When Make Mine Music opened in 1946, The New York Post called it “…a veritable vaudeville show, a three-ring circus, and grand opera thrown together into one technical masterpiece.”
It may be the best description for this film made during a difficult time for Walt Disney and his Studio. Between an animators’ strike, and America’s involvement in World War II, production at the Studio had been a challenge during most of the 1940s.
Walt kept animation production going during this period by producing lower-budgeted, easy-to-execute films, known as “package films,” which didn’t have a traditional plot but instead were a series of short subjects strung together during a feature-length running time.
One of these was Make Mine Music, with a common theme among the segments being that each was set to a particular piece of music. As each is so vastly different, the Post’s description of the film is appropriate.
The film plays with the Fantasia formula, opening like a concert complete with a program that reads: “Make Mine Music: A Musical Fantasy.”
From here, the film segues to the first section of the film, “The Martins and the Coys” (billed on the program as “A Rustic Ballad”), narrated by the singing group The King’s Men, as it tells the musical tale of two feuding mountain families.
After this, the Ken Darby Chorus performs the title song, “Blue Bayou.” The slow-paced music features accompanying visuals of a nighttime bayou as a bird takes flight, in a sequence that reuses animation intended for a sequel to 1940’s Fantasia, originally intended to accompany the musical composition “Clair de lune.”
Next up is Benny Goodman and his Orchestra with “All the Cats Join in.” Two “hepcat bobbysoxer” teens of the decade dance to the upbeat music as they get ready for a date, with animation introduced by a pencil that draws images that come to life.
Singer Andy Russell performs the next segment, “Without You,” a ballad, with sad, surreal images that transition into views of lonely woods and nighttime stars.
The following segment is one of the film’s most famous, “Casey at the Bat,” narrated as a “Musical Recital” by comedian Jerry Colonna, in his over-the-top style, as a re-telling of the “baseball poem” by author Ernest Thayer about the Mudville team and their star player. This segment was released later in 1946 as a stand-alone short subject and even spawned a sequel with Casey Bats Again, in 1954.
Singer Dinah Shore sings “Two Silhouettes,” the next segment, a “Ballade Ballet” featuring two ballet dancers in rotoscoped silhouette animation, performing in front of a stylized backdrop and assisted by two cherubic figures.
Next is arguably the most popular segment, “Peter and the Wolf,” narrated by the familiar, comforting voice of Disney stalwart Sterling Holloway, from the famous musical composition by conductor Sergei Prokofiev. This segment (sans narration) was also created to be an additional component to Disney’s Fantasia.
Set in Russia, the segment tells the tale of young Peter and his friends Sascha, a bird, Sonia the duck, and Ivan the cat, who venture off into the woods to hunt a wolf. A different musical instrument represents each character, with a distinct theme.
“Peter and the Wolf” was such a substantial segment that it has been shown on its own several times and even released as a record album (paired with “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” on the flip side).
“Peter and the Wolf” is followed by another Benny Goodman number, “Since You’ve Been Gone,” which provides the backdrop for a march of anthropomorphized musical instruments.
The Andrews Sisters then perform the musical narration for “Johnny Fedora and Alice Blue Bonnet,” a sweet story of two hats who fall in love after meeting in a department store window.
The concluding segment is baritone singer Nelson Eddy and the story of “The Whale Who Wanted to Sing at the Met,” about a whale named Willie with incredible operatic talents and dreams. He is hunted by a music conductor who believes that the whale has swallowed an opera singer.
Although it contains a sad ending, this segment includes beautiful, lush animation, particularly where Willie sings as Pagliacci the Clown, and full opportunity is taken for sight gags involving the size and scale of Willie.
Directed by Jack Kinney, Clyde Geronimi, Hamilton Luske, Joshua Meador, and Robert Cormack, Make Mine Music features animation by Disney Legends Ward Kimball, Ollie Johnston, and Eric Larson, among others.
The artists balance the different styles. There’s the entertaining, overly caricatured design of “Casey,” with the main character’s jut-jaw, and a player who touches the base with his giant handlebar mustache. This is offset by scenes with such images in “Without You,” which play out like rain cascading down a window.
Make Mine Music has been shown on The Disney Channel and released on home video in 2000 (with “The Martins and the Coys” removed due to violence and gunplay concerns), and on Blu-ray in 2021, but as of this writing, the film is still not available on Disney+ (although it is available on Amazon Prime).
