Some Day My Prince Will Come - Jazz and Pop Covers

Adriana Caselotti's showstopping "Some Day My Prince Will Come" is one of the many touching highlights from Snow White. Composed by Frank Churchill with lyrics by Larry Morey, the song is ranked #19 on the American Film Institute's list of the 100 greatest songs in movie history.

Over the years, the tune has been performed by both jazz and pop artists alike. First covered by the Dave Brubeck Quartet in 1957, the American jazz pianist was inspired to record the song for his Dave Digs Disney album after hearing the original on one of his kid's Disney records. Other jazz greats followed including Miles Davis whose 1961 arrangement included a sax solo by John Coltrane. Modern day recordings continue like that of Venetians Radu and Violeta Zaplitnii.

Pop covers include Diana Ross and The Supremes (1967), Sinéad O'Connor (1988), Tanya Tucker (1996), Barbra Streisand (2001), Tiffany Thornton (2009) and quite a number of others. Some are welcome renditions of Adrianna Caselotti's original. Others nearly make me ill. But who am I to judge?


Here's a cross section...

Performed by Dave Brubeck Quartet. Video posted by daalmelo.

Performed by Bill Evans Trio. Video posted by kenjames64.

Performed by Miles Davis, John Coltrane, et al. Video posted by elnapoli.

Performed by Radu e Violeta Zaplitnii. Video posted by neboske.

Performed by Lena Horne. Video posted by lenahorneclub.

Performed by Diana Ross and The Supremes. Video posted by dreamsupreme4u.



Performed by Linda Ronstadt. Video posted by planetlove71.



Performed by Barbra Streisand. Video posted by StylishlyDemented.



Performed by Ashley Tisdale. Video posted by Pinkgirlie1995. 



Performed by Cheetah Girls. Video posted by wiishup0nast4r. 

 

Performed by Tiffany Thornton. Video posted by DisneyChannelUK.

Adriana Caselotti - The Voice of Innocence

A boss with a vision. Hundreds of multi-talented artists at the ready. And a project the likes of which had never been seen before. Nothing short of monumental was the collaborative effort put forth by the men and women who made Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

Fans and animation historians today can easily rattle off a throng of celebrated names whose creative and dedicated labor contributed to the massive success of the film. The animation was stunning, the multiplane photography innovative, the music composition sublime, and the story tight as a drum. Yet, the crowning stroke was Walt Disney's choice of Adriana Caselotti as "the voice of Snow White." She was the perfect "icing" for this awe-inspiring "cake".

Caselotti was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, May 16, 1916 to a very operatic family...

Her father Guido, an immigrant from Italy, taught music in New York City, her mother Maria (from Naples) sang at the Royal Opera, and a sister Louise was a noted opera singer and voice teacher. Source: IMDb.

Adriana received her formal schooling at a convent near Rome while her mother sang in the Opera. Upon returning to America, her father trained her in the art of hitting those high notes.

Authentic Autographed Adriana Caselotti 8x10 courtesy of Brian Sibley (signed in his presence).

As Hollywood looked to expand its use of this new technology called "sound", the early 1930s saw operetta being incorporated more and more into motion pictures. MGM's The Merry Widow and Disney's own Silly Symphony The Goddess of Spring  were two such projects released in 1934. Snow White, already in development during this period, would feel their influence.

Left: The Merry Widow (1934). Image via Alt Film Guide. Copyright Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.
Right: The Goddess of Spring (1934). Image via ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive. Copyright Disney.

Snow White Wishing Well scene (1937). Image via Ink and Pixel Club. Copyright Disney.

Walt knew that finding the right voice for his heroine would be critical to the charm and success of the movie. Snow White more the anything was the embodiment of innocence. The actor who played her must exhibit this vocally. So important was the quest to find the perfect lead that more than 150 girls had already auditioned for the part when Guido Caselotti, now working as a vocal coach in Los Angeles, got a call from, Roy Scott, a Disney talent scout.

