Alan Irwin Menken (born July 22, 1949) is an American composer, best known for his scores and songs for films produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios. His scores and songs for The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), Aladdin (1992), and Pocahontas (1995) have each won him two Academy Awards. He also composed the scores and songs for Little Shop of Horrors (1986), Newsies (1992), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), Hercules (1997), Home on the Range (2004), Enchanted (2007), Tangled (2010), and Disenchanted (2022), among others. His accolades include eight Academy Awards, becoming the second most prolific Oscar winner in the music categories after Alfred Newman (who has 9 Oscars), a Tony Award, eleven Grammy Awards, seven Golden Globe Awards, and a Daytime Emmy Award. Menken is one of seventeen people to have won an Oscar, an Emmy, a Grammy, and a Tony ("an EGOT"). He is one of two people to have won a Razzie, an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, and a Tony ("REGOT").He is also known for his work in musical theater for Broadway and elsewhere. Some of these works are based on his Disney films, but other stage hits include Little Shop of Horrors (1982), A Christmas Carol (1994), and Sister Act (2009).
Menken has collaborated with lyricists such as Lynn Ahrens, Howard Ashman, Jack Feldman, Tim Rice, Glenn Slater, Stephen Schwartz, and David Zippel.
