Silly Symphonies

Silly Symphony is a series of animated musical short films produced by Walt Disney Productions from 1929 to 1939. As their name implies, the Silly Symphonies were originally intended as whimsical accompaniments to pieces of music. Unlike the Mickey Mouse cartoon universe (with the exception of the Three Little Pigs and most notably Donald Duck who made his first appearance in the 1934 Silly Symphony cartoon, The Wise Little Hen), Silly Symphonies didn't have recurring characters, and each one was depicted as a stand alone Disney production. A total of 75 Silly Symphonies shorts were made and the series is mostly remembered as being a platform which Walt Disney had used to experiment with different processes, techniques, characters, stories, and technologies for which the then fledging company could use to refine and perfect its animation style; making the series a key part in aiding Disney's efforts to expand the Silly Symphonies into his feature length animated movies. 
Over it's ten year run, Silly Symphonies would go on to win Walt Disney seven Academy Awards for Best Animated Short Film (eventually tying with Joe Barbara and Bill Hanna's Tom and Jerry's record for most Oscar wins for a cartoon series in the category) and spawned numerous imitators, some of which, (such as Warner Bros' Merrie Melodies) would go on to be major competitors with Disney. 
The series also spawned a Disney media franchise that included the Silly Symphonies newspaper comic strip distributed by King Features Syndicate, the Dell comic book series Silly Symphonies, as well as several children's books, many of which were based on the Silly Symphony cartoons. 
The Silly Symphonies were re-issued and re-released by RKO Radio Pictures and Buena Vista Distribution.