The guys of Termite Terrace (Warner Bros ... Termite Terrace) who wrote and animated all of the Bugs Bunny cartoons also managed to keep a full time orchestra busy as well. I heard some of my first classical pieces watching these cartoons. One examples is What's Opera, Doc, which was my introduction to Richard Wagner. Not a fan of opera (I can't understand most of the time because of the Italian lyrics), nonetheless, this cartoon (snippet here: Partial "What's Opera, Doc") was based largely on Wagner's opera and included the Ride of the Valkyries renamed in the cartoon as "Kill the Wabbit".
Another classic, The Rabbit of Seville, takes on Mozart with a spin on the Barber of Seville. They also manage to squeeze the Marriage of Figaro into this 7-minute wacky feature.
Bugs was also known to play the great Leopold Stokowski as he puts his snobby neighbor and professional baritone through the loops on stage until it comes crashing down in Long Haired Hare.
You can tell my classical upbringing was largely spurred by passive intake of information from various radio and tv sources. In my next blog, we will venture into the real reason that I got interested in all of this ...
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