Bugs Bunny at the Symphony Album and Performances

This is the sequel to Bugs Bunny on Broadway, the record-setting orchestra-and-film concert that reinvented a new genre of symphony orchestra concert when it debuted in 1990.

Also in keeping with the project's 20-year history of traversing the globe, Bugs Bunny at the Symphony is currently being unveiled in a series of major performances that are spanning the planet, including the one month Australian tour just completed. The Bowl performances, which will include a spectacular fireworks display, will also mark Warner Bros.' official celebration of the concert's 20th anniversary. The U.S. East Coast premiere will take place in Washington D.C. with the National Symphony Orchestra at Wolf Trap Filene Center on Friday and Saturday, August 6 and 7, followed by an American/Canadian tour in 2010-11. The production debuts in Asia in April, 2011.

Conducted and created by Emmy Award� winner George Daugherty, Bugs Bunny at the Symphony had the first of two world premiere engagements in May 2010 at the Sydney Opera House, with the Sydney Symphony, and this new CD captures the excitement of that sold-out debut. Bugs Bunny at the Symphony has the second tier of its world premiere on July 16 and 17 at the Hollywood Bowl, with the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

In 1990, Bugs Bunny On Broadway, conducted and created by Daugherty, took the symphony orchestra world by storm, and pioneered the brand new concept of "live orchestra and big screen" concerts. Since its legendary Broadway premiere at The Gershwin Theatre, the original concert has circumnavigated the globe several times over, playing to millions of people worldwide in iconic venues ranging from the Hollywood Bowl to London's Royal Festival Hall, Moscow's Kremlin Palace and the Sydney Opera House, and with the world's greatest orchestras, from the Los Angeles Philharmonic to the Sydney Symphony, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, The Cleveland Orchestra, and The Philadelphia Orchestra, just to name but a few of many.

The new version of the concert celebrates this 20-year legacy of Looney Tunes and orchestral music