The story of how Adriana listened in on the extension to her father's conversation is an oft-repeated Snow White anecdote. When Scott asked Guido if he knew of any young singers that might fit the role, she immediately chimed in with a recommendation of herself. Hearing that Walt Disney was looking for the voice of a younger girl, Adriana, 19 at the time, sang and spoke into the phone with her now familiar operatic child-like intonation. Her embarrassed father told her to get off the line, but not before Scott had invited her to come to the studio for an audition.

Walt Disney Studios 1926-1940. Image via Floyd B. Bariscale. Creative Commons License. 

Candidates for the title role would be brought into the soundstage where they'd sing and read lines for the casting director. If the girl seemed promising, Walt would be paged to come hear the voice for himself. Not wanting to be influenced by the appearance of the girl, he had a wire run to his office near to the stage so he could listen in on a speaker without having to see what she looked like. When Adriana performed, Walt knew she was the one. "That's the girl! That's Snow White!" The search was over and the contract signed.

Adriana started recording on January 20th, 1936. She was paid $20 a day for 48 days of recording and took home a total salary of $970. During the sessions, she continued to speak and sing her lines in what she considered to be the voice of a 14 year old, "but I never told Disney that. He never knew."

There was no one to play off of for her lines and no musical accompaniment for her singing (except for Frank Churchill plunking away with one finger on the piano). She had to carry it all on her own which she admitted was not always easy.

Occasionally spoken lines gave Caselotti's child-voice trouble... 

One of the lines was, 'Grumpy. I didn't know you cared'. Instead of that I couldn't get the DNT at the end of: 'didn't'...I would say 'din". We rehearsed this thing over and over again and Walt said, "Listen, you're going to have to put this thing in there'. So I tried again--fine in rehearsal and came the take. I still got it wrong and Walt said, 'Oh, the hell with it...' And it's still there.*

Image via AcePhotos, posted by crown022002.

Adriana breathed life into the title character and imbued her with the endearing qualities of innocence and grace--just what Walt was looking for. It's difficult to imagine the film without her. And yet, it's interesting to note that at the 1937 Carthay Circle premiere, she was not considered to be one of the invited guests. The main artists and animators were given tickets, but apparently the voice actors were not. This didn't stop Adriana.

She showed up with Harry Stockwell, the voice of the prince, on her arm. When they reached the ticket booth, they were told by the attendant that their names were not on the list. 'Tickets? We don't have any tickets--I'm Snow White and this is Prince Charming!'** The attendant, of course having no idea who these two were, refused their request. The two stars of the film stepped aside and waited until no one was looking. Then quietly they slipped upstairs to one side of the balcony to watch the movie.

It was the Golden Age of Hollywood and a time when studios held contract over their actors. Walt owned Caselotti's voice. Not wanting to spoil the illusion of Snow White, he prevented her from working in other films or even appearing on radio shows. Except for a vocal bit part in The Wizard of Oz (1939) and an uncredited performance as the Singer at Martini's in It's A Wonderful Life (1946), Adriana would never really work in motion pictures again.

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Later in life, Adriana was to say that she may have only received $970 for her role, but it really didn't matter if she ever got a penny. She was just grateful for having the opportunity of being part of this great film.

Actively involved with many of the re-releases of the motion picture including the 50th Anniversary in 1987, Adriana would appear on radio, in television specials and at other publicity events.

She was also asked to re-record the "I'm Wishing" song which plays at Disneyland's Snow White's Grotto.

(Left) Adriana poses next to Snow White poster outside Mann's Theatre in Hollywood, 1987. Image via of David Lesjak at Vintage Disney Collectibles. Used with permission.

At age 70, Adriana is seen in this 1986 video below with the same spirit and spunk she possessed as an 18 year old. It's a wonderful glimpse into her joyful personality.

Adriana Caselotti interview. Video posted by yensidnaf.

This autographed 8x10 photo of Adriana is one of thousands that she would sign and sell to fans as a form of income...

Autographed 8x10. Image via AcePhotos. Posted by sunrise1982.

