Farmyard Symphony

Last updated
Farmyard Symphony
Farmyard Symphony (film.jpg
Directed by Jack Cutting
Story by Erdman Penner
Vernon Stallings
Produced by Walt Disney
StarringMelvin J. Gibby
Beatrice Hagen
Dorothy Lloyd
Lee Millar
Victor Rodman
Lee Sweetland
Max Terhune
Billy Bletcher
Florence Gill
Clarence Nash
Music by Leigh Harline
Layouts byArthur Heinemann
David Hilberman
Color processTechnicolor
Production
company
Distributed by RKO Radio Pictures
Release date
  • October 14, 1938 (1938-10-14)
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Farmyard Symphony is a 1938 Silly Symphonies animated short film. [1] It can be seen as a precursor to Fantasia due to using various pieces of classical music in one short. The film was directed by Jack Cutting and produced by Walt Disney. [2]

Contents

An adaptation of the short was featured in the Silly Symphony comic strip over six weeks, from October 23 to November 27, 1938, around the time of the film's theatrical release. While the short doesn't have much of a story, the comic adaptation expands on a running gag involving a piglet looking for food, giving one of the piglets distinctive markings and a name (Spotty), and turns the gag into a short narrative. [3] Spotty Pig also appeared in a nine-page story in the Silly Symphonies comic book issue #2 (1953). [4]

Plot

Set to various classical pieces, the animals of a farmyard go about their daily business. The highlight is a rooster wooing a white hen, with the other animals joining in until they hear a sound more welcoming to them: the call of feeding time.

Pieces included

In order of appearance, the film includes the following pieces and arias:

In addition to the above pieces, the film features a few excerpts adapted by Leigh Harline from traditional tunes (such as the one to which "Chick, chick, chick, chick..." is sung by the peasant woman), as well as original orchestral passages of his, which have no classical source.

Voice cast

Home media

The short was released on December 4, 2001, on Walt Disney Treasures: Silly Symphonies - The Historic Musical Animated Classics , [5] as an Easter egg in the "Accent on Music" section. [2] Prior to that, the featurette also appeared on the Walt Disney Cartoon Classics Limited Gold Edition: Silly Symphonies VHS in the 1980s. It is also a bonus on the Make Mine Music DVD.

Related Research Articles

<i>The Wise Little Hen</i> 1934 Silly Symphony cartoon

The Wise Little Hen is a 1934 Walt Disney's Silly Symphony cartoon, based on the fable The Little Red Hen. The cartoon features the debut of Donald Duck, dancing to "The Sailor's Hornpipe". Donald and his friend Peter Pig try to avoid work by faking stomach aches until Mrs. Hen teaches them the value of labor.

<i>Babes in the Woods</i> 1932 animated short film directed by Burt Gillett

Babes in the Woods is a 1932 Silly Symphonies animated film.

<i>The Practical Pig</i> 1939 American film

The Practical Pig is a Silly Symphony cartoon. It was released on February 24, 1939, and directed by Dick Rickard. It was the fourth and final cartoon starring The Three Pigs. Like its predecessors, The Practical Pig incorporates the song "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?". Unlike its predecessors however, its title cards labeled it as a standalone Three Little Pigs cartoon, suggesting that they were to get their own series of cartoons. It is also the second-to-last Silly Symphony cartoon.

Elmer Elephant is a Silly Symphony cartoon short produced by The Walt Disney Company, directed by Wilfred Jackson and released on March 28, 1936.

<i>The Ugly Duckling</i> (1939 film) 1939 American film

The Ugly Duckling is an animated short film by Walt Disney, based on the 1843 fairy tale "The Ugly Duckling" by Hans Christian Andersen. The film was directed by Jack Cutting and Clyde Geronimi, and released in theaters on April 7, 1939. Music was composed by Albert Hay Malotte, who was uncredited for the film. The animated short was first distributed by RKO Radio Pictures, and was shown with Love Affair.

<i>The Big Bad Wolf</i> (1934 film) 1934 film

The Big Bad Wolf is an animated short released on April 13, 1934, by United Artists, produced by Walt Disney and directed by Burt Gillett as part of the Silly Symphony series. Acting partly as a sequel to the wildly successful adaptation of The Three Little Pigs of the previous year, this film also acts as an adaptation of the fairy-tale Little Red Riding Hood, with the Big Bad Wolf from 1933's Three Little Pigs acting as the adversary to Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother.

<i>The Tortoise and the Hare</i> (film) 1935 film

The Tortoise and the Hare is an American animated short film part of the Silly Symphony series, released on January 5, 1935, by United Artists, produced by Walt Disney and directed by Wilfred Jackson. Based on an Aesop's fable of the same name, it won the 1934 Oscar for Best Short Subject: Cartoons. This cartoon is also believed to be one of the inspirations for Bugs Bunny by Warner Bros., who first appeared in 1940.

