Legendary bandleader Glenn Miller only made two film appearances as an actor. 20th Century Fox's 1941 musical Sun Valley Serenade introduced two standards into the American Songbook - "Chattanooga Choo Choo" and "At Last" - and earned three Academy Award nominations. Its 1942 follow-up, Orchestra Wives, moved Miller from featured status to above-the-title billing and introduced another Oscar-nominated hit, "I've Got a Gal in Kalamazoo." Yet both films, and their remarkable treasure trove of music, have remained largely unheralded. The Kritzerland label is setting out to change that with the first-ever complete soundtrack releases (including over 30 previously unreleased tracks!) to these two classic films featuring rare performances by The Glenn Miller Orchestra at its swinging finest! The limited edition 2-CD set is now available for pre-order from Kritzerland.
Sun Valley Serenade (1941) featured Miller and his orchestra alongside an all-star cast: Olympic champion figure skater Sonja Henie, John Payne, Milton Berle, Lynn Bari, Joan Davis, Dorothy Dandridge, The Modernaires, and The Nicholas Brothers. In addition to established Miller classics ("Moonlight Serenade," "In the Mood"), the movie directed by H. Bruce Humberstone boasted songs by the team of Harry Warren and Mack Gordon including the winter favorite "It Happened in Sun Valley." An elaborate production number with Dandridge and The Nicholas Brothers was set to Warren and Gordon's "Chattanooga Choo Choo," which became not only a major smash for Miller but the first-ever recipient of a Gold Record. Another new Warren/Gordon song, "At Last," was also recorded for Sun Valley Serenade, but wasn't used, except as background music in several scenes. "At Last" - later popularized by Etta James and recorded by everybody from Celine Dion to Beyoncé - would end up in the next Miller film.
The success of Sun Valley Serenade led to a quick follow-up, Orchestra Wives. George Montgomery, Ann Rutherford, Lynn Bari, Cesar Romero, Marion Hutton (sister of Betty), The Modernaires and The Nicholas Brothers appeared in director Archie Mayo's film which emphasized realistic drama far more than its predecessor. Warren and Gordon were once again enlisted to provide the score, featuring the cast-off "At Last" as well as "Serenade in Blue," "People Like You and Me," and the Oscar-nominated "I've Got a Gal in Kalamazoo."
Kritzerland's release marks the first complete release of the scores to Sun Valley Serenade and Orchestra Wives. Indeed, each CD is close to eighty minutes in length. Mike Matessino has painstakingly restored both scores from the Fox vault elements for a stunning sonic presentation. The label notes that while the films were given a synthesized stereo treatment in the early 1990s for home video, all of the original music elements are, in fact, mono. Yet these tracks remain clear and vibrant today. All the songs, the incidental scoring, and an array of amazing bonus material (alternates and outtakes!) are here, derived for the first time on CD from all original elements.
These films feature musical direction by the legendary Alfred and Emil Newman as well as truly indelible big-band performances from the unparalleled Glenn Miller Orchestra. We were delighted to speak with the producer of this reissue, Kritzerland's Bruce Kimmel, about this very special title!
Bruce, thanks for taking the time to speak with us about this incredible new release. How long has Sun Valley Serenade/Orchestra Wives been in development at Kritzerland?
Nick Redman and I have been talking about this for two or three years now, but it was a huge task and it just kept getting shoved aside for other stuff. But finally everything fell into place in January, and off on this adventure we went.
Did you and Mike [Matessino] face any unique or unusual challenges in assembling and restoring these complete scores for compact disc release?
When you're dealing with original vault elements of anything from the early 1940s (in this case, 1941 and 1942), it's nothing but unusual challenges. But Mike Matessino has become expert at dealing with them. But for elements that old, they sound absolutely amazing. And to have all of it, finally, is such an incredible thing - each film on its own CD and each CD running over seventy-eight minutes. Lots of never-before-released tracks, wonderful bonus material...Some of this has been out before, but always in very sketchy sound, but only the Glenn Miller tracks - none of the great incidental scoring. It's a major, major upgrade for both Miller fans and film score fans.
It most certainly is! These two films introduced some songs that are still well-known today, especially "At Last" and "Chattanooga Choo Choo." Why aren't the movies better known today? Similarly, I've always wondered why the names of Harry Warren and Mack Gordon remain largely unknown today, outside of musical theatre and movie circles. Any theories?
It's an enigma, given how much incredible music and how many classic songs Harry Warren has written over the years. And Mack Gordon, too. People just probably think Glenn Miller wrote it all; I don't know. No one seems to remember that "Chattanooga" was the first song to ever get a gold record. "At Last" is one of the great songs of that era, and all the other Warren/Gordon songs in the film are wonderful.
What are some of your favorite tracks?
Since "At Last" is one of my all-time favorite songs, any of the incidental tracks featuring it are favorites. Interestingly, the song was written for Sun Valley Serenade, but not used in that film vocally - but it is used in the underscoring, as you'll hear. The skating music cues in Sun Valley Serenade are really wonderful - and, of course, those Glenn Miller tracks, each and every one, cannot be beat. Hearing those musicians and singers in their prime is just a treat.
