Someone--God bless him--has downloaded the episodes of "Victory at Sea" onto Youtube, where you can watch them at your convenience. Clicking once or twice on the image below will play the opening of the first episode.
I watched the TV show with my Dad a few times in the Fifties. He wasn't as interested in it as I was, probably because he'd been there, done it and didn't need to watch it on television. The show, and Richard Rodgers's score, are icons not only of the Navy's participation in World War Two, but the way our Navy's contribution was remembered afterward.
Considering that the various episodes total eleven-and-a-half hours, the creation of the musical score was a formidable task. Of more interest to us, perhaps, than to the general public, is the fact that Richard Rodger's contribution to this effort was limited to the compostion of twelve short themes. The scoring, the cutting, pasting and embellishment of Rodgers's themes into orchestrations that supported the moods of the episodes--was not his own work.
This dirty business was handled by Robert Russell Bennett. Bennett was a premier orchestrator and arranger of Broadway shows for close to half a century. Showboat. Oklahoma! Annie Get Your Gun. The King and I, The Sound of Music: his music is ingrained in American culture.
And thanks to "Victory at Sea," in our Navy careers, too.
It's stirring to experience the music in its original context, with the images, the narration, the "whole nine yards." You can watch many of the episodes at YouTube by clicking here.
Frank Mullen's very unofficial source of poop, skinny and bitching for present and former U.S. Navy Musicians.
