Schulz’s Beethoven: Schroeder’s Muse

Hey, it's Beethoven's birthday today. How do I know that? Because of Peanuts. Because Beethoven is Schroeder's favorite composer and he would remind us every December that the 16th was the man's birthday.


The Charles M. Schulz Museum has a new online exhibit about Peanuts and Beethoven beginning today. Here's the press release:

Hear the Music of the Peanuts Comic Strip
for the First Time On-line in
Schulz’s Beethoven: Schroeder’s Muse

New On-line Exhibition opens
on Beethoven’s birthday, December 16th

www.americanbeethovensociety.org/schulzsbeethoven/

Santa Rosa, California. Musicians are often surprised to find that they can actually play the music notes floating above Schroeder’s toy piano in the Peanuts comic strip, and they are even more amazed to learn that it’s not just anyone’s music Schroeder is playing—the compositions were created by none other than his idol, Ludwig van Beethoven!

Now visitors anywhere in the world can hear the Beethoven excerpts that Schroeder plays in the Peanuts comic strip with a new on-line exhibition devoted to Schulz’s Beethoven, Schroeder’s Muse that will premier on Beethoven’s birthday, December 16.

Schulz’s Beethoven, Schroeder’s Muse features 60 cartoons that include meticulously drawn music from Beethoven’s piano sonatas complemented with manuscripts, first editions, and artwork from the rich collections of the Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies at San José State University. Visitors to the on-line exhibition can listen to the music, travel to other websites to enrich their understanding of the strips, and explore cartoon and music history.

Excerpts from the complete recordings of Beethoven’s sonatas are performed by internationally–renowned pianist Craig Sheppard, Professor of Piano at the University of Washington in Seattle.

An earlier version of the exhibition was mounted at the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa from August 16, 2008 through January 26, 2009, and from May 1 through July 31, 2009, in the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library at San José State University. Both the on-line and the mounted exhibitions are joint projects of The Charles M. Schulz Museum and the Center for Beethoven Studies (San José).

PEANUTS © United Feature Syndicate, Inc.

PRO CARTOONIST & GAG WRITER Mid-Feb 1962

Here is the complete PRO CARTOONIST & GAG WRITER for Mid-February 1962. This pro-zine was put together by the late, great Arnold Wagner. Famous Artists School founder Albert Dorne is caricatured on the coverv and there's an interview with him, conducted by LOOK Magazine cartoon editor Gurney Williams. More highlights:

• Virgil "VIP" Partch launches his syndicated "Big George" panel,
• veteran gag cartoonist Chon Day is interviewed by Arnold Wagner,
• Johnny Hart launches "funny caveman" strip B.C.
• and the many insider features, including ads and "clip and file" market listings to paste into your Rolodex.

Video: Matt Wuerker

The Newseum interviews Poltico's editorial cartoonist Matt Wuerker. All of these clips run a minute or under.

Paul Conrad's Influence



Where He Gets His Ideas



"Low-hanging Fruit" Ideas



Drawing Tools



Reactions to His Cartoons

Cartoon Books and Magazine For Sale

I am clearing my shelves. I have some vintage cartoon books for sale. Please consider taking a look. I'll be adding more.

PRO CARTOONIST & GAG WRITER Feb 1962

I have scanned in the entire PRO CARTOONIST & GAG WRITER for February 1962.

This pro-zine, "The Voice of America's Professional Cartoonists," was edited by Joe Pierre and the late, great Arnold Wagner. Highlights in this issue:

• The cover: Ding Darling's last editorial cartoon accompanies an interior tribute to the late Des Moines Register editorial cartoonist written by Arnold Wagner,
• Art Gates starts up Gates Syndicate.
  
• Virgil "VIP" Partch visits with gag cartoonist Betty Swords,,
• veteran gag cartoonist Chon Day is interviewed by Arnold Wagner (this is the 2nd part of a multi-part interview with this great gag cartoonist),
• and the many other features, including ads and "clip and file" market listings to paste into your Rolodex.

I'll have the following issue of PRO CARTOONIST & GAG WRITER for you tomorrow.

PEARLS BEFORE SWINE Makes Fun of Universal Press Syndicate

Stephan Pastis' PEARLS BEFORE SWINE once again bites the hand that feeds him with a swipe at Universal Press Syndicate's Chairman John Glynn. It's all in today's strip.

Hat tip to Sean Kelly! Thanks, Sean!

RIGHT AROUND HOME by Dudley Fisher Part 2

Ten Cent Dreams scans in a quartet of RIGHT AROUND HOME syndicated comics by Dudley Fisher. These were all large panel, bird's-eye-view looks at small town America and its habits. Just for sheer cartoon drawing power, Ohioian Dudley Fisher has a clean line that's lovely to look at.

Related: more RIGHT AROUND HOME here.

The Month Before Christmas by Frank Jacobs with Drawings by Don Martin

The Golden Age Comic Book Stories blog hits one out of the part with "The Month Before Christmas" by Frank Jacobs with art by the late, great Don Martin, MAD's "Maddest" Artist! This is from MAD Magazine #132, January 1970. I haven't seen these drawings since I was a kid and I remember them all. Like so much of Mr. Martin's output, these cartoons bored a hole into my young soul.

A large tip o' the hat to Tom Spurgeon.

Rube Goldberg at Work

Last week was the anniversary of Rube Goldberg (7/7/1883 - 12/7/1970) passing away.

Reuben Lucius Goldberg was one of the founding members and the first president of the National Cartoonists Society. The Reuben Award, the "Oscar" of cartooning, is named after him.

Although he graduated in 1904 from the University of California Berkeley with a degree in engineering, Rube only worked as an engineer for all of six months. He left City of San Francisco Water and Sewer Department to work at the San Francisco papers; first, the Chronicle, then, the next year, the Bulletin.

He moved to New York City in 1907, working for five newspapers. His work was syndicated beginning in 1915. He married Irma Seeman a year later.

As Wikipedia puts it:

Goldberg is best known for a series of popular cartoons he created depicting complex devices that perform simple tasks in indirect, convoluted ways – now known as Rube Goldberg machines.

And so, as we learn, he did succeed as a sort of engineer!

I just happened to have a couple of these photos of Goldberg at his drawing board in later years. I would guess this is may be when he lived in his Long Island home, although it looks like he's in a Manhattan high-rise in the above photo. I can't recall where these photos were originally found. Just something found on the hard drive.

I do know that if you were out along the North Shore in the 1960s, you could easily find his house because his bold "Goldberg" signature was on his mailbox.


There's a lot to admire about his lasting impact. He won a Pulitzer, and his own Reuben Award (although he had to wait nearly 2 decades before his colleagues voted that he should receive it), and his name lived on as an adjective for an over-engineered mechanism.

Related: Some more cartoonist photos from the San Francisco Examiner.

Meeting Brant Parker by Richard Thompson

Richard Thompson talks about visiting cartoonist Brant Parker when he (Richard) was a teenager. It was a big moment, meeting a real adult who cartoons for a living. Richard recalls visiting his studio to interview him for the school paper:

"He had a mustache, great eyebrows and kind eyes and he was affable and twinkly and immensely droll. I guess we went through a handshake and pleased to meet you and I love your work and all the usual niceties. Then I sat and listened to him answer questions, all the usual ones, and describe his work process, pretty much the usual process, and tell funny stories. And I remember what his studio looked like; it had a kitchen and an American flag on the ceiling and a TV that he kept on with the sound off (as inspiration, he said) and there were drawings everywhere."

The rest is here.

Video: DOCTOR WHO "End of Time" New Promo and Clips

Above: Bernard Cribbins as Tom Campbell, in a photo from the movie DALEK INVASION OF EARTH (1966). He would return to DOCTOR WHO in 2007 as Wildred Mott, Donna Noble's grandpa. More about recurring WHO actors in The Ones Who Came Back.

Ooh. Some good video in the run up to the final episodes.

Some rather mild spoilers in these clips, but if you have to get some DOCTOR WHO clips (and I have to) ASAP, then here they are. No major plot elements are exposed, other than stuff you may have seen in previous preview (like who the adversary is, what characters return, etc.).

New "End of Time" trailer:



A clip from the episode:



Bernard Cribbins & David Tennant:



In the United States, the final 3 Tennant episodes air on BBC America:

"The Waters of Mars" Dec 19
"End of Time" Part 1 Dec 26
"End of Time" Part 2 Jan 2

Hat tip to TrekMovie for the clips.

Video: Tom Hart Interview

Victor Kalogiannis and Andrew Goldstein interview cartoonist Tom Hart at the School of Visual Arts. The interview is in 9 segments, each runs five minutes.



Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Part 7
Part 8
Part 9

Fake STAR TREK Motivational Posters

Some hilarious (and a few NSFW) spoof STAR TREK motivational posters for your Friday viewing pleasure.


H/t to Mark "From hell I spit at thee!" Anderson!

A Day in the Life: Walt Kelly (1955) by Michael Barrier

I missed this item, posted by Michael Barrier: Here is a press package that the Hall Syndicate sent out: 8 photos of their star cartoonist, Walt Kelly, to be published in papers across the country and push on the good name of POGO. This is, as Barrier aptly describes it, "a glimpse back 53 years into the workaday world of the man who was in the eyes of some, myself included, the greatest comic-strip creator, ever."

Editor & Publisher 1884-2009

Editor and Publisher, as well as Kirkus, will cease publication effective at the end of this year.

Shawn Moynihan, E&P's managing editor/online editor, wrote on the site:

As news spread of E&P's fate, the staffers have been inundated with calls from members of the industry it covers, and many others, expressing shock and hopes for a revival. Staff members will stay on for the remainder of 2009.

Greg Mitchell, editor since 2002, has hailed the staff and accomplishments, including a dozen major awards and strong showing on the Web for many years. Some staff writers/editors have been at E&P for a quarter of a century. "I'm shocked that a way was not found for the magazine to continue it some form -- and remain hopeful that this may still occur," he said.

TCJ.com: Audio Interviews w/Schulz, Breathed, Crumb, Walt Kelly, more

The Comics Journal has released, for your personal download pleasure, audio files of interviews through the years with:

• Charles Schulz
  
  
• Berkeley Breathed
  
  
• Gil Kane and Robert Crumb
  
  
• Walt Kelly
  
  
• Stan Lee

The Charles Schulz interview is mammoth, and well worth a listen. If I recall correctly, the Walt Kelly interview is the one where he's getting heckled by another cartoonist: Rube Goldberg. Like I said, these recordings span the years. Nab them now before they're gone!