FANTASIA: the JOURNEY Back in Ye Olden Days, Before Video Devices Made Us Controllers of Our Content
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FANTASIA: THE JOURNEY Back in ye olden days, before video devices made us controllers of our content ― when “content” meant “happy” and “controller” had nothing to do with gaming ― we were not nearly as hapless and helpless as today’s young’uns think we were. We may not have been able to micro-manage our daily entertainment by the micro-moment, but we had wise men and women of exceptional taste who created and curated entertainment on our behalf. Walt Disney was such a creator/curator. He created, with the assistance of brilliant artists, completely original works that synthesized image and sound, establishing a canon of animated and live-action films that are as much a part of the psychic bookshelf of young minds as the works of the Brothers Grimm or Rudyard Kipling (each of whom he borrowed from unabashedly). And he curated his wares with a keen business sense, knowing which cities would be best for premieres, how often to re-release his films to whet the public appetite, and how and when to ignite the power of theme parks and new technologies to extend the Disney brand. It’s impossible to say objectively which is Disney’s “best” animated film, because there are so many to cherish, from his first major feature, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves (1938) to Frozen (2013). But without question, the most influential Disney film for those of us in the classical music field ― the one that helped set me on my professional path ― is Fantasia. No, I didn’t see it when it first premiered in 1940 in my home town of Los Angeles, but I did see it as a lad in short pants in the 1970s during one of its regular re-releases. With its mixture of avant- garde and slapstick, the film charmed common folk and critics at its debut and entranced this gawky kid thirty-something years later. In an era before MTV or VH1 or You Tube, the idea that you could be immersed in a wonderful world of color and characters and symphonic music was transporting. Fantasia has been edited and enhanced for various editions, but I clearly remember my first viewing. Deems Taylor, the esteemed classical music critic and commentator, came up on the screen to introduce the program. (I thought he was Walt Disney; I was wrong.) Then the great conductor Leopold Stokowsky ascended an immense podium. (I thought he was God; wrong again, but closer.) Then the giant shadows and blast of instruments brought Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor to life. The shock of that opening sequence never wears off, especially when I realize now how bold such aesthetics were at the time: in 1940 the public had barely accepted cubism and abstract expressionism in the fine arts, and here Hollywood, with its obsessive focus on the populist bottom line, embraced it fully. (And this was 15 years before The 5,000 Fingers of Doctor T, my second favorite psychedelic film!) Tonight we hear a mash-up of selections from the original Fantasia, as well as the sequel produced sixty years later, Fantasia 2000. Deems Taylor and Leopold Stokowski have been replaced with a cavalcade of contemporary comics, and we begin not with my beloved Bach Toccata but with the mighty Fifth Symphony of Beethoven, envisioned in a series of thunderous shapes and colors, in homage to the original Bach overture. From there our parade of masterpieces unfolds: a mythic tableau of centaurs, cupids, and fauns gamboling to Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6 (“Pastoral”) followed by delicate figurines moving in colorful formation to the lush melodies of Tchaikovsky’s “Nutcracker Suite.” Debussy’s Clair de lune, with its lone egret soaring in the moonlight, was cut from the original Fantasia but has since been restored. Ponchielli’s Dance of the Hours, with hippos in tutus, is pure cotton candy, but the dark cartoon that follows, Dukas’ The Sorcerer's Apprentice, reminds us that not all fables have a happy ending: our beloved Mickey Mouse reaches too far in his pursuit of magic powers and ends up awash (quite literally) in a nightmarish comeuppance. We end the evening in grand style, with majestic selections from Sir Edward Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance, starring Donald Duck as an unlikely ship’s mate to Noah, of Ark fame. A conductor often becomes immersed in the score to the point of distraction, especially when leading an ensemble as great as the National Symphony Orchestra, and even more so when the breeze of a summer evening swirls around the Filene Center. But for me few musical experiences are as distracting ― perhaps transporting is the better word ― as Fantasia. With its twists and turns from merry to scary, from high art to buffoonery, from magic to majestic, it is not just a synthesis of music and film. It is a journey. Won’t you join me? Emil de Cou .