"Into the Unknown" is a song recorded by American actress and singer-songwriter Idina Menzel and Norwegian singer-songwriter Aurora from the 2019 Disney film Frozen 2, with music and lyrics composed by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez. The song received Academy Award, Critics' Choice Movie Award, Golden Globe Award and Satellite Award nominations for Best Original Song.

Production Anderson-Lopez and Lopez, who wrote the songs for the 2013 animated film Frozen, reprised their roles for the sequel Frozen II. They also helped develop the story alongside Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, and Marc E. Smith. Once a foundation for the story emerged, Anderson-Lopez and Lopez marked out points where songs would be used to move the story forward. The pair needed a song for a major moment for Elsa. Initially, the pair wrote a song called "I Seek the Truth" for the moment. At this point, the concept of Elsa hearing and following a mysterious voice had not been conceived yet. When this plot point was developed, the pair went back to the scene and wrote "Into the Unknown".

Menzel first sang the song in her dressing room backstage at an off-Broadway play, with Anderson-Lopez and Lopez bringing in a keyboard to provide the music.

Context

The song is Elsa's "flagship number", and prominently features a siren call that serves as the film's musical motif that Christophe Beck weaves throughout the film score. The call is derived from the Latin sequence Dies irae, but is delivered in a manner inspired by the Scandinavian music form kulning.

Within the narrative of the film, the song details Elsa's inner conflict over deciding whether or not to leave Arendelle and track down the source of a mysterious voice she keeps hearing.

International versions On its theater release, the movie numbered 48 dubbings worldwide, to which an Indonesian and Malay version was added the following year, with the song Into the Unknown counting 47 versions overall: Charlotte Hervieux's recording of the song was used in both French versions released in Europe and Canada, although the rest of the dubbings were independent. Among the dubbings released, a version in Tamil, Telugu and Northern Sami was recorded for the sequel, even though the first movie has never been dubbed into these languages. As it happened in Moana with a Tahitian, Māori, and Hawaiian version, the Sami version was an exceptional dubbing made specifically for the movie, given the inspiration it took from Sami culture.

As was done for Frozen, Dutch musical actress Willemijn Verkaik sang both for the Dutch and German-language version, while Spanish singer Gisela performed both the Catalan and European Spanish version.

