Silly Symphony (also known as Silly Symphonies) is an American animated series of 75 musical short films produced by Walt Disney Productions from 1929 to 1939. As the series name implies, the Silly Symphonies were originally intended as whimsical accompaniments to pieces of music. As such, the films usually did not feature continuing characters, unlike the Mickey Mouse shorts produced by Disney at the same time (exceptions to this include Three Little Pigs, The Tortoise and the Hare, and Three Orphan Kittens, which all had sequels). The series is notable for its innovation with Technicolor and the multiplane motion picture camera, as well as its introduction of the character Donald Duck, who made his first appearance in the Silly Symphony cartoon The Wise Little Hen in 1934. Seven shorts won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.
Many of the shorts were adapted into print mediums. Starting in 1932, a Silly Symphony newspaper comic strip was distributed by King Features Syndicate, as well as a Dell comic book series and numerous children's books.
The Silly Symphonies returned to theaters with its re-issues and re-releases, and tied with Joseph Barbera and William Hanna's Tom and Jerrys record for most Oscar wins for a cartoon series in the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film category.
The first five Silly Symphony shorts entered the public domain on January 1, 2025 with another 10 on January 1, 2026. The same will happen to subsequent shorts from 1931, 1932, and 1933 in 2027, 2028, and 2029 respectively.
Production
While Walt Disney and Carl Stalling, a theatre organist from Kansas City, were in New York to add sound to the Mickey Mouse shorts The Gallopin' Gaucho, The Barn Dance and Plane Crazy, Stalling suggested the idea of making a series of musical animated shorts that combined the latest sound technology with storytelling. At first Walt did not seem interested, but when they returned to New York in February to record the sound for a fifth Mickey Mouse cartoon, The Opry House, they also recorded the soundtrack for The Skeleton Dance, the type of short that Stalling had suggested and the first Silly Symphony cartoon.
Within the animation industry, the series is known for its use by Walt Disney as a platform for experimenting with processes, techniques, characters, and stories in order to further the art of animation. What The Skeleton Dance and Silly Symphonies did differently than any other cartoons that had been made previously in regard of sound, was that the music and sounds were recorded before the actual animated segments, instead of the other way around.Silly Symphonies, 1929–1935 - San Francisco Silent Film Festival The series also provided a venue to try out techniques and technologies, such as Technicolor, special effects animation, and dramatic storytelling in animation, that would be crucial to Disney's plans to eventually begin making feature-length animated films.
Shortly after the switch to United Artists, the series became even more popular. Walt Disney had seen some of Dr. Herbert Kalmus' tests for a new three-strip, full-color Technicolor process, which would replace the previous two-tone Technicolor process. Disney signed a contract with Technicolor which gave the Disney studio exclusive rights to the new three-strip process through the end of 1935, and had a 60% complete Symphony, Flowers and Trees, scrapped and redone in full color. Flowers and Trees was the first animated film to use the three-strip Technicolor process, and was a phenomenal success. Within a year, the now-in-Technicolor Silly Symphonies series had popularity and success that matched (and later surpassed) that of the Mickey Mouse cartoons. The contract Disney had with Technicolor would also later be extended another five years as well.
The success of Silly Symphonies would be tremendously boosted after Three Little Pigs was released in 1933 and became a box office sensation; the film was featured in movie theaters for several months and also featured the hit song that became the anthem of the Great Depression, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf". Several Silly Symphonies entries, including Three Little Pigs (1933), The Grasshopper and the Ants (1934), The Tortoise and the Hare (1935), The Country Cousin (1936), The Old Mill (1937), Moth and the Flame (1938), Wynken, Blynken, and Nod (1938), and The Ugly Duckling (1939, with an earlier black-and-white version from 1931), are among the most notable short films produced by Walt Disney.
Due to problems related to Disney's scheduled productions of cartoons, a deal was made with Harman and Ising to produce three Silly Symphonies: Merbabies, Pipe Dreams, and The Little Bantamweight. Only one of these cartoons, Merbabies, ended up being bought by Disney, the remaining two Harman-Ising Silly Symphonies were then sold to MGM who released them as Happy Harmonies cartoons. Disney ceased production of Silly Symphonies in 1939.
Distribution The series was first distributed by Pat Powers from 1929 to 1930 and released by Celebrity Productions (1929–1930) indirectly through Columbia Pictures. The original basis of the cartoons was musical novelty, and the musical scores of the first cartoons were composed by Carl Stalling.
Columbia Pictures After viewing The Skeleton Dance, the manager at Columbia Pictures quickly became interested in distributing the series, and gained the perfect opportunity to acquire Silly Symphonies after Disney broke with Celebrity Productions head Pat Powers after Powers signed Disney's colleague Ub Iwerks to a studio contract. Columbia Pictures (1930–1932) agreed to pick up the direct distribution of the Mickey Mouse series on the condition that they would have exclusive rights to distribute the Silly Symphonies series; at first, Silly Symphonies could not even come close to the popularity Mickey Mouse had. The original title cards to the shorts released by Celebrity Productions and Columbia Pictures were all redone after Walt Disney stopped distributing his cartoons through them.
United Artists In 1932, after falling out with Columbia Pictures, Disney began distributing his products through United Artists. UA refused to distribute the Silly Symphonies unless Disney associated Mickey Mouse with them somehow, resulting in the "Mickey Mouse presents a Silly Symphony" title cards and posters that introduced and promoted the series during its five-year run for UA. United Artists also agreed to double the budget for each cartoon from $7,500 to $15,000. The first short released by United Artists was The Bears and Bees.
