INTERVIEW WITH THE SOUNDTRACK and LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S SYMPHONY # 6 (“PASTORAL”) — Part One

After the intermission, there is a jam session of jazz music led by a clarinetist in the orchestra, followed immediately by the brief Meet the Soundtrack sequence which gives audiences a stylized example of how sound is rendered as visual waveforms to record the music for Fantasia. The sequence features animation by effects animator Joshua Meador (1911-1965) and his team, who give the soundtrack (initially a squiggly line which changes into various shapes based on the individual sounds played on the soundtrack) a distinct personality.

The instruments are a harp, violin, flute, trumpet, bassoon, and percussion including the bass drum, snare drum, cymbals, and triangle.[1]

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S SYMPHONY # 6 (“PASTORAL”)

“Wow! This’ll make Beethoven!” exclaimed Walt Disney in an excess of zeal about his pictorial interpretation of the Pastoral Symphony, Beethoven’s Sixth. What I believe he meant by this remark might be more accurately expressed as “This’ll make Beethoven popular!”

Ludwig von Beethoven (1770-1827) wrote nine symphonies. After the first two, in which he demonstrated mastery of the classic symphonic form codified by his forebears such as Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) and particularly his mentor Josef Haydn (1732-1809), the great German master riffed on that form repeatedly in his remaining seven compositions of this kind. Such was his symphonic invention that he intimidated the musical establishment of his day – if not sometimes actually scandalizing it. His acknowledged Teutonic successor Johannes Brahms (1833-1897) was so in awe of Beethoven’s oeuvre that it was years into his career before he was emboldened enough to write the first of his four magnificent works in this form. By the end of Beethoven’s life, his compositions (especially his string quartets) were so far beyond the norms of his time that his contemporaries actually thought he had gone insane! Only decades later was the brilliance of “late Beethoven” understood and marveled at.

During his unhappy life (unrequited love, a mercenary nephew, encroaching deafness) Beethoven often turned to Nature for solace, enjoying long strolls through verdant landscapes. Always he kept a small notebook with him. In it he jotted down whatever musical ideas came to mind so that later at home he might remember and elaborate on them. His Sixth Symphony is subtitled “Recollections of Country Life”. It differs from all his others in two ways: first, it is not “absolute” music, but has “extra-musical” references described in a title for each movement; and second, instead of the traditional four movements, it has five. Some suggest that this Sixth Symphony was the progenitor of the Romantic Era in concert music. It was followed by such formally similar works as Hector Berlioz’s (1803-1869) Herold in Italy (1834) and Symphonie fantastique (1830),PyotrTchaikovsky’s Manfred Symphony (1885) and Richard Strauss’ (1864-1949) symphonically-structured tone poems.

Apparently though, the idea of portraying Greek mythology in this segment of Fantasia anteceded the choice of Beethoven’s music to accompany it. The prior choice was French composer Gabriel Pierné’s (1863-1937) Cydalise et le chèvre-pied. This two-act ballet concerned its title character’s infatuation with a satyr (chèvre-pied translates as “goat-foot”) and involves such mythological characters as nymphs, dryads and Pan, himself. Composed in 1923, its music would have been even more recent than Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, though not nearly so avant-garde. Walt was especially enthused about early designs and animation possibilities for the flying horse Pegasus, but not much for Pierné’s ballet. “The material is so damn good in here,” he said, but “This music is not so hot to me… We should find some music to fit the things we have in mind here – but good music.”[2] So for this segment of Fantasia, he already had the perfect cast but no show to star them in…

One of Fantasia’s story directors Dick Huemer (1898-1979) suggested actually hiring Pierné or Stravinsky to compose a piece specifically to fit the developing mythological theme. “Let’s do some exploring first,” Disney responded. About three months later, another storyman George Stallings (1891-1963) wrapped up those explorations with a sketchy continuity for the final three movements of Beethoven’s symphony and apparently that cinched it. Though Walt advised,

“There’s a certain refinement in the whole thing. We’ll go for the beautiful rather than the slapstick. But I feel we have a perfect liberty to be humorous. I feel it from the music. And when he inserts a cuckoo bird in the score you know he’s trying to be funny. It creates a whole new feeling, a whole new sympathy for this music.”[3]

The result of his observation is this Pastoral segment of Fantasia, vividly and fantastically colored, stylistically consistent and stunning, picture-perfect and imaginatively extra-ordinary. And yes, replete with humorous touches. Fortunately, Walt thought better of an initial idea – in anticipation of the segment’s centaurs – to have Deems Taylor introduce the Pastoral costumed as the front end of a two-man horse. Thankfully in this instance refinement trumped hilarity!

---

[1] www.disney.fandom.com/wiki/Fantasia

[2] Culhane, John: op. cit., p.135.

[3] From the audio commentary accompanying the 2000 DVD release of The Fantasia Anthology.