I know that hearing "At Last" in instrumental form in its original context will be fascinating. You've made so many remarkable discoveries over the years, as Kritzerland is certainly the leader in restoring and reissuing (or issuing for the first time, in so many cases) Golden Age film scores. Why is this so important?
It wasn't planned for us to be so Golden Age-heavy but it's kind of turned out that way - not exclusively, of course, but a lot of our releases fall into that category. Other labels do them, but because sales are better on the 1980s stuff (and now, shockingly, on the 1990s stuff and they've even gone into the 2000s!) that's what they seem to concentrate on. Much of that stuff doesn't interest me at all - so I guess that means I'm not a good businessperson, but I'm not sure Kritzerland has ever put out a CD soundtrack that I don't personally like. Some film music fans just aren't having any of the older stuff, and certainly not if it involves songs, but they may come around to it someday so it's important not to let this stuff melt away into oblivion until it can never be transferred. There have already been scores - classic scores - that are completely lost.
Thank you for all of your efforts in keeping this music alive. This is a major find for collectors of Glenn Miller's oeuvre as well as for fans of big band and swing in general. Why do you think his work still resonates today?
It's a funny phenomenon, but Miller's music has resonated with every generation, maybe because every time there's another movie set in that era, the soundtracks are loaded with his music as source music. It's really timeless, and it's never lost its cool. Miller was a genius and genius tends to resonate through the years.
So well said. Many greats were involved with these two scores, including Alfred and Emil Newman...
They were the musical directors of the films, so they conducted the non-Miller tracks. I don't believe there's any original music from Alfred Newman, but there are cues by Cyril Mockridge and David Buttolph - but most of the incidental music is based around the songs in the film. The orchestrators are people like Alfred Newman, David Raksin, Conrad Salinger - you know, those guys.
What should the Miller fans out there be most excited about?
Having these classic performances sound so great and the new bonus material, too. Plus, they're his only two films and it's great to finally have them complete as complete can be.
Thanks again, Bruce. Here at The Second Disc, we're certainly looking forward to hearing Sun Valley Serenade/Orchestra Wives!
Sun Valley Serenade/Orchestra Wives is limited to 1,000 units only and can be pre-ordered now directly from Kritzerland. CDs will ship by the first week of May, but pre-orders usually ship an average of four weeks early. You can pre-order your copy at the link below!
The Glenn Miller Orchestra, Sun Valley Serenade/Orchestra Wives: Original Soundtracks (Kritzerland KR 20030-7, 2016)
CD 1: Sun Valley Serenade (1941)
- Main Title (The Kiss Polka)/Snoop Magazine **
- It Happened in Sun Valley (Rehearsal) *
- Moonlight Serenade/I Know Why (And So Do You)
- Taxi Ride *
- Toy Instruments/Getting Married *
- In the Mood
- I Know Why (And So Do You) (Piano) *
- At Last *
- Trip to Sun Valley *
- It Happened in Sun Valley
- Ted's Room *
- First Time Skating *
- Miss Carstairs *
- The Rink
- Chattanooga Choo Choo
- Chase Through the Snow
- The Kiss Polka *
- Marriage Announcement *
- Moonlight Ski Ride *
- I Know Why (And So Do You) (Reprise) *
- Sun Valley Ice Ballet
- End Cast
- Main Title Montage (Unused) *
- Sunny Valley Jump (Fox Trot) (Unused)
- Measure for Measure (Unused)
- The Spirit Is Willing (Unused)
- At Last (Alternate) *
- Chase Through the Snow (Alternate No. 1) *
- Chase Through the Snow (Alternate No. 2) *
- End Cast (Alternate) *
CD 2: Orchestra Wives (1942)
- Main Title (Moonlight Serenade)
- Chattanooga Choo Choo (Rehearsal) *
- People Like You and Me
- Boom Shot
- At Last
- Yours (Rhumba) *
- Ready to Fight *
- Father Agrees *
- American Patrol
- Bugle Call Rag
- I'm Not Going to Let You Go *
- Band Montage *
- Pot Pie Joint *
- In Tears *
- Serenade in Blue
- On to Iowa *
- Band Talk *
- Serenade in Blue (Piano) *
- I've Got a Gal in Kalamazoo
- End Title
- Main Title (Moonlight Serenade) (Alternate)
- Serenade in Blue (Alternate) *
- That's Sabotage (Unused)
- You Say the Sweetest Things, Baby (Unused)
- Moonlight Sonata (Unused)
- The Man in the Moon (Unused)
- End Cast (Unused) *
(*) denotes previously unreleased track
(**) contains previously unreleased material
In The Mood: Rollofone Label Celebrates Glenn Miller On New Album Of 78 RPM Records
Odd that no stereo elements are used. I know that several songs exist with stems that will allow synchronized stereo mixes. These have been issued before and aren't electronically created. The last time it was done it was synchronized manually but could be synchronized really well digitally.
