believes Ashman also would have appreciated. Jezebel contributor Kate Dries hailed the cover as a "perfect alignment of recording artist and song". Canada.com's Jon Dekel described Jeps
caption: Canadian singer-songwriter Carly Rae Jepsen covered "Part of Your World" for The Little Mermaid's Diamond Edition re-release.
exif: {"Image Make": "NIKON CORPORATION", "Image Model": "NIKON D300", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "300", "Image YResolution": "300", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.8.16", "Image DateTime": "2017:10:24 02:34:51", "Image Artist": "Brendan Lally", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image Copyright": "Brendan Lally", "Image ExifOffset": "342", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "1030", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1142", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5265", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1250", "EXIF FNumber": "16/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Aperture Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "400", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0210", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2010:07:01 14:59:58", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2010:07:01 14:59:58", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "Y", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "3", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Cloudy weather", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire", "EXIF FocalLength": "200", "EXIF SubSecTime": "159", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "0", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "0", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1804", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "3031", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1000", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CVAPattern": "[0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 1, 2]", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Manual", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "300", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF GainControl": "Low gain up", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "0"}