One of my favorite professors at the University of Western Ontario when I took a year of advanced undergrad and one grad economics classes there in 1971-72 was John Palmer.
John posted a graphic today showing that a large percent of Americans got their exposure to classical music from cartoons. That’s true of me too.
Here’s what I wrote in Chapter 8, “The Joy of Capitalism” in my book The Joy of Freedom: An Economist’s Odyssey:
How I Got Culture
A stereotype that many intellectuals hold strongly is that television and radio are the enemies of culture. Yet, popular television and radio shows gave me my earliest experience of classical music. I, like most other Americans over age 45, first heard Rossini’s “William Tell Overture” as the theme song to the radio program, and later the television show, “The Lone Ranger.” When my brother Paul and I used to hear it on the radio, we would gallop around the house, hitting our own backsides with our hands to spur on our imaginary horses, which is one reason I will never forget the “William Tell Overture.” Of course, it wasn’t until I was in college that I bought the record and heard the whole overture, but I never would have been interested in it had it not been for the radio and TV programs.
Similarly, my interest in Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” was first piqued by a Bugs Bunny cartoon in which Bugs, to the tune of Rossini’s opera, sings:
Let me cut your mop,
Let me save your crop,
Ooooh, you’re next.
Yoouur’e so next.
Update:
Phil Magness points out that the following Elmer Fudd cartoon, “Kill the Rabbit,” has Wagner’s music.
READER COMMENTS
Jon Murphy
Nov 23 2018 at 7:10pm
Oh man, yes. I grew up watching WB cartoons like Animaniacs and Pinky and the Brain. Not only did they use classical and folk music, but put (relatively) educational lyrics to them. Eg: Pinky and the Brain’s Meticulous Analysis of History, or Animaniac’s State Capitals or Presidents.
David
Nov 24 2018 at 12:25pm
“Kill the Wabbit” appears in the short, “What’s Opera, Doc?”
Thaomas
Nov 24 2018 at 1:05pm
Fantasia used Night on Bald Mountain.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLCuL-K39eQ
Jeff Hummel
Nov 24 2018 at 3:24pm
“Night on Bald Mountain” was one of my favorites as a child. But of course it wasn’t the only animated classical music from Fantasia that Disney would regularly air on TV.
David, did you mean to include the link to John Palmer’s graphic?
David Henderson
Nov 24 2018 at 9:34pm
Thanks.
I went to his link but it didn’t seem easily doable.
Alan Goldhammer
Nov 24 2018 at 4:53pm
For a great many of us Disney’s Fantasia (1940) was the first exposure to classical music. I was particularly fond of ‘The Sorcerer’s Apprentice’ segment. I don’t know whether the Warner Brothers cartoons pre-date the Disney movie or not.
Richard A.
Nov 25 2018 at 8:39pm
Disney’s Fantasia also had a scene animated to Debussy’s Clair De Lune which was unfortunately deleted from the movie. Here it is on You Tube.
Before Leopold Stokowski starred in the 1940 cartoon Fantasia, he was in the 1937 live movie, “100 Men and a Girl”, where he played himself. Here is an edited clip from the movie on You Tube.
MattB
Nov 26 2018 at 2:51pm
and don’t forget TV commercials either. I can’t hear Beethoven’s Fur Elise without singing the hamburger song from that McDonald’s ad to myself. Also my first exposure to Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin was from a United Airlines commercial.
Richard A.
Nov 26 2018 at 11:40pm
A while back, British Airways used The Flower Song from Delibes’ opera Lakme.
Another popular piece from Delibes’ Lakme is The Bell Song which found its way in a 1935 movie and sung by Lily Pons.
James A. McClure
Nov 26 2018 at 3:00pm
I’m enjoying Mozart’s Queen of the Night aria on the current Volvo commercial.
David Henderson
Nov 27 2018 at 12:00am
So many wonderful examples above. Thanks, commenters.
Tom Chambers
Nov 27 2018 at 11:22am
My father often surprised me with the variety of things he knew something about. Fifty-odd years ago, we were watching something on TV and there was a commercial for United Airlines. It ended with a swell of music and Dad exclaimed: “That’s Tristan und Isolde!”
At next opportunity I checked out the recording of Tristan und Isolde from the public library and we played through it from the beginning. Of course the airline music was from the Liebestod, the last 5 minutes of a 4-hour-long opera. And that was my introduction to Wagner.
All his children got some characteristics from Dad, but that particular one did not transfer widely . I bought him an LP that included the Liebestod (sans soprano) and he must have played it to the family a hundred times as dinner background music. Three years ago on a long vacation drive with one of my brothers, I turned on the car radio and there was Tristan, and I deliberately left it on through the Liebestod. I wanted to see if my brother recognized it. He didn’t. I wish I could blame the soprano.
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