Favorite Use of a Song in a Golden Era Movie

[LizzieMaine]

An acquaintance of mine refers to the 1920s and '30s music that I love as "cartoon" or "Little Rascals" music.

When I was a kid I used to tape cartoons and comedy shorts off the air just for the music. The Leroy Shield stuff for Hal Roach was a lot more subtle than you might think when you separate it from the visuals -- some of the arrangements are astonishingly intricate. The Warner/Carl Stalling stuff was great, of course, but I was also fond of the stuff Darrell Calker did for Walter Lantz in the mid-40s -- some of the best swing recorded in that period backed up Woody Woodpecker. And I also loved the "Ant and Aardvark" cartoons done by DePatie-Freleng in the early 70s -- they had really fine Dixieland/trad jazz scores performed by some pretty fair musicians. You listen to them and you think of the stuff Adrian Rollini and Red Nichols were doing in the twenties and thirties.

But the finest music I ever heard on television was the stuff Johnny Costa did on "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood." Costa was a legitimate jazzman who worked the show live-on-the-set with a small combo, and some of the improvisations they did were just beautiful -- I'd put Costa up against Jess Stacy or Teddy Wilson, he was that good. {Art Tatum went so far as to call him "the white Art Tatum," which is a pretty high recommendation.) I always especially looked forward to the closing theme music, because they never used stock recordings: every single program, Costa and the group performed a new version of "The Tomorrow Song" or "It's Such A Good Feeling" under the credits, and at no time did they compromise it with rinky-dinky kiddie stuff -- they were playing some of the best straight-up jazz ever performed on television, and they did it for an audience of five-year-olds. Visualize Mr. Rogers strolling thru the Neighborhood to these sounds, and you realize that not only was he one of the greatest Americans of the 20th Century but also one of the flat-out coolest.

 

[3fingers]

When I was a kid I used to tape cartoons and comedy shorts off the air just for the music. The Leroy Shield stuff for Hal Roach was a lot more subtle than you might think when you separate it from the visuals -- some of the arrangements are astonishingly intricate. The Warner/Carl Stalling stuff was great, of course, but I was also fond of the stuff Darrell Calker did for Walter Lantz in the mid-40s -- some of the best swing recorded in that period backed up Woody Woodpecker. And I also loved the "Ant and Aardvark" cartoons done by DePatie-Freleng in the early 70s -- they had really fine Dixieland/trad jazz scores performed by some pretty fair musicians. You listen to them and you think of the stuff Adrian Rollini and Red Nichols were doing in the twenties and thirties.

But the finest music I ever heard on television was the stuff Johnny Costa did on "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood." Costa was a legitimate jazzman who worked the show live-on-the-set with a small combo, and some of the improvisations they did were just beautiful -- I'd put Costa up against Jess Stacy or Teddy Wilson, he was that good. {Art Tatum went so far as to call him "the white Art Tatum," which is a pretty high recommendation.) I always especially looked forward to the closing theme music, because they never used stock recordings: every single program, Costa and the group performed a new version of "The Tomorrow Song" or "It's Such A Good Feeling" under the credits, and at no time did they compromise it with rinky-dinky kiddie stuff -- they were playing some of the best straight-up jazz ever performed on television, and they did it for an audience of five-year-olds. Visualize Mr. Rogers strolling thru the Neighborhood to these sounds, and you realize that not only was he one of the greatest Americans of the 20th Century but also one of the flat-out coolest.

 

[EmergencyIan]

These two short gems, from "Rio Bravo." Dean and Ricky (along with Walter Brennan) are so good in this. These songs get stuck in my head every time I see this.

- Ian

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

When I was a kid I used to tape cartoons and comedy shorts off the air just for the music. The Leroy Shield stuff for Hal Roach was a lot more subtle than you might think when you separate it from the visuals -- some of the arrangements are astonishingly intricate. The Warner/Carl Stalling stuff was great, of course, but I was also fond of the stuff Darrell Calker did for Walter Lantz in the mid-40s -- some of the best swing recorded in that period backed up Woody Woodpecker. And I also loved the "Ant and Aardvark" cartoons done by DePatie-Freleng in the early 70s -- they had really fine Dixieland/trad jazz scores performed by some pretty fair musicians. You listen to them and you think of the stuff Adrian Rollini and Red Nichols were doing in the twenties and thirties.

But the finest music I ever heard on television was the stuff Johnny Costa did on "Mister Rogers' Neighborhood." Costa was a legitimate jazzman who worked the show live-on-the-set with a small combo, and some of the improvisations they did were just beautiful -- I'd put Costa up against Jess Stacy or Teddy Wilson, he was that good. {Art Tatum went so far as to call him "the white Art Tatum," which is a pretty high recommendation.) I always especially looked forward to the closing theme music, because they never used stock recordings: every single program, Costa and the group performed a new version of "The Tomorrow Song" or "It's Such A Good Feeling" under the credits, and at no time did they compromise it with rinky-dinky kiddie stuff -- they were playing some of the best straight-up jazz ever performed on television, and they did it for an audience of five-year-olds. Visualize Mr. Rogers strolling thru the Neighborhood to these sounds, and you realize that not only was he one of the greatest Americans of the 20th Century but also one of the flat-out coolest.

 

[EmergencyIan]

^ Very nice, indeed!

- Ian

 

[Worf]

"Ald Lang Syne" - In the film "The Burmese Harp" Japanese and British forces sing this song to one another. First the Japanese sing their version then the British chime in. The Japanese, surrounded and doomed surrender only to find out the war had ended a few days before the encounter. That one instance of shared humanity... saved their lives and some of the lives of those about to attack them.

Worf