Hello everyone, and welcome to a special #DisneyMusicMonday. Today also happens to be the 4th anniversary of when I started My Dreams of Disney, so on this day, I’m sharing with you a video that really was the start of it all for so many of us in this business.
On November 18, 1928, Mickey Mouse stars in Steamboat Willie, the first commercially successful animated cartoon to use synchronized sound. Disney’s third Mickey short (but the first with sound) debuts as a sneak preview at Universal’s Colony Theatre – located at Broadway & 53rd Street in New York City. It is shown before the feature film Gang War. Steamboat Willie is co-directed by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks and features the first appearance of Minnie Mouse. It is animated by Ub Iwerks, Wilfred Jackson and Dick Lundy. The short also features the work of inbetween artist Les Clark (who will go on to be one of “Walt’s Nine Old Men”). Walt himself supplies the voices for all the characters – although there isn’t any real spoken dialogue just whistling, grunts, laughter and other vocal sounds. Walt sits nervously at the rear of the theater to gage the audience’s reaction. To his delight, the Colony echoes with laughs and giggles throughout the short! Steamboat Willie will be shown every night for 2 weeks. (Despite the fact that this is not the first Mickey cartoon made or released, it is still considered Mickey Mouse’s true debut … and birthday!)
It’s not every day that we celebrate an anniversary for our blog, and I never imagined that my little blog would grow into the site that it is — or that it would even be still around after four years! Our first post (and posts) were written as recaps of the memories that I have from my original visits to Walt Disney World, but as the months went by, our posts became more about reviews, and lists of favorites, dining reviews, and so on. It’s crazy to imagine that we have published 1,513 posts now (with this being number 1,513)! Well, enough about the blog — today is #DisneyMusicMonday, and I’ve got two videos to share with you — the first is the intro music for Walt Disney Animation Studios, and the second is the actual Steamboat Willie cartoon. I hope you have time to enjoy both of them, and don’t forget to check out the rest of the posts below. Also, special thanks as always to my friend Tim from Dad for Disney for co-hosting with me!
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