On December 13, a multi-language video of the song featuring 29 of the 47 existing versions was published on Disney's Vevo channel. On February 9, 2020, Menzel and Aurora performed the song during the 92nd Academy Awards together with nine of the song's international singers singing in nine different languages: Maria Lucia Heiberg Rosenberg in Danish, Willemijn Verkaik in German, Takako Matsu in Japanese, Gisela in European Spanish, Carmen Sarahí in Latin American Spanish, Lisa Stokke in Norwegian, Kasia Łaska in Polish, in Russian and Gam Wichayanee in Thai. "Into the Unknown" worldwide Language Performer Title Translation Arabic نسمة محجوب (Nesma Mahgoub) "في طريق مجهول" ("Fi tariq majhul") "On an unknown path" Modern Standard Arabic نسمة محجوب (Nesma Mahgoub)"داخل المجهول‎" ("Dakhil almajhuli")"Inside the unknown" Bulgarian Надежда Панайотова (Nadezhda Panayotova) "Към незнаен свят" ("Kŭm neznaen svyat") "To an unknown world" Cantonese 王嘉儀 (Sophy Wong)"Into the unknown" Catalan Gisela "Un lloc secret" "A secret place" Croatian "U tajnovit svijet" "To a mysterious world" Czech Monika Absolonová "Do neznáma dál" "To the unknown beyond" Danish Maria Lucia Heiberg Rosenberg "Ud i ukendt land" "Out on terra incognita" Dutch Willemijn Verkaik "Een onbekend oord" "An unknown place" English Idina Menzel"Into the unknown" Estonian "Tundmatuse teel" "On the road to the unknown" Finnish "Tuntemattomaan" "Into the unknown" Flemish Elke Buyle "Als ik je nu volg" "If I follow you now" French "Dans un autre monde" "Into another world" German Willemijn Verkaik "Wo noch niemand war" "Where no one’s ever been" Greek "Στ' άγνωστο να 'ρθω" ("St' áynosto na 'rtho") "To come into the unknown" Hebrew מונה מור (Mona Mor) "אל עבר הסוד" ("El ever hasod") "Towards the secret" Hindi सुनिधि चौहान (Sunidhi Chauhan) "अनजान जहाँ" ("Anjaan jahaan") "Unknown world" Hungarian "Messze hívó szó" "Far beckoning word" Icelandic Ágústa Eva Erlendsdóttir "Inn á nýja braut" "On a new path" Indonesian Mikha Sherly Marpaung"Ke tempat yang tak dikenal""To an unknown place" Italian Serena Autieri "Nell'ignoto" "Into the unknown" Japanese 松たか子 (Takako Matsu) ""("Intū ji announ ~ Kokoro no mama ni") "Into the unknown ~ As my heart desires" Kazakh Гүлсім Мырзабекова (Gúlsim Myrzabekova) "Белгісіздікке" ("Belgisizdikke") "Into the unknown" Korean "숨겨진 세상" ("Sumgyeojin sesang") "A hidden world" Latvian Jolanta Strikaite "Nezināmajā" "Into the unknown" Lithuanian "Ten kur nežinia" "Where there is uncertainty" MalayMafarikha Akhir"Ke alam baru""To a new world" Mandarin Chinese (China) "寻找真相" ("Xún zhǎo zhēn xiāng") "Looking for the truth" Mandarin Chinese (Taiwan) 蔡永淳 (Tsai Yung-Chun) "向未知探索" ("Xiàng wèizhī tànsuǒ") "Exploring the unknown" Norwegian Lisa Stokke "I ukjent land" "Into Unknown Lands" Polish Kasia Łaska "Chcę uwierzyć snom" "I want to believe in dreams" Portuguese (Brazil) "Minha intuição" "My intuition" Portuguese (Europe) Ana Margarida Encarnação "Muito mais além" "So farther away" Romanian Dalma Kovács "În necunoscut" "Into the unknown" Russian Анна Бутурлина (Anna Buturlina) "Вновь за горизонт" ("Vnov za gorizont") "Beyond the horizon again" Sámi Marianne Pentha "Amas mu vuordá" "The unknown is waiting for me" Serbian Јелена Гавриловић (Jelena Gavrilović) "Мени незнано" ("Meni neznano") "Unknown to me" Slovak Andrea Somorovská "Do neznáma ísť" "Go into the unknown" Slovene "Nekam daleč stran" "Somewhere far away" Spanish (Europe) Gisela "Mucho más allá" "So farther away" Spanish (Latin America) Carmen Sarahí Swedish Annika Herlitz "In i en ny värld" "Into a new world" Tamil சுருதி ஹாசன் (Shruti Haasan) "இழுக்கும் மாயோள்" ("Izhukkum maayoll") "Enchanting Squall" Telugu రమ్య బెహరా (Ramya Behara) "నీ మాయవల్లో" ("Nee maaya val lo")"Your magic trap" Thai วิชญาณี เปียกลิ่น (Wichayanee Pearklin) "ดินแดนที่ไม่รู้" ("Dindaen Thi Mai Ru") "The unknown land" Turkish Begüm Günceler "Meçhule doğru" "Into the unknown" Ukrainian Шаніс (Shanis) "У незнане знов" ("U neznane znov") "Again into the unknown" Vietnamese Tiêu Châu Như Quỳnh "Nơi hư vô lạc lối" "The lost world filled with nothingness"

Reception

Critical reception The song was presented to the public as the "Let It Go" of Frozen II. Slate argues that the song was "engineered to deliver the same euphoria of internal struggle followed by cathartic release." The Daily Telegraph suggested that it had the same catchy qualities as its predecessor but that time would tell if younger fans of the film would accept it as a hit.

