Silly Symphony

***Silly Symphony*** (also known as _Silly Symphonies_) was a series of animated short films produced by Walt Disney Productions from 1929 to 1939.

## Disney studios

After the films changed to sound, Walt Disney began making Mickey Mouse and musical _Silly Symphony_ shorts. To keep costs down Disney produced his own music. Disney's first music director and composer was Carl Stalling. The Mickey Mouse shorts used pop music while the Silly Symphony cartoons used Classical music. In 1932 the studio produced its first cartoon in Technicolor, _Flowers and Trees_. The success of the song Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?, from the Silly Symphony short _Three Little Pigs_ (1933), convinced Disney to keep producing original music. It was at this time Disney introduced the characters of Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto and Minnie Mouse. Over its ten year run,  _Silly Symphonies_ had won Walt Disney the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film seven times, eventually tied with Bill Hanna and Joe Barbara's _Tom and Jerry's_ record for most awards for a cartoon series in the category. It spawned numerous imitators and competitors (like Warner Bros' _Merrie Melodies_ and _Looney Tunes)_.  United StatesFebruary 29, 1929 BrazilDecember 25, 1929 United KingdomJuly 21, 1930 UruguaySeptember 11, 1930 MexicoDecember 25, 1931 PortugalMarch 16, 1932 IrelandApril 3, 1932 GreeceApril 10, 1933 SwedenOctober 7, 1933- Argentinian in Chilean SpanishDecember 11, 1934

(***Silly Symphony***) IcelandFebruary 28, 1934 SpainMarch 23, 1935 ItalyApril 12, 1935 CanadaAugust 1, 1936 CzechoslovakiaDecember 17, 1936 Hong KongOctober 16, 1937 NorwayOctober 31, 1937 BulgariaDecember 25, 1938  SwitzerlandDecember 25, 1938 (German speaking region) Soviet UnionDecember 25, 1938 YugoslaviaJuly 31, 1938 FinlandNovember 4, 1938 PolandAugust 7, 1939 AustriaJanuary 12, 1939 DenmarkApril 2, 1939 West GermanyOctober 10, 1939 ThailandJune 13, 1939 BelgiumAugust 14, 1939 IndiaDecember 25, 1939 TurkeyAugust 15, 1939 JapanSeptember 23, 1939 South KoreaOctober 3, 1939 MaltaJuly 31, 1939 New ZealandJune 29, 1941 South AfricaJune 29, 1941 LebanonDecember 25, 1947 IranMarch 16, 1954 MoroccoMarch 16, 1954 EgyptMarch 26, 1954 IndonesiaJune 17, 1954 QatarJune 17, 1954 SingaporeJune 17, 1954 Sri LankaApril 26, 1965 KuwaitJune 4, 1966 IsraelNovember 8, 1971

## Franchise

The series also spawned a Disney media franchise which included the newspaper comic strip _Silly Symphony_, the Dell comic book series _Silly Symphonies_, as well as several children's books, many of which were based on _Silly Symphony_ cartoons.

