Austin Symphonic Band Performing The Sound of Music by Rodgers and Hammerstein
13,786
Published 2016-02-10
Program notes by David Cross:
The Sound of Music (2015)
Music: Richard Rodgers (1902–1979)
Lyrics: Oscar Hammerstein (1895–1960)
Orchestration: Robert Russell Bennett (1894–1981)
The film version of "The Sound of Music" is fifty years old! The last musical by the luminary team of Rodgers and Hammerstein addresses the unsavory topic of Nazi Germany and the oppression of the arts. Critical response to the film was widely mixed, with Bosley Crowther of The New York Times calling it “romantic nonsense and sentiment,” and Philip K. Scheuer of the Los Angeles Times describing it as “three hours of visual and vocal brilliance.” The film was a major commercial success, becoming the number one box office movie after four weeks, and the highest-grossing film of 1965. By November 1966, "The Sound of Music" became the highest grossing film of all-time—surpassing "Gone With the Wind"—and held that distinction for five years. The film was just as popular throughout the world, breaking previous box-office records in twenty-nine countries.
"The Sound of Music" received five Academy Awards including Best Picture and Best Director. In 1998, the American Film Institute listed "The Sound of Music" as the fifty-fifth greatest American movie of all time. In 2001, the United States Library of Congress selected the film for preservation in the National Film Registry, finding it “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.”
"The Sound of Music" trivia:
The opening scene of Andrews twirling on the mountaintop may look effortless, but it was anything but. Not only was it raining and cold throughout production, the helicopter kept knocking Andrews over. “This was a jet helicopter,” she said, and the down draft from those jets was so strong that "every time . . . the helicopter circled around me and the down draft just flattened me into the grass. And I mean flattened. It was fine for a couple of takes, but after that you begin to get just a little bit angry… And I really tried. I mean, I braced myself, I thought, ‘It’s not going to get me this time.’ And every single time, I bit the dust.”
Nicholas Hammond, who played Friedrich, grew from 5 feet, 3 inches to 5 feet, 9 inches during the six months of shooting. Since Friedrich had to be shorter than Liesl but taller than Louisa, the growth spurt posed a continuity problem. At the start of the film, Hammond had lifts on his shoes; by the end, his shoes were off, and Carr had to stand on a box.
Julie Andrews sang “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious” to the children in the cast to entertain them between shooting. Since "Mary Poppins" (1964) hadn’t yet been released, they just thought she’d made up the song for them.
When the film was released in South Korea, it did so much business that some theaters were showing it four and five times a day. One theater owner in Seoul tried to figure out a way to be able to show it even more often, in order to bring in more customers. So he cut out all the musical numbers.
Among kids who auditioned to play the Von Trapp children were Kurt Russell, Richard Dreyfuss, Veronica Cartwright, Mia Farrow, Liza Minelli, Patty Duke, Sharon Tate, and the four eldest Osmond Brothers (Alan Osmond, Jay Osmond, Merrill Osmond, and Wayne Osmond). Sean Connery, Yul Brenner and Richard Burton were considered for the part of Captain von Trapp.
Robert Russell Bennett orchestrated "The Sound of Music" for Broadway. Irwin Kostal orchestrated and conducted music for the film.