That is actually incorrect - everyone knows for a fact and yet the facts are different 🙂 The synthesized stereo tracks on the home vid releases were just that, synthesized by Chace Audio, who was known for that back then. From Mike Matessino, who did this amazing restoration:
Upon evaluating the original elements and finding no legitimate dual perspective material, I back-traced the project to the early '90s with what is now Deluxe Audio and discovered that technically this was a Chace Stereo project. As you know, it was relatively new at the time, and this was simply an example of Fox trying it out.
Yes there are separate overlays and separate vocals -- for SOME but not ALL of the songs -- which allowed, for example, for the orchestra to be stereo-ized while the vocals are basically kept mono. And, yes there are occasional instances where passages between verses have distant orchestra on the vocal track, which could have been utilized to enhance things into a stereo image, but that's it. Any discerning ear can tell what's going on by listening to the track from those videos.
Only where we have genuine dual perspective "push-pull" elements does it make sense to create stereo for a CD soundtrack release and that was not the case here (occasionally I'll stereo-ize a mono track if it has to blend with true stereo material around it). We have not actually had those push/pull elements for titles as early as this. It's the late '40s through '53 that we find them.
The most obvious evidence in this case is that the orchestral material was not slated with two numbers (11 & 12, 81 & 82, etc.) as they would be if they were recorded in dual perspective. Could it have been synthetically stereo-ized? Sure, but that would not have been responsible preservation. The documentation and the elements are clear, even if memories are not.
When people still argued with him - I mean, this is the premiere Fox restoration person, he's not an idiot - he followed up with:
I'm staring at the recording logs right now. I've never been able to upload images here because they have to have a URL link. There are no dual perspective recordings of any of the orchestra tracks, either for the songs for the underscore. The latter are all straight mono. The songs indicate things like: 1) orchestra, 2) principals, 3) chorus, but in several cases those do not survive, only comp mixes. And that's all there is. Additionally, Deluxe Audio's records, which, as I said, I checked, indicate that Chace Stereo ™ was applied to the jobs.
Hope this helps.
I've just ordered this; the samples on the Kritzerland site sound great. This will be my third CD of this music, but it promises to be the best.
I have a question, Bruce. Do Chattanooga Choo Choo and I've Got A Gal In Kalamazoo include the Nicholas Brothers (and, in the case of the former, Dorothy Dandridge) performances? Is there any indication who played the music on those recordings? I'm pretty sure it wasn't the Miller band, but I've never known for sure.
Thanks for doing this!
Hi Mark! According to the Fox paperwork (and all this information is included in the CD booklet), on Choo Choo and Kalamazoo it is the Glenn Miller Orchestra. And yes, all the performances are included.
I have no problem with this being mono. A lot of the rhino/MGM soundtracks that were mixed to stereo had a pallid sound, I think they would have sounded much more impactful mixed to mono.
On the RCA 10" lp soundtracks, there was a clumsy jump or "edit" just as the orchestra changes tempo for the last time, has this been cleaned up?
I haven't heard the record but there are no weird edits on our CD
I would like both, "Sun Valley Serenade" and "Orchestra Wives." This looks exciting.
I received my copy yesterday. It really is a treasure trove of great -- and great-sounding recordings. My only complaint is that the track listings do not include a list of vocalists (Pat Friday for Lynn Bari, etc.).
I believe it's mentioned in the liner notes. You would be shocked at the lack of paperwork on this stuff, so no one is comfortable putting stuff in the track listings that's not confirmed by paperwork - yes, everyone knows who these people are, which is why it's referenced in the liners, but if it's not in the paperwork, then we usually don't list it in the track listing.
I bought this CD a couple of weeks ago, listened to it and found two selections missing from the SVS score. I sent Kritzerland a message, but no response yet. Maybe through the connections you have some folks could be asked about some unused material in the SVS score that is MISSING from this disc compilation.
One big missing element, especially for the Glenn Miller aficionados, is a Warren-Gordon tune that was published with no mention of the SVS score. Hildegarde and others made vintage recordings of it or performed it on radio (in Canada). This first song in question is titled "The World Is Waiting To Waltz Again," and it is believed this was to be performed during the ice sequence by the Glenn Miller Orch. with strings added. John Payne, no great singer, did the vocal on this. I have a rough copy of this audio, but would liked to have heard a clean version of this from the Fox vaults.
Second song in question from SVS score that is missing is also a Warren-Gordon tune, written for Joan Davis, whose role in the film was somehow diminished just prior to its official release. She recorded the comic song "I'm Lena, The Ballerina" for the soundtrack and the sequence was filmed and shown to preview audiences. This is clear from newspaper reviews. There are hints this sequence may have been cut from final version of the film due to production code objections. This is one song that I haven't personally heard, though. Any word on the Fox vault status of this one?
There was also an instrumental selection that Harry Warren is credited with writing that may have been used as part of a cut extended ice ballet sequence. Surely the ice ballet was originally longer than the final presentation, but the version on the disc is exactly what was heard in the film. No extended version. 🙁
As far as is known, what is provided with the "Orchestra Wives" disc appears to be complete.
Would really like to hear from someone about the Miller and Davis tunes that are missing from the SVS disc.
The correct title of CD 1 Track 24 should be SUN Valley Jump not SUNNY Valley Jump.