Adriana embraced her Snow White persona even to the extent of having a full size Wishing Well built in the front yard of her Beverly Hills home. Located at 201 S. Larchmont Blvd., the house contained Snow White figurines and other memorabilia. Even her telephone answering machine was set with her recording of "I'm Wishing".

Adriana Caselotti's Larchmont home. Images (top row) courtesy of btmeacham, (bottom row) via California Jarod. Used with permission.

Snow White researchers and authors Brian Sibley and Richard Hollis visit Adriana outside her home in 1988. Pictured (L-R): Brian Sibley, Adriana, her then-partner Florian, and Richard and Christine Holliss. Photo shot by long-time Snow White buff Muir Hewitt. Image via Brian Sibley's flickr. Used with permission.

Honored as a Disney Legend in 1994, Adriana was invited to leave her handprints in cement during the ceremony. Later a bronze cast would be created and the plaque put on display at the Disney Legends Plaza (dedicated October 16, 1998) at the Walt Disney Studios in Burbank .


Image (left) courtesy of Scott Wolf. Used with permission. Learn more about the Disney Legends at Scott's MouseClubhouse.com.

Bronze Handprints. Image courtesy of DarthValley. Used with permission.

Adriana was the true embodiment of the childlike nature that Walt Disney sought to reach in people--and the perfect choice for the role of Snow White. In 1995, she told a reporter, "I know that my voice will never die." She was so right.

Adriana Caselotti passed away on January 19th, 1997 at the age of 80.


* Adriana Caselotti quoted in Walt Disney and Europe by Robin Allan, p.41.
** Adriana Caselotti quoted in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs--The Making of the Classic Film by Brian Sibley and Richard Hollis, pp. 35-36.

The Souvenir Album

It's interesting to note that in the early days, Disney did not have its own music publishing company. All material was contracted out to Irving Berlin Music and later the Bourne Music Company.

All the rights to publish the music and songs from this film are actually still controlled by the Bourne Co. In later years, the Studio was able to acquire back the rights to the music from all of the other films, except this one. Prior to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, a movie soundtrack recording was unheard of and [had] little value to a movie studio.  Source: IMDb.

Read about a 1995 United States Court of Appeals case of Bourne vs. Walt Disney Company in regards to a Snow White copyright infringement in the use of video cassettes (first released on home video in 1994) and TV commercials.

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The Souvenir Album: 

Published by both Irving Berlin, Inc. and the Bourne Co., this softcover book includes the songs and musical notation by Larry Morey and Frank Churchill, but also 14 full black and white illustrations, 50 pages, 8 3/4 x 11 1/4".
 

Front Cover (above), Rear Cover (below)

 Souvenir Album (1938). Publisher Bourne Music Publishers. Images courtesy of RareLibrary.com. Used with Permission.

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Other editions of the Souvenir Album contained the same illustrations, layout and music sheets. However, a red background color was added.

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 Souvenir Album (1938). Publisher Bourne Music Publishers. Images courtesy of ToGo Books and Comics. Used with Permission.

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There was also a children's edition of the album with simplified versions of each song.

 

 Children's Simplified Edition (1937). Publisher Bourne Music Publishers. Image courtesy of A Page From the Past. Used with Permission.

Snow White Sheet Music

With the general release of the movie in 1938, the public was simply enthralled with Snow White and just couldn't get enough. One of the ways in which they sustained the enchantment was through the Frank Churchill and Larry Morey songs--that is, in the purchase of sheet music.

Sheet music was to folks in 1938 what CDs and mp3 downloads are in today's world. When people heard a song they liked, they'd run out to buy the songbook in order to learn to play and sing it themselves. Snow White sheet music sold like hotcakes.

 "One Song" Sheet Music (1937). Publisher Irving Berlin, Inc. New York. Images courtesy of RareLibrary.com. Used with Permission.

Sheet music--usually for vocal with piano accompaniment--also had symbols for guitar and chords for ukulele and banjo too. Sold as individual songs (3 pages) or the entire set of eight songs (16 pages).

[CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE]

Above:"Song Selection" Sheet Music, 16 pages (1937). Below: "Heigh-Ho", 3 pages (1938). Publisher Allan & Co. Ltd., Melbourne, Australia. Images courtesy of DaCapo Music. Used with Permission

"Some Day My Prince..." Sheet Music, 3 pages (1937). Publisher Bourne Music Publishing Co. Image courtesy of judibird. Used with permission.

"I'm Wishing" Sheet Music, 3 pages (1937). Publisher Irving Berlin, Inc. New York. Image courtesy of Fire Monkey Fish. Creative Commons License.

"Whistle While You Work" Sheet Music, 3 pages (1937). Publisher Irving Berlin, Inc. New York. Image courtesy of FindArt.

"With A Smile and a Song" Sheet Music, 3 pages (1937). Publisher Bourne Music Publishing Co. 

"The Dwarf Yodel Song" Sheet Music, 3 pages (1937). Irving Berlin, Inc. Image courtesy of cosmictradingcompany. Used with Permission.

A music sheet book from the UK with the complete set of songs...

 Piano Selection Sheet Music (1937). Chappell and Company, Inc. London. Image courtesy of CollectingCollectibles.com. Used with Permission.

Composing Snow White

Pre-Snow: Carl Stalling and the Silly Symphony--
(Right: The Skeleton Dance title plate. Copyright 1929 Disney.)

Walt Disney knew early on that he would need his own in-house music for sound cartoons. In 1928, Carl Stalling, Walt's associate from Kansas City became the studio's composer, creating the scores for many of the early Disney shorts. Stalling's desire to raise the musical bar for his compositions led to discussions with Walt into what should come first, the orchestration or animation. From these talks were born the Silly Symphonies which allowed Stalling to compose more elaborate pieces. Sometimes the animators would match their drawings to the completed music, other times it would work in reverse.

Stalling pioneered the use of the "tick system" of recording music to animation:

The thought struck me that if each member of the orchestra had a steady beat in his ear, from a telephone receiver, this would solve the problem. I had exposure sheets for the films, with the picture broken down frame by frame, sort of like a script, and twelve of the film frames went through the projector in a half second. That gave us a beat.
Carl Stalling from an interview via MichaelBarrier.com.

After two productive years, Stalling left Disney at the same time as Ub Iwerks. Eventually he found himself at Warner Brothers in 1936 where he would work for the next 22 years writing approximately one score per week for their Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies shorts.

(Left: Carl Stalling. Image via Animation World Network)

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The Big Bad Wolf: Frank Churchill--

Filling Stalling's shoes at Disney was Frank Churchill. A pre-med student at UCLA, Churchill dropped out of school to pursue a career in music and took jobs at radio stations and at RKO-Radio Pictures. It was 1930 when he was hired by Walt to be a composer on the Silly Symphonies. He scored nearly 65 animated shorts over his career, but it only took Churchill three years to strike gold. In 1933, he composed Disney's first smash hit, "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?" for the Three Little Pigs. It changed the way music was thought of at the studio. Creating original memorable songs would now become a integral part of the filmmaking process.

Frank Churchill (right) with Walt Disney and Wilfred Jackson. Image via Michael Sporn Animation from the  Filmguide’s Handbook to Cartoon Production by Harold Turney, copyright 1940.

The success of 'Big Bad Wolf' landed Churchill the dream job of composing the music for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. But he would not do it alone.

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The Songs: Larry Morey--

Larry Morey came to the Disney studio in 1933. He's credited as a Sequence Director on Snow White, but his name is remembered more for his authoring of the lyrics to all of the songs in the movie. Working with Frank Churchill's music, the two of them created 25 tunes from which 8 were chosen for inclusion in the final film.

Image via Denmark Disney online; copyright Disney.

Walt made it clear to the composers that he wanted the songs integrated into the story. "Dialogue and music work together...use the dialogue to lead into songs naturally."[p.40, Walt Disney and Europe by Robin Allan]. He wanted the musical numbers to spring accordingly from the characters rather than causing abrupt interruptions in the flow of the story. Churchill and Morey rose to the task swimmingly.

