''Tubby the Tuba'' is a 1947 American animated short film from

Paramount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film and television production company, production and Distribution (marketing), distribution company and the main namesake division of Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS). It is the fifth-oldes ...

, directed by

George Pal George Pal (born György Pál Marczincsak; ; February 1, 1908 – May 2, 1980) was a Hungarian-American animator, film director and producer, principally associated with the fantasy and science-fiction genres. He became an American citizen after ...

as part of his '' Puppetoons'' series. It was based on the

original song "Original Song" is the sixteenth episode of the second season of the American television series '' Glee'', and the thirty-eighth episode overall. It was written by Ryan Murphy, directed by Bradley Buecker, and premiered on Fox in the United St ...

Paul Tripp Paul Tripp (February 20, 1911 – August 29, 2002) was an American children's musician, author, songwriter, and television and film actor. He collaborated with a fellow composer, George Kleinsinger. Tripp was the creator of the 1945 " Tubby ...

and

George Kleinsinger George Kleinsinger (February 13, 1914, San Bernardino, California – July 28, 1982, New York City, New York) was an American composer. His works include his collaboration with Paul Tripp on the 1940s children's classical-music piece " Tubby the T ...

. The film features narration by Victor Jory. The film received an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

nomination for Best Animated Short, but lost to

Warner Bros. Cartoons Warner Bros. Cartoons, Inc. was an American animation studio, serving as the in-house animation division of Warner Bros. during the Golden Age of American animation. One of the most successful animation studios in American media history, it was ...

' ''

Merrie Melodies ''Merrie Melodies'' is an American animated series of comedy short films produced by Warner Bros. starting in 1931, during the golden age of American animation, and ending in 1969. Then some new cartoons were produced from the late 1970s to the ...

'' cartoon ''

Tweetie Pie ''Tweetie Pie'' is a 1947 Warner Bros. ''Merrie Melodies'' cartoon directed by Friz Freleng. The short was released on May 3, 1947, and stars Tweety with Sylvester the Cat, who is called "Thomas" in this cartoon. ''Tweetie Pie'' marks the first ...

''. A feature-length version was released in 1975 by AVCO Embassy. The 1987 compilation feature, '' The Puppetoon Movie'', featured the original short in its entirety.Amazon.com: The Puppetoon Movie
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Plot

This story takes place in an

orchestra An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...

featuring, among each other, a

piccolo The piccolo ( ; Italian for 'small') is a half-size flute and a member of the woodwind family of musical instruments. Sometimes referred to as a "baby flute" the modern piccolo has similar fingerings as the standard transverse flute, but the s ...

(Peepo), a

flute The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedles ...

, an

oboe The oboe ( ) is a type of double reed woodwind instrument. Oboes are usually made of wood, but may also be made of synthetic materials, such as plastic, resin, or hybrid composites. The most common oboe plays in the treble or soprano range. ...

, a

clarinet The clarinet is a musical instrument in the woodwind family. The instrument has a nearly cylindrical bore and a flared bell, and uses a single reed to produce sound. Clarinets comprise a family of instruments of differing sizes and pitch ...

, a

bassoon The bassoon is a woodwind instrument in the double reed family, which plays in the tenor and bass ranges. It is composed of six pieces, and is usually made of wood. It is known for its distinctive tone color, wide range, versatility, and virtuos ...

, a

trumpet The trumpet is a brass instrument commonly used in classical and jazz ensembles. The trumpet group ranges from the piccolo trumpet—with the highest register in the brass family—to the bass trumpet, pitched one octave below the standard ...

, a

French horn The French horn (since the 1930s known simply as the horn in professional music circles) is a brass instrument made of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. The double horn in F/B (technically a variety of German horn) is the horn most ...

, a

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...

, a tuba (Tubby), a

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

, a

cello The cello ( ; plural ''celli'' or ''cellos'') or violoncello ( ; ) is a bowed (sometimes plucked and occasionally hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually tuned in perfect fifths: from low to high, C2, G2, ...

, a

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...

, a

xylophone The xylophone (; ) is a musical instrument in the percussion family that consists of wooden bars struck by mallets. Like the glockenspiel (which uses metal bars), the xylophone essentially consists of a set of tuned wooden keys arranged in ...

cymbals A cymbal is a common percussion instrument. Often used in pairs, cymbals consist of thin, normally round plates of various alloys. The majority of cymbals are of indefinite pitch, although small disc-shaped cymbals based on ancient designs soun ...

, a

timpani Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionall ...

and a

celeste Celeste may refer to: Geography * Mount Celeste, unofficial name of a mountain on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada * Celeste, Texas, a rural city in North Texas ** Celeste High School, public high school located in the city of Celest ...

. Tubby, the orchestra's tuba, comments after a rehearsal's warmup that he is tired of playing only the bass line. This draws ridicule from the other instruments, and Tubby runs off crying to a nearby creek. A

frog A frog is any member of a diverse and largely Carnivore, carnivorous group of short-bodied, tailless amphibians composing the order (biology), order Anura (ανοὐρά, literally ''without tail'' in Ancient Greek). The oldest fossil "proto-f ...

who lives there consoles Tubby; both are treated poorly, as neither is thought to be capable or worthy of a solo. The frog teaches Tubby a melody and the two part ways. The next day, at the warmup, Tubby begins playing his newly learned melody. The orchestral instruments are shocked, but are encouraged to let the tuba have his solo by their conductor. With the frog's help, Tubby gets to play his solo.

References

External links

* * *
Tubby the Tuba
' on TCM 1947 films 1947 animated films American animated short films Short films directed by George Pal Paramount Pictures short films Puppetoons Stop-motion animated short films 1940s American films {{short-animation-film-stub