The secret to the Frozen soundtrack’s success

“The success of Frozen’s soundtrack likely is frustrating music executives, as its sales have eclipsed every other 2014 release. It’s also outsold Beyoncé’s self-titled album, released in December, by more than 1 million copies. But the album’s sales indicate much more than the popularity of the movie, which premiered in November. It’s thanks to a winning combination of Broadway-caliber music and excellent marketing.” — Dustin Levy

Frozen couldn’t be hotter right now.

The soundtrack for the Disney smash hit just topped the Billboard 200 for an 11th nonconsecutive week, making Frozen one of only nine albums to spend at least 11 weeks at the No. 1 spot since the chart started using SoundScan’s point-of-sale data in 1991.

The holiday weekend gave the album its biggest push, selling 259,000 copies in the week ending on Easter. This marked the soundtrack’s fifth straight week selling more than 100,000 copies, bringing its total sales to 2.3 million.

The success of Frozen’s soundtrack likely is frustrating music executives, as its sales have eclipsed every other 2014 release. It’s also outsold Beyoncé’s self-titled album, released in December, by more than 1 million copies. But the album’s sales indicate much more than the popularity of the movie, which premiered in November. It’s thanks to a winning combination of Broadway-caliber music and excellent marketing.

Frozen’s achievements are not a mere upshot of the Disney princess genre. The soundtracks of Disney’s last two princess musicals, Tangled and The Princess and the Frog, peaked at 44 and 80 on the Billboard 200, respectively.

Oscar gold was another influence on the prolonged success of the Frozen soundtrack. Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez, who is the 12th person ever to win an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony, took home the award for Best Original Song for “Let it Go” at the 86th Academy Awards. “Let it Go,” performed by Broadway actress Idina Menzel, became the first win for a Walt Disney Animation Studios song since Phil Collins took home the prize in 2000 for Tarzan’s “You’ll Be in My Heart.”

Frozen’s recruitment of Broadway veterans certainly proved an important factor in the soundtrack’s Billboard success. Robert Lopez co-created Broadway hits Avenue Q and The Book of Mormon, taking home three Tony Awards in the process. Additionally, the voice cast of Frozen included Broadway stars such as Josh Gad, Jonathan Groff and Menzel, whose show-stopping vocals propelled “Let it Go” to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Frozen’s marketing was crucial to its musical success. Early teasers of the film focused on the film’s comic relief, the snowman Olaf, as well as the action and adventure side of the movie. According to Forbes, 43 percent of Frozen’s audience was male, proving the skewed marketing of a princess movie could bring in diverse audiences and expose more moviegoers to the film’s music.

The album’s impressive sales boost can also be attributed to Starbucks, which started stocking copies of the Frozen soundtrack April 15, with some stores starting a day or two sooner. The coffee chain, which holds 33 percent of the market share for U.S. coffee, primarily targets men and women between the ages of 25 and 40, according to the Houston Chronicle. This subset, responsible for almost 50 percent of Starbucks’ business, includes many parents who are likely to buy the album for young kids who have become addicted to everything Frozen.

But nothing has contributed more to Frozen’s musical triumph than the film itself. With an “A+” on CinemaScore, an 89 percent “fresh” rating on Rotten Tomatoes and the unseating of The Lion King as the highest grossing Disney-produced animated movie of all time, Frozen was so appealing on all fronts that it would take some really crummy music for album sales to disappoint.

And the age of the Internet and social media deserves credit as well. The official “Let it Go” video on YouTube has amassed almost 200 million views, and a Demi Lovato cover of the song has generated more than 138 million. With last year’s decision to update the Billboard Hot 100 to include U.S. YouTube data, Frozen fans have been able to influence the success of the film’s music without paying a cent.

Prior to hits such as Tangled and Wreck-it Ralph, Disney animation had struggled to replicate the high-quality content it produced in the ’90s. Frozen is a major victory for the studio because it has achieved so much beyond the box office.

The Disney smash, thanks in part to its catchy, whimsical music, has become a cultural phenomenon. So for anyone suffering from Frozen fatigue: Get used to it (or, more appropriately, let it go).