The original eight recorded songs (vocal artists in parentheses): 

1-I'm Wishing 
    (Adriana Caselotti)
2-One Song
   (Harry Stockwell)
3-With A Smile and A Song 
   (Adriana Caselotti)
4-Whistle While You Work 
   (Adriana Caselotti)
5-Heigh Ho
  (Roy Atwell, Pinto Colvig, Billy Gilbert, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw )
6-Bluddle-Uddle-Um Dum or The Dwarfs' Washing Song 
   (Roy Atwell, Pinto Colvig, Billy Gilbert, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw)
7-Dwarfs' Yodel Song or The Silly Song 
   (Roy Atwell, Pinto Colvig, Billy Gilbert, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw, with yodeling by James MacDonald )
8-Someday My Prince Will Come 
  (Adriana Caselotti)

Two additional recorded songs were cut from the final film. The first was dropped when the soup-eating scene was pulled by Walt. The second was replaced by "The Silly Song".

A-Music in Your Soup
  (Roy Atwell, Pinto Colvig, Billy Gilbert, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw )
B-You're Never Too Old to Be Young 
   (Roy Atwell, Pinto Colvig, Billy Gilbert, Otis Harlan, Scotty Mattraw )

"Heigh-Ho" Sheet Music from the Snow White Souvenir Album. Image copyright 1938 Bourne Co.

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The Oscar Nominated Score: Enter Leigh Harline and Paul Smith--

In addition to writing the songs, Frank Churchill co-composed the instrumental score with Leigh Harline and Paul Smith. Harline joined the Disney team in 1932; Smith arrived two years later. Inspired by concept art and storyboard illustrations, they worked and weaved the different musical segments of the film together. From the "Overture"opening and the dark forest escape to the climatic witch chase and final choral reprise, the trio of young composers created a dramatic score the likes of which had never been heard before at the Disney Studios.

Leigh Harline. Image via Care About Music and Film. Copyright Disney.

Paul Smith. Image via Original Mickey Mouse Club Show Website. Copyright Disney.

Frank Churchill also arranged the entire score and conducted the Disney orchestra during the recording sessions.

The Disney Orchestra. Image via Michael Sporn Animation from the  Filmguide’s Handbook to Cartoon Production by Harold Turney, copyright 1940.

For their efforts, Churchill, Harline and Smith earned an Academy Award nomination for "Best Music, Score" in 1938. Their orchestration, along with Larry Morey's lyrics, became the first ever commercially-released movie soundtrack...and it sold like crazy.

Ilene Woods As Snow White, 1949 Recording

In memory of Ilene Woods who passed away on July 1st at the age of 81. Woods is best known for her lead role in Disney's 1950 Cinderella.

Image courtesy Fun4Sale 1952 Unusual Collectibles. Used with Permission.

Dated 1949, this Walt Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs music and storybook album is an unusual recording in that the Snow White voice actor is not Adriana Caselotti from the original film. Rather it is Ilene Woods.

At the time of the recording, Miss Woods would have been working for the Disney Studio as the Cinderella project moved toward completion. By having her partake in this little side job, the studio was clearly looking for inexpensive ways to capitalized on her talents as well as building buzz for their upcoming film.

The album is a fully dramatized story narrated and sung by Dennis Day. Six of the eight songs from the film are included.* The music was arranged and conducted by Paul Smith, one of the original composers of the Snow White score, although not the actual original conductor (that would have been Frank Churchill).

The recording is on a two-disc 78rpm record set from RCA Victor, 1949 (in their Little Nipper Series, Y-33). Note: This would be the last year that Disney utilized third party companies such as RCA Victor to record and publish their music. In 1950, the Walt Disney Music Company was formed and Cinderella would be its first film soundtrack.

The set also includes a 22 page book.

Book image courtesy of Rosvita Burrows. Used with Permission.

* I'm Wishing, With a Smile and a Song, Whistle While You Work, Heigh-Ho, Some Day My Prince Will Come, One Song