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Oliver Wallace

English-American composer (1887–1963)

Oliver Wallace
Background information
Born	(1887-08-06)August 6, 1887 London, England, UK
Died	September 15, 1963(1963-09-15) (aged 76) Los Angeles, California, US
Genres	Film score, musical theatre
Occupation(s)	Composer
Years active	1911–63

Oliver George Wallace (August 6, 1887 – September 15, 1963) was an English composer and conductor.^[1] He was especially known for his film music compositions, which were written for many animation, documentary, and feature films from Walt Disney Studios.^[2]

Biography[edit]

Wallace was born on August 6, 1887, in London. After completing his musical training, he went to the United States in 1904, becoming a US citizen ten years later.^[1] He initially worked primarily on the West Coast in Seattle as a conductor of theater orchestras and as an organist accompanying silent films. At the same time, he also made a name as a songwriter, writing tunes such as the popular "Hindustan [de]". With the advent of the talking film era, he worked increasingly for Hollywood film studios in the 1930s.

In 1936 he joined Disney Studios and quickly became one of the most important composers in the studio for animated short films. He provided the music for 139 of these shorts. One of his best-known pieces is the song "Der Fuehrer's Face" from the 1942 Donald Duck propaganda cartoon, though he was uncredited. This parody of a Horst Wessel song was, mainly through the version by Spike Jones and His City Slickers, one of the biggest hits during the Second World War. Other shorts he scored included Ben and Me (1953), about Benjamin Franklin and a mouse, and the Oscar-winning Toot, Whistle, Plunk and Boom (1953), the first cartoon to use the new CinemaScope process. He also appeared in live action reference footage for Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), posing as a live action model for two of the seven dwarfs that were stacked on top of each other, Dopey and Sneezy. He also did the whistling voice for Ichabod Crane as he’s riding home on his horse in The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949).

Walt Disney also had Wallace score full-length films for the studios for over 27 years. He started writing and orchestrating the score for Dumbo (1941), for which he, together with Frank Churchill, won his first and only Oscar in 1942.^[3] He went on to score Victory Through Air Power (1943), The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949), Cinderella (1950) along with Paul J. Smith, Alice in Wonderland (1951), Peter Pan (1953), and White Wilderness (1958). His last work for a Disney animated feature was Lady and the Tramp (1955). He received four other Oscar nominations for the music to Victory Through Air Power with Edward H. Plumb and Paul J. Smith (losing to Alfred Newman for The Song of Bernadette), Cinderella with Paul J. Smith (losing to Adolph Deutsch and Roger Edens for Annie Get Your Gun), Alice in Wonderland (losing to Johnny Green and Saul Chaplin for An American in Paris), and White Wilderness (losing to Dimitri Tiomkin for The Old Man and the Sea). A common characteristic of all these productions was the cooperation of several composers in the creation of the music. Wallace understood this and integrated leitmotiv-like elements from the individual songs into the film scores.

When the Disney studios began to increasingly produce full-length feature films, Wallace also wrote scores for these. In Darby O'Gill and the Little People (1959), Wallace wrote not only the score but also set the Lawrence Edward Watkin-penned popular songs "Pretty Irish Girl" and "The Wishing Song". In Toby Tyler, or Ten Weeks with a Circus (1959), he appeared as an actor, playing the conductor of the circus band.

Starting with Seal Island (1948), Wallace also specialized in musical accompaniments for Disney documentaries, including nearly all the films for the "People and Places" series and some of the True-Life Adventures. The music of White Wilderness (1958) was even nominated for an Oscar in 1959, a rare feat for a documentary film.

Overall, Wallace contributed music to almost over 150 Walt Disney productions.^[2] He worked for Disney studios for 27 years.^[4] He remained active in the studio in Los Angeles until shortly before his death at a Burbank, California hospital on September 15, 1963, at the age of 76.^[4] In 2008, he was posthumously honored with a Disney Legends award.^[5]

Filmography[edit]

This list is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (July 2018)

Most of the films were scored in collaboration with other composers.

• 1934 – Girl in the Case – Music
• 1941 – Dumbo – Score and some songs
• 1943 – Victory Through Air Power – Score
• 1944 – The Three Caballeros – Score
• 1946 – Make Mine Music – Score
• 1947 – Fun and Fancy Free – Score
• 1948 – Seal Island – Score
• 1949 – The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad – Score
• 1950 – Cinderella – Score
• 1951 – Alice in Wonderland – Score
• 1953 – Peter Pan – Score and some songs
• 1954 – Siam – Score
• 1955 – Men Against the Arctic – Score
• 1955 – Lady and the Tramp – Score
• 1957 – Old Yeller – Score and song
• 1958 – White Wilderness – Score
• 1958 – Tonka – Score
• 1959 – Darby O'Gill and the Little People – Score and song
• 1960 – Jungle Cat – Score
• 1960 – Ten Who Dared – Score
• 1961 – Nikki, Wild Dog of the North – Score
• 1962 – Big Red – Score
• 1962 – The Legend of Lobo – Score
• 1963 – Savage Sam – Score
• 1963 – The Incredible Journey – Score (final film)

Animated Shorts[edit]

Actor[edit]

• Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) as Dopey and Sneezy (live-action reference)
• The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949) as Mr. Winkie (voice, uncredited)/Ichabod Crane (whistling, uncredited)
• Toby Tyler, or Ten Weeks with a Circus (1960) – as the Bandleader (voice)

References[edit]

External links[edit]

• Oliver WallaceatIMDb