Scan barcode
jmandrake's review
4.0
This was a really fascinating read. Goldmark goes into great detail about the history of music in animation, focusing on early Hollywood cartoons from Warner Bros., Disney, MGM, and others from the 1930s through the 1950s, the Golden Age of animation. Using carefully researched case studies of specific shorts and composers like Carl Stalling and Scott Bradley, Goldmark really does an incredible job of tracing how music was used in these cartoons--how studio practices influenced the process of composition, how popular songs were incorporated into the shorts, and how jazz and opera started to infuse so many cartoons. I would have loved to see Goldmark talk more about cartoons outside this era, and he only assigns two pages to modern cartoons, but the dearth of studies on this topic make any contribution worthwhile. I thought Tunes for 'Toons was overall an immensely enjoyable and readable book. If you have any interest in the history of animation, definitely check it out.
More...