Make Mine Music had its premiere in New York City on April 20, 1946, and went into general release on August 15. As the film now celebrates 80 years, it’s the perfect time to revisit this “vaudeville show, three-ring circus, and grand opera” from a unique era in Disney history.
For more about the music of Make Mine Music, check out Greg Ehrbar’s 2016 article.
Michael Lyons is a freelance writer, specializing in film, television, and pop culture. He is the author of the book, Drawn to Greatness: Disney’s Animation Renaissance, which chronicles the amazing growth at the Disney animation studio in the 1990s. In addition to Animation Scoop and Cartoon Research, he has contributed to Remind Magazine, Cinefantastique, Animation World Network and Disney Magazine. He also writes a blog, Screen Saver: A Retro Review of TV Shows and Movies of Yesteryear and his interviews with a number of animation legends have been featured in several volumes of the books, Walt’s People. You can visit Michael’s web site Words From Lyons at: 
Kids who grew up with “World of Color” got to see nearly all the individual segments, woven into themed episodes often hosted by Ludwig Von Drake. I was a Disney and cartoon buff as a kid, but it was some years before I read they were pieces of feature films I’d never heard of. In the mid-70s saw campus showings of MAKE MINE MUSIC and MELODY TIME, both of which played well to us students. Outside of a few “straight” sentimental moments (“Without You” and “Trees”) everybody was laughing at the right bits.
Note how many of the package films have “downer” endings, sometimes but not always mitigated by a broad wink. As noted, MAKE MINE MUSIC ends with the narrator Eddy expressing the hope Willie is in Heaven. MELODY TIME closes with Pecos Bill returning to the wild to mourn Slue Foot Sue, and that’s why coyotes howl to this day. FUN AND FANCY FREE has the endearingly goofy giant falling to his death, then turning up alive for a final here-and-now gag with narrator Edger Bergen. ICHABOD AND MISTER TOAD sort of has it both ways, showing us Ichabod Crane married to a rich widow somewhere while Bing Crosby insists that’s just a silly rumor and it’s generally agreed the Headless Horseman got him. The two Latin American films stay cheerful throughout, perhaps a result of their public relations mission.
It’s concerning that the Disney company has never trusted the public to make up its own mind regarding “The Martins and the Coys.” Thus, “Make Mine Music” has not appeared on home video in its entirety due to prior censoring. As a Disney piece, the segment is only fair, and certainly not a very dignified way to open the compilation. Given the option, I might skip over it anyway–but I wish that it could have been my choice to skip over it rather than having the studio make it for me. In its favor, the animation is lively, and its sub-theme of the afterlife balances out the finale of the film at the end of “The Whale Who Wanted to Sing at the Met.” On Disney Channel, the film was shown complete.
I have stated elsewhere, that as with much of Disney’s 40’s output and particularly with this film, there is an air of melancholy that pervades. Almost every segment of “Make Mine Music” deals with death in one form or another–perhaps not surprising, as so many lives were lost during that decade in World War II. And even when death is not directly referenced, there is loss, such as in “Without You”, or Casey’s defeat at the plate, or the survival of Johnny and Alice by having earholes for horses cut out of them. “Peter and the Wolf” also deals with the supposed death of Sonya the duck, whose return is almost too little, too late, plus of course the Wolf is slated to be killed even though we don’t actually see that part. This sadness is somewhat offset by attempts at “high art” such as “Blue Bayou” and “Two Silhouettes,” or by nods to then-popular culture in “After You’ve Gone” and “All the Cats Join In.”
The vocal talent is of course not to be overlooked. This film presents an early example of “celebrity” voices and participation in Disney cartoons. Dinah Shore, Jerry Colonna, Benny Goodman, the Andrews Sisters, and Nelson Eddy–the latter fresh from his series of popular musicals with costar Jeanette MacDonald–were all big names at the time.
In some ways this is typical Disney fare–but in other ways it is an anomaly, grappling with themes that are rarely encompassed in a Disney film–such as loss, death, depression, and heartache, with “high art” and “low art” functioning together. But all of this makes it a valuable entry in the Disney catalog–and one which we members of the public should be allowed to make up our own minds about.
