How Does a Moment Last Forever marks the first collaboration between Menken and Rice in over two decades; the last time they worked together had been in the "Beauty and the Beast" musical. Menken believes that the songs he and Rice had written for the musical would not have translated well to the screen due to the structural differences between the two formats. One of at least nine significant changes made to the film specifically for the remake, "How Does a Moment Last Forever" was conceived to explain Belle's backstory. Her quest to find out her mother's fate serves, in the plot, as a foundation for
How Does a Moment Last Forever up being so different from everybody else in a town where nobody understands her, and how did the Beast become the person who earned that curse? That's the stuff we started to fill in", he said. "How Does a Moment Last Forever" is a ballad and its lyrics deals with the theme of nostalgia. According to Menken, it’s about hanging on to precious moments. In "Beauty and the Beast", it is performed twice, first by Maurice when he reminisces about his deceased wife and later by Belle after she discovers her mother's fate. Dion was contacted to record a pop