RKO Radio Pictures In 1937, Disney signed a distribution deal with RKO Radio Pictures to distribute the Silly Symphony cartoons, along with the Mickey Mouse series. RKO would continue to distribute until the end of the series in 1939.
Home media Several Symphonies have been released in home media, most of the time as bonus shorts that relate to something within various Disney films. For instance, the original Dumbo VHS included Father Noah's Ark, The Practical Pig and Three Orphan Kittens as bonus shorts to make up for the film's short length. In the UK, several Silly Symphonies were released in compilations under Disney Videos' "Storybook Favourites" brand. The three "Storybook Favourites Shorts" volumes released included among others, The Three Little Pigs, The Tortoise and the Hare and the remake of The Ugly Duckling.
On December 4, 2001, Disney released "Silly Symphonies" as part of its DVD series "Walt Disney Treasures". On December 19, 2006, "More Silly Symphonies" was released, completing the collection and allowing the cartoons to be completely available to the public.
Some Disney Blu-ray discs include Silly Symphonies as high definition special features. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs includes six, Beauty and the Beast and Dumbo both contain two and Pixar's A Bug's Life contains one.
The Silly Symphony shorts originally aired on Turner Classic Movies' period program block "Treasures from the Disney Vault".
Some Silly Symphony shorts are viewable on Disney+.
List of films All films released in or before 1930 are in the public domain. #FilmOriginal release dateDirectorMusicNotesRunning time (minutes) 1 First entry in the Silly Symphony series. Only cartoon to have its soundtrack recorded in New York.5:31 2 El Terrible Toreador The first Silly Symphony to have its soundtrack recorded in Los Angeles.6:14 3 Springtime Scenes from this film appeared in the 1961 film One Hundred and One Dalmatians.6:14 4 Hell's Bells 5:49 5 5:57 6 Summer 5:51 7 Autumn The last Silly Symphony with involvement from Ub Iwerks and Carl Stalling.6:24 8 Cannibal Capers The version that aired on The Mickey Mouse Club was cut short at the end. The version that is on the "More Silly Symphonies" DVD includes the original ending along with the cut ending.6:15 (5:56 cut) 9 Frolicking Fish Originally released with green tinting.6:02 10 Arctic Antics Burt Gillett Planned to be directed by Ub Iwerks before he left the studio.7:00 11 Night Originally released with blue tinting.6:53 12 Midnight in a Toy Shop 7:34 13 Monkey Melodies 7:00 14 Winter 6:53 15 Playful Pan 6:59 16 Birds of a Feather In the public domain as it was copyrighted in 1930.8:04 17 Mother Goose Melodies Frank Churchill 8:10 18 7:32 19 7:07 20 The film's working title was The Cat's Out, and the current vault print features that title in its credits. However, it was copyrighted and released as The Cat's Nightmare.7:20 21 Egyptian Melodies 6:20 22 7:12 23 7:14 24 6:22 25 Frank Churchill This short would be remade in color in 1939, also titled "The Ugly Duckling".7:11 26 The last Silly Symphony to be distributed by Columbia Pictures.6:52 27 The first Silly Symphony to be distributed by United Artists. 6:18 28 Just Dogs The first appearance of Pluto without Mickey Mouse.7:13 29 Flowers and Trees Frank Churchill Winner of the inaugural Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. The first film to be produced in three-strip Technicolor.7:49 30 Bugs in Love The last Silly Symphony to be produced in black-and-white.7:04 31 King Neptune 7:11 32 Babes in the Woods The last Silly Symphony to be recorded with Cinephone.8:14 33 Santa's Workshop The first Silly Symphony to be recorded with RCA Photophone.6:37 34 Birds in the Spring Frank Churchill 7:32 35 Father Noah's Ark 8:24 36 Three Little Pigs Winner of the 1932–33 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. From this film came the Disney studio's first hit song, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?". The scene with the wolf impersonating a Jewish peddler is censored on various releases.8:41 37 Old King Cole Bert Lewis 7:28 38 Lullaby Land Leigh Harline 7:22 39 7:32 40 8:27 41 8:23 42 Grasshopper and the Ants Reissued by RKO Radio Pictures as The Grasshopper and the Ants.8:24 43 Funny Little Bunnies Reissued by RKO Radio Pictures.7:10 44 A sequel to Three Little Pigs.9:21 45 (Carthay Circle Theatre) The debut appearance of Donald Duck.7:43 46 Bert Lewis 9:17 47 Peculiar Penguins 9:21 48 9:48 49 Winner of the 1933–34 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.8:36 50 The last film directed by Walt Disney.10:34 51 Based on the book of the same name by Robert Michael Ballantyne.7:48 52 Water Babies 8:17 53 This short is in the public domain due to an invalid copyright renewal.8:00 54 Who Killed Cock Robin? Nominated for the 1935 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. Named one of the ten best films of 1935 by the National Board of Review. Scenes from this film appeared in the 1936 film Sabotage.8:30 55 Music Land 9:34 56 Three Orphan Kittens Winner of the 1935 Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.8:55 57 Cock o' the Walk Albert Hay Malotte 8:23 58 Broken Toys 7:53 59 Elmer Elephant 8:29 60 Three Little Wolves 9:26 61 Toby Tortoise Returns 7:34 62 Three Blind Mouseketeers 8:43 63 Wilfred Jackson