Disney was still experiencing the after-effects of the Strike, the ravages that World War II inflicted on the studio, plus Walt’s personal and business frustrations which mounted during this decade. This unrest and unease is reflected in the varying tone of “Make Mine Music.” But in its way it still contains much of the Disney magic.
“…themes that are rarely encompassed in a Disney film–such as loss, death, depression, and heartache….”
Really? Those themes are all over the classic Disney material–every one of its heroines is missing a parent, Bambi’s mother is killed on screen, Gepetto mourns the apparent loss of his son. And they continue into the best of the live-action films, such as “Old Yeller” and “Pollyanna”.
Point taken. You are absolutely right. I was thinking more in terms of degree. That is a very valid correction. The thought occurred to me while I was writing it, but I didn’t fix it. Thank you for setting the record straight!
Apparently Disney felt the British could handle the violence since the UK DVD does contain “The Martins and The Coys” segment. Fortunately I have region free player so I‘m able to play it.
When I got this Region 2 UK release I figured I was going to have to put up with it running slightly fast, since the standard practice for transferring films for PAL-format video was to run them at 25 frames per second rather than 24. Turns out that it runs at the correct speed. I compared the running times of the segments also on the Blu-ray and they match exactly.
Does it have the original “All the Cats Join In”, or the altered version?
Make Mine Music is definitely a mixed bag, and on the whole is near the bottom of my personal rankings of Disney animated features, but the highlights are well worth watching, from the joyous “All the Cats Join In” showcasing Freddie Moore’s designs, to the solid if not terribly risk-taking adaptations of “Casey at the Bat” and “Peter and the Wolf”.
The unfortunate excising of “The Martins and the Coys” has been mentioned already; while I can understand wanting to make sure young children aren’t exposed to its flippant gun violence without parental supervision (although I watched far more cavalierly violent cartoons daily from Termite Terrace when I was a kid), the extent to which Disney is trying to completely bury the segment strikes me as extreme. It’s not an essential lost classic, but it’s fun and well-made, and not nearly so violent as to deserve being hidden from even interested adults.
I have mentioned this matter before, and I shall continue to do so for as long as it remains necessary: There is no such person, thing, or fictional character as “Pagliacci the clown.” The title of the opera is “I Pagliacci”, which simply means “the clowns.” The tragic operatic clown who sings “Vesti la giubba” and murders his wife and her lover in the final scene is named Canio. To say “Pagliacci the clown” is like saying “Clowns the clown,” a redundant tautology, which is the very worst kind. I feel compelled to warn you, in the most friendly spirit of charity, that if you persist in committing this solecism, opera lovers will look askance at you, as though you were some untutored hayseed with gobs of cow dung clinging to your bare feet like one of the Martins or, conversely, one of the Coys. Trust me, you do not want opera lovers looking askance at you. It’s not pleasant. Those little glasses we wear intensify the effect like you wouldn’t believe.
So please, let’s have no more talk of “Pagliacci the clown.” Expunge the phrase from your vocabulary forthwith. And, as Willie the whale sings at the very end of “Make Mine Music” (quoting the quintet from Act III of Flotow’s “Martha”): “Mag der Himmel Euch vergeben [May Heaven forgive you].”
While admittedly a mixed bag this one is still deserving of more recognition than it gets and definitely worth a look. It feels very much like a deliberate revamping of the FANTASIA premise for a more mainstream audience. If nothing else it shows the studio stretching its wings with shorts and it seems a shame we didn’t get latter, more adventurous variations. “All the Cats Join In” in particular is delight, both as an example of how post war pop culture viewed the seemingly frantic and silly “new generation” with a whiff of affectionately, mildly acerbic social commentary.
If nothing else the film is a genuine curio in the archives.
I have enjoyed the music package features since I became aware of them in the 2000s. I like Melody Time a lot more, Make Mine Music is just as interesting, with the many different vignettes. I always explain to others that they probably won’t recognize the titles, but would be familiar with some of the individual segments within.
I find the home media censorship with both frustrating, but Make Mine Music is moreso (at least one can import both films uncensored from Europe). I immediately compared the hillbilly feud to Tex Avery’s A Feud There Was, which is arguably more violent. I presume the emphasis of the deaths of the hillbillies, as their spirits rise to the clouds, in the former was seen as potentially troubling for some viewers. At least these are available at all. The best audience for the package films nowadays are the diehards and film historians.