Accolades Award Category Result Academy Awards Best Original Song Critics' Choice Awards Best Song Georgia Film Critics Association Best Original Song Golden Globe Awards Best Original Song Grammy Awards Best Song Written for Visual Media Hollywood Critics Association Best Original Song Houston Film Critics Society Best Original Song Hollywood Music in Media Awards Best Original Song Satellite Awards Best Original Song

Personnel Credits adapted from Tidal.

Earl Ghaffari – editing David Boucher – mixing, recording engineer Andrew Page – music production Tom Hardisty – recording Kevin Harp – recording engineer Dave Metzger – recording arranger Joey Raia – recording engineer Gabe Guy – assistant recording engineer Nathan Eaton – assistant recording engineer Zach Hancock – assistant recording engineer Paul McGrath – assistant recording engineer Jack Mills – assistant recording engineer Juan Peña – assistant recording engineer John Prestage – assistant recording engineer Adam Schoeller – assistant recording engineer Morgan Stratton – assistant recording engineer

Charts Chart (2019–2020) Peakposition Australia Digital Tracks (ARIA) 32 Malaysia (RIM) 7 New Zealand Hot Singles (RMNZ) 4 Singapore (RIAS) 5 South Korea (Gaon) 2 US Kid Digital Songs Sales (Billboard) 1 US Rolling Stone Top 100 22

Certifications

Panic! at the Disco version

Most dubbings played the English version, performed by American solo project Panic! at the Disco, over the end credits. However, the song numbers 12 more versions in other languages. The Japanese and Korean versions opted for two female vocalists, while the version used for the Mandarin version made for China was sung by an ensemble. The Hindi, Tamil and Telugu versions were all performed by Indian singer Nakul Abhyankar, who also dubbed Kristoff in Tamil and Telugu, and sang Weezer's version of "Lost in the Woods" into all three languages. + "Into the Unknown" (end credits version) worldwideLanguagePerformerTitleTranslationEnglishPanic! at the Disco"Into the unknown"GermanMark Forster"Wo noch niemand war""Where no one’s ever been"Hindiनकुल अभ्यङ्कर (Nakul Abhyankar)"अनजान जहाँ" ("Anjaan jahaan")"Unknown world"ItalianGiuliano Sangiorgi"Nell'ignoto""Into the unknown"Japanese""("Intū ji announ ~ Kokoro no mama ni")"Into the unknown ~ As my heart desires"KazakhДәурен Оразбеков (Dauren Orazbekov)"Белгісіздікке" ("Belgisizdikke")"Into the unknown"Korean태연 (Taeyeon)"숨겨진 세상" ("Sumgyeojin sesang")"A hidden world"Mandarin Chinese (China)Super Vocal"未知的真相" ("Wèizhī de zhēnxiàng")"The unknown truth"Portuguese (Europe) Fernando Daniel"Muito mais além""So farther away"RussianРоман Архипов (Roman Arkhipov)"Вновь за горизонт" ("Vnov za gorizont")"Beyond the horizon again"SpanishDavid Bisbal"Mucho más allá""So farther away"Tamilनकुल अभ्यङ्कर (Nakul Abhyankar)"இழுக்கும் மாயோள்" ("Izhukkum maayol")"Deceiving enchantress"Telugu"నీ మాయవల్లో" ("Nee maaya val lo")"Your magic trap"

Personnel Credits adapted from Tidal.

Claudis Mittendorfer – mixing Rachel White – recording arranger Suzy Shinn – recording engineer Steve Genewick – assistant recording engineer

Charts Chart (2019–2020) Peakposition Australia Digital Tracks (ARIA) 36 Canada (Hot Canadian Digital Songs) 33 Ireland (IRMA) 88 Israel (Media Forest) 21 New Zealand Hot Singles (RMNZ) 8 Singapore (RIAS) 25 South Korea (Gaon) 118 US Kid Digital Songs Sales (Billboard) 1 US Pop Digital Songs (Billboard) 13 US Rolling Stone Top 100 87

Certifications

References