Abigail Barlow, Emily Bear and Opetaia Foa’i on writing Moana 2’s songs

Abigail Barlow has never had to fight off a supernatural creature but she still understands what it’s like to walk in Moana’s shoes.

“We are also young women just trying to find our place in the world,” she told The Nightly. “When we booked the job, we weren’t fighting lava monsters, but everybody has their version of a lava monster so we could just really relate to her struggle and her evolution in this story.”

Barlow and her songwriting partner, Emily Bear, might relate to Moana better than many. The women, at 26 and 23 years old, are not much older than Moana’s 19 years and while they’re not trying to break a curse to reunite the peoples of the Pacific Ocean, they have taken on a gargantuan challenge.

The pair are the main songwriters on Moana 2, which would be an enormous opportunity by normal standards but even more intimidating when you’re replacing music impresario Lin-Manuel Miranda, who was Oscar-nominated for his work on “How Far I’ll Go”, the signature song from the first movie.

They were starstruck when they met Miranda, who gave Barlow and Bear his blessing.

“He was really wonderful and supportive, especially when we were setting sail on this journey,” Barlow recalled. “He also threw books at me, told me what to study, take a look at musical theatre culture and just the craft of songwriting for theatre. That was really integral to the writing process for me.”

Bear added, “He also urged us to lean into what inspires us and who our heroes were because he’s so influenced by his heroes.” Like Miranda, Bear also lists Stephen Sondheim among hers, even if, she admitted, you won’t hear that in the arrangements, alongside Alan Menken, Leonard Bernstein, Howard Ashman and Steven Schwartz.

It’s a heavyweight list of composers and lyricists, and maybe not what you expect from songwriters who broke out in the popular imagination on TikTok. There’s a story here about Barlow and Bear’s journey from social media stardom to the hallowed halls of Disney, but it’s only half the tale.

In 2021, the two women become TikTok sensations with their Unofficial Bridgerton Musical, an album of songs developed on the platform which Broadway-fied the popular Netflix Regency-era romance.

The album, which you can stream through more traditional platforms as well, is packed with songs that are brimming with infectious energy and the effusive earnestness of Broadway, but with a tongue-in-cheek spirit. It took them six weeks to do the whole thing, and they won the Grammy for musical theatre album.

It wasn’t how they got started through. Bear is a musical prodigy, having performed professionally since she was six-years-old. As a child, she’s played the piano at Carnegie Hall and the Hollywood Bowl and by the time she was eight, she had composed more than 350 songs. Last year, she was Beyonce’s touring pianist.

Barlow has worked primarily in pop including her song “Heartbreak Hotel”, which peaked at number two on iTunes, and has worked with Meghan Trainor. Barlow also had a much longer history on TikTok, stretching back to when the app was called Musical.ly.

Bear said that even though both of them have extensive histories in the industry, there’s no doubt TikTok fame sped up the process to them becoming the youngest composing team and the first all-female one to work on a Disney animated film.

“(As a woman), it’s harder to get your foot in the door and have people put faith in you, so I think the TikTok outlet was so powerful and served us in a way that nothing else could because we didn’t need permission from some dude saying, ‘OK, fine, we will trust you this once’.

“But we showed them that we know what we’re doing, we love what we’re doing and people like it, so it’s an invaluable thing.”

Barlow and Bear might have the combination of classical and pop, but writing for Moana 2 was a team effort that also included composers Mark Mancina and Opetaia Foa’i, both whom had worked with Miranda on the first film.

Barlow said from the moment they started on Moana 2, they were given a huge binder of research, what she called “the Moana bible”. Bear added that speaking to the Oceanic Cultural Trust, the group of consultants drawn from across Pacific Peoples, informed the song “Get Lost”.

“It was something they said, which is getting lost is the pathway to finding magic, which we thought was so cool, so beautiful and so poetic,” she added.

The Samoan-born Foa’i was tapped to return to Moana’s world in February this year and he said it was pretty miraculous it all came together with only nine months. Foa’i worked with Barlow and Bear over zoom, but primarily with music supervisor Matt Walker, to inject specific elements into the songs to ensure their cultural authenticity.

“My work is very much on the emotional level,” Foa’i told The Nightly. “They would give me a storyline and the music and I would find whatever is appropriate, emotionally, from the Pacific side. Of course, I’m very biased because chants and percussion is really where come from and with where the Pacific sits, I try to insert as much of that as possible.”

Given the difference style of Barlow and Bear’s work compared to Miranda’s, Foa’i said some songs were easier than others in terms of finding a way in.

“The aim of the music team was to make this more Broadway so they could be performed on Broadway, so there were a few more Broadway-type songs in it, and I can appreciate that. My work was to try and work my way around it, so that the authenticity of the Pacific could be put in there somehow. I think we managed it.”

When it comes to favourites, Foa’i said his was “Mana Vavua”, an emotional song that is sung by himself, Dwayne Johnson and Rachel House, and which comes on in a pivotal moment.

“I knew Dwayne was very proud of his Samoan side but he’s never spoken the language in public, so you could say I forced his hand by writing that piece, and I guided him via zoom through it, and he did a great job.”

In the decade since Foa’i worked on the first film, he has at times been overwhelmed by the response to the music, especially from young people. “We didn’t know where it was going to go, how popular it would be, but it has affected the younger generation in a positive way,” he said.

In time, Foa’i argued that the songs from number two could prove to be just as popular.

Which could set up a very interesting showdown at next year’s Oscars where Moana 2 will surely compete in the best original song category against Disney’s other big movie to be released before the end of this year, Mufasa: The Lion King. Miranda is writing the songs for that one.

At the suggestion of a face-off, Bear said, “Hopefully we’ll see you there”. With a laugh, Barlow went further and laid down the gauntlet, “Bring it on!”.

Moana 2 is in cinemas now