<i>Three Orphan Kittens</i> 1935 American film

Three Orphan Kittens is a 1935 animated short film in the Silly Symphonies series produced by Walt Disney Productions. It was the winner of the 1935 Oscar for Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoons). It was followed in 1936 by a sequel, More Kittens.

The Ugly Duckling is an animated black-and-white cartoon released by Walt Disney in 1931 as part of the Silly Symphonies series. This cartoon was later remade into a color version released in 1939, which follows the original Andersen story much more faithfully. This gives The Ugly Duckling the unique distinction of being the only Silly Symphony to be made twice. This film was then sold to reach about 4,000 dollars per month at the most profit, because it slowly climbed up the scale of growth.

The Grasshopper and the Ants is a 1934 American animated short film produced by Walt Disney Productions and released by United Artists. Part of the Silly Symphonies series, the film is an adaptation of The Ant and the Grasshopper, one of Aesop's Fables. It was directed by Wilfred Jackson and stars Pinto Colvig as the voice of the grasshopper Hop.

Mother Pluto is a Silly Symphonies cartoon released on November 14, 1936, directed by Wilfred Jackson. The cartoon features Pluto.

<i>The Robber Kitten</i> 1935 film

The Robber Kitten is a 1935 Walt Disney Silly Symphonies cartoon, directed by David Hand.

Birds of a Feather is a Silly Symphonies animated Disney short film. It was released on February 10, 1931, by Columbia Pictures.

<i>Bugs in Love</i> 1932 film

Bugs in Love is a Silly Symphonies animated Disney short film. It was released in 1932, and was the final Symphony to be shot with black-and-white film.

<i>Birds in the Spring</i> 1933 film

Birds in the Spring is a Silly Symphonies animated Disney short film. It was released in 1933.

Peculiar Penguins is a Silly Symphonies animated Disney short film. It was released in 1934. The song played during the cartoon is called "The Penguin Is a Very Funny Creature", by Leigh Harline.

<i>Woodland Café</i> 1937 American film

Woodland Café is a Silly Symphonies animated Disney short film. It was filmed in Technicolor and released by United Artists in 1937 and was re-issued by RKO Radio Pictures in 1948. While it contained no on-screen credits, Wilfred Jackson was the director and Leigh Harline was the musical director.

<i>Chicken in the Rough</i> (film) 1951 American film

Chicken in the Rough is a 1951 animated short starring Chip 'n' Dale. It is Chip 'n' Dale's first solo cartoon together, and the footage is reused from the Silly Symphony short, Farmyard Symphony (1938). In the short film, Chip 'n' Dale wander into a farmyard to collect acorns. Dale mistakes an egg for a nut, but when he tries to demonstrate to a newly hatched chick how to get back into the egg, a rooster mistakes him for one of his chicks, much to Chip's amusement.

<i>Silly Symphonies: The Complete Disney Classics</i>

Silly Symphonies: The Complete Disney Classics is a book series which reprints Walt Disney's Silly Symphony Sunday comic strip, drawn by several different Disney artists from 1932 to 1945. The strip was published by King Features Syndicate. The strip often introduced new Disney characters to the public, including its first comic character, Bucky Bug. The series was published by The Library of American Comics from 2016 to 2019.

Silly Symphony is a weekly Disney comic strip that debuted on January 10, 1932, as a topper for the Mickey Mouse strip's Sunday page. The strip featured adaptations of Walt Disney's popular short film series, Silly Symphony, which released 75 cartoons from 1929 to 1939, as well as other cartoons and animated films. The comic strip outlived its parent series by six years, ending on October 7, 1945.

References

  1. ↑ Mullaney, Dean, ed. (2016). Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies Volume 1: The Complete Disney Classics. San Diego, CA: IDW Publishing. p. 192. ISBN   9781631408045.
  2. 1 2 3 Merritt, Russell; Kaufman, J. B. (2016). Walt Disney's Silly Symphonies: A Companion to the Classic Cartoon Series (2nd ed.). Glendale, CA: Disney Editions. pp. 204–205. ISBN   978-1-4847-5132-9.
  3. ↑ Taliaferro, Al; Osborne, Ted; De Maris, Merrill (2016). Silly Symphonies: The Complete Disney Classics, vol 2. San Diego: IDW Publishing. ISBN   978-1631408045.
  4. ↑ "Silly Symphonies #2". Inducks . Retrieved 27 July 2019.
  5. ↑ "Silly Symphonies: The Historic Musical Animated Classics DVD Review". DVD Dizzy. Retrieved 20 February 2021.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.