March 02, 2007
Gratuitous Cartoon Musickal Posting (TM)
Happy birthday, Bedřich Smetana! Born this day in 1824 in Litomyšl, Bohemia. I'm generally not much of a 19th Centuryist, but I've always enjoyed Smetana's music.
So have you, if you're a fan of the classic Roadrunner cartoons. The theme music of the early ones was based on the "Dance of the Comedians" from Smetana's opera The Bartered Bride.
Here's an example, in which I'm sure you'll recognize the themes:
Ah, this takes me back! When I was a kid, the Roadrunner was my absolute, all time favorite cartoon. And looking back over them now, I'm still impressed with the artistry - not just the nifty animation and use of appropriate music, but the shear genius of Chuck Jones' comic timing.
The earliest Roadrunner cartoons are the best. The first one (this one) came out in 1949. Jones kept making them until 1963, but gradually the animation got more two-dimensional and wooden and the music less subtle. Bob McKimson directed about a dozen more in the mid 60's, but they were rotten. And of course, none of the Warner Bros. cartoons involving Bugs, Daffy, the Roadrunner or any of the old gang made since then can come close to matching those made during the Golden Age.
UPDATE: Ah, YouTube! Here's Victor Borge taking on the original. Enjoy!
Posted by Robert at March 2, 2007 10:37 AM | TrackBackBetween the two, I far and away prefer to work of Bob Clampett to that of Chuck Jones. Chuck was pretty notorious for claiming the work of others as his own.
Posted by: Mike at March 2, 2007 11:13 AMI think Fritz Freleng got involved with WB at some point in the Sixties and made some Roadrunner cartoons that were both unwatchable and musically unlistenable. Anything post-Chuck Jones is basically the desecration of a great, great humor tradition.
I will always cherish the Acme Indestructible Steel Sphere.
Posted by: utron at March 2, 2007 02:36 PMMy dad and I watched Roadrunner together when I was a kid. Sometimes we'd both be laughing through tears, those things were so funny.
Cartoon music in general is very under appreciated. Some of it is absolutely, positively, brilliant.
If you want to hear the most sophisticated example of humor in music of all time, get Mozart's "Ein Musakalisher Spass" sometimes called "A Musical Joke" in English. If you are a fan of classical music and know what the sonata process is all about, it will just slay you. It even ends in two different and distant keys simultaneously. It's amazingly funny.
Posted by: Hucbald at March 3, 2007 10:13 AMHucbald - I know the piece well. And also knowing some of Leopold Mozart's more unfortunate offerings, I firmly believe that the joke was as much a dig at the Old Man as anybody else.
Posted by: Robbo the LB at March 3, 2007 10:55 AM
Image courtesy of the lovely and talented 