Overview
Introduction
The Grand Canyon Suite is a suite for orchestra by Ferde Grofé, composed between 1929 and 1931. It was initially titled "Five Pictures of the Grand Canyon".
It consists of five movements, each an evocation in tone of a particular scene typical of the Grand Canyon. Paul Whiteman and his orchestra gave the first public performance of the work, in concert at the Studebaker Theatre in Chicago on November 22, 1931.
Structure
The movements of the suite are:
I. Sunrise
II. Painted Desert
III. On the Trail
IV. Sunset
V. Cloudburst
In the conductor's score, the coda to the Cloudburst movement is notated as a separate movement: VI. Distant Thunder with Crickets Chirping.[citation needed]
Influence
Grand Canyon is a 1958 short Walt Disney film in CinemaScope format directed by James Algar. It features color film footage of the Grand Canyon accompanied by the Grand Canyon Suite, though the order of the movements has been somewhat altered. In the manner of Fantasia, there is no story and no dialogue. The film won an Academy Award in 1959 for Best Short Subject.
On The Trail was the theme music for commercials for Philip Morris cigarettes on US radio and television from 1934 until sometime in the 1960s, accompanied by the voice of Johnny Roventini calling "Call For Philip Morris" in the style of a hotel bellhop paging a customer. This movement is also used extensively in the Bob Clark film "A Christmas Story", with the Celesta solo providing the soundtrack music when Ralphie and his younger brother are seen sleeping and dreaming about Christmas morning.