## List of movies

|| Title|Release date|Director|Notes|||
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
|1|_The Skeleton Dance_|August 22, 1929|Walt Disney|Clips of this short have been featured in both Disney and non-Disney productions.||
|2|_El Terrible Toreador_|September 7, 1929|Walt Disney|||
|3|_Springtime_|October 24, 1929|Ub Iwerks|Seen in _One Hundred and One Dalmatians_||
|4|_Hell's Bells_|October 30, 1929|Ub Iwerks|Featuring Satan, the Grim Reaper, Cerberus, and various unnamed demons of Hell.||
|5|_The Merry Dwarfs_|December 16, 1929|Walt Disney|||
|6|_Summer_|January 6, 1930|Ub Iwerks|||
|7|_Autumn_|February 13, 1930|Ub Iwerks|||
|8|_Cannibal Capers_|March 13, 1930|Burt Gillett|||
|9|_Frolicking Fish_|May 8, 1930|Burt Gillett|Introduced continuous movements or ’overlapping action’ in animation, instead of the old stop-and-go movements.||
|10|_Arctic Antics_|June 5, 1930|Ub Iwerks|||
|11|_Midnight in a Toy Shop_|July 3, 1930|Wilfred Jackson|||
|12|_Night_|July 31, 1930|Walt Disney|||
|13|_Monkey Melodies_|August 10, 1930|Burt Gillett|||
|14|_Winter_|November 5, 1930|Burt Gillett|||
|15|_Playful Pan_|December 28, 1930|Burt Gillett|Featuring Pan||
|16|_Birds of a Feather_|February 10, 1931|Burt Gillett|||
|17|_Mother Goose Melodies_|April 17, 1931|Burt Gillett|Featuring among others Humpty Dumpty, Jack and Jill, Little Bo Peep, Little Boy Blue, Little Jack Horner,  Mother Goose, Old King Cole, and Simple Simon.||
|18|_The China Plate_|May 25, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|Retelling of the Willow pattern legend.||
|19|_The Busy Beavers_|June 22, 1931|Burt Gillett|||
|20|_The Cat's Out_|July 28, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|||
|21|_Egyptian Melodies_|August 21, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|||
|22|_The Clock Store_||Wilfred Jackson|||
|23|''The Spider and the Fly|October 16, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|||
|24|_The Fox Hunt_|November 18, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|Remade in 1938 as the _Donald & Goofy_ film _The Fox Hunt_||
|25|_The Ugly Duckling_|December 16, 1931|Wilfred Jackson|Based on a story by Hans Christian Andersen; remade in 1939||
|26|_The Bird Store_|January 16, 1932|Wilfred Jackson|||
|27|_The Bears and the Bees_|March 12, 1932|Wilfred Jackson|||
|28|_Just Dogs_|April 16, 1932|Burt Gillett|Featuring the first starring role of Pluto (Mickey Mouse does not appear)||
|29|_Flowers and Trees_|July 30, 1932|Burt Gillett|First cartoon produced in Technicolor; won the inaugural Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|30|_King Neptune_|September 17, 1932|Burton Gillett|Featuring Neptune as the "King of the Sea"||
|31|_Bugs in Love_|October 1, 1932|Burt Gillett|Last black-and-white _Silly Symphony_||
|32|_Babes in the Woods_|November 19, 1932|Burt Gillett|Featuring Hansel and Gretel||
|33|_Santa's Workshop_|December 3, 1932|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring Santa Claus||
|34|_Birds in the Spring_|March 11, 1933|David Hand|||
|35|_Father Noah's Ark_|April 8, 1933|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring Noah, Ham, Japheth, Shem and their respective wives, as well as a cavalcade of animals. The "building the ark" music is an adaptation of Beethoven's Contradanse in C Major, WoO 14 No. 1. The short itself would be referenced several times in the _Pomp and Circumstance_ segment of _Fantasia 2000_||
|36|_Three Little Pigs_|May 27, 1933|Burt Gillett|Featuring the namesake characters and the Big Bad Wolf; won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|37|_Old King Cole_|July 29, 1933|David Hand|Featuring the namesake character along with various nursery rhyme characters||
|38|_The Pied Piper_|September 16, 1933|Wilfred Jackson|Adaptation of The Pied Piper of Hamelin||
|39|_Lullaby Land_|November 11, 1933|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring the Sandman||
|40|_The Night Before Christmas_|December 2, 1933|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring Santa Claus||
|41|_The China Shop_|January 13, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|||
|42|_The Grasshopper and the Ants_|February 17, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|Based on a fable by Aesop||
|43|_Funny Little Bunnies_|March 10, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|||
|44|_The Big Bad Wolf_|April 14, 1934|Burt Gillett|Featuring the title character along with the Three Little Pigs and Little Red Riding Hood||
|45|_The Wise Little Hen_|May 19, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|Debut of Donald Duck||
|46|_The Flying Mouse_|July 14, 1934|David Hand|||
|47|_Peculiar Penguins_|October 20, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|||
|48|_The Goddess of Spring_|December 8, 1934|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring Persephone and a version of her uncle-husband Hades/Pluto, identified here with Satan. The Disney animators' first attempt to create visually realistic human characters.||
|49|_The Tortoise and the Hare_|January 19, 1935|Wilfred Jackson|Featuring Max Hare and Toby Tortoise; won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|50|_The Golden Touch_|February 16, 1935|Walt Disney|Featuring Midas and Goldie the elf||
|51|_The Robber Kitten_|April 13, 1935|David Hand|||
|52|_Water Babies_|May 11, 1935|Wilfred Jackson|||
|53|_The Cookie Carnival_|June 15, 1935|Ben Sharpsteen|A homage to the Atlantic City boardwalk parade and bathing beauty contest of the 1920s and 30s (which became the Miss America Pageant)||
|54|_Who Killed Cock Robin?_|July 6, 1935|David Hand|Includes caricatures of Mae West (Jenny Wren), Bing Crosby (Cock Robin), Harpo Marx (the cuckoo), and Steppin Fetchit (the blackbird); incorporated into Alfred Hitchcock's _Sabotage_.||
|55|_Music Land_|September 14, 1935|Wilfred Jackson|||
|56|_Three Orphan Kittens_|October 19, 1935|David Hand|Won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|57|_Cock 'o the Walk_|November 9, 1935|Ben Sharpsteen|||
|58|_Broken Toys_|December 14, 1935|Ben Sharpsteen|Some toys are caricatures of Hollywood stars.||
|59|_Elmer Elephant_|January 18, 1936|Wilfred Jackson|||
|60|_Three Little Wolves_|March 14, 1936|David Hand|Featuring the title characters along with their father the Big Bad Wolf and his rivals the Three Little Pigs||
|61|_Toby Tortoise Returns_|April 18, 1936|Wilfred Jackson|Sequel to _The Tortoise and the Hare_; featuring cameo by Elmer Elephant and a parody of Harpo Marx||
|62|_Three Blind Mouseketeers_|June 20, 1936|David Hand|||
|63|_The Country Cousin_|August 15, 1936|David Hand|Won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|64|_Mother Pluto_|October 10, 1936|David Hand|Featuring Pluto mothering a number of newly hatched chicks||
|65|_More Kittens_|November 7, 1936|David Hand, Wilfred Jackson |||||
|66|_Woodland Café_|January 17, 1937|Wilfred Jackson|Contains animator Ward Kimball's first animating assignment||
|67|_Little Hiawatha_|February 21, 1937|David Hand|The last _Silly Symphony_ distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer/United Artists||
|68|_The Old Mill_|October 22, 1937|Wilfred Jackson|Disney's first use of the multiplane camera and the first _Silly Symphony_ distributed by RKO Radio Pictures; won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||
|69|_Moth and the Flame_|April 1, 1938|Burt Gillett|||
|70|_Wynken, Blynken and Nod_|May 27, 1938|Graham Heid|||
|71|_Farmyard Symphony_|October 14, 1938|Jack Cutting|||
|72|_Merbabies_|December 9, 1938|Rudolf Ising,||Outsourced to Harman and Ising after the studio donated inkers and painters to the Disney studio to complete _Snow White_|
|73||December 23, 1938|Wilfred Jackson|Last film showing a _Silly Symphony_ title card; features multiple caricatures of Hollywood film stars and a cameo by Donald Duck||
|74|_The Practical Pig_|February 24, 1939|Dick Rickard|Featuring the Three Little Pigs, the Big Bad Wolf and the Three Little Wolves; released as a _Three Little Pigs_ standalone short||
|75|_The Ugly Duckling_|April 7, 1939|Jack Cutting|Remake of the 1931 film and the only _Silly Symphony_ story to be remade; won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film||