The Band Concert

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The first color Mickey Mouse cartoon, and still one of his most popular of the Classic Disney Shorts, "The Band Concert" is a 1935 cartoon in which Mickey attempts to conduct Giacomo Rossini's William Tell Overture at a outdoor picnic, but is frequently interrupted by Donald Duck, who attempts to play "Turkey in the Straw" with his infinite arsenal of fifes. Hilarity Ensues.

The short currently holds #3 on Jerry Beck's "The 50 Greatest Cartoons" list, the highest ranking Disney short on it.

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Tropes

• Amusing Injuries: Horace Horsecollar hits a colleague instrumentalist with his cymbals and a hammer in an attempt to kill an annoying bee.
• Call Back: The Sega CD version of Mickey Mania has a level based on this cartoon included as a bonus.
  • House of Mouse in one episode had Mickey briefly don his band concert uniform for a second when he was shifting through his many designs over the years to prove he was really Mickey in that episode.
  • When Mickey meets Horace Horsecollar in Epic Mickey, Horace tries to entice Mickey's memory of him with this cartoon among others. (The provided photo had Horace almost out of frame.)
• Cartoon Conductor
• Does This Remind You of Anything: Near the end the entire orchestra hangs from a large tree, resembling a Christmas tree.
• Do Not Touch the Funnel Cloud
• Early Installment Weirdness: Mostly with Donald's long-billed appearance. Donald also seems to be almost a toned-down Screwy Squirrel here, and is much shorter than Mickey.
• Exactly What It Says On the Tin: It's a band concert.
• Mickey Mousing Despite a lot of the music coming from on-screen instruments, there is still a lot of this going on.
• Nice Hat: Mickey and several of the band players wear them.
• Ice Cream In My Pants
• Running Gag:
  • Mickey's sleeves are too long and keep falling over his hands and baton.
  • Donald playing Turkey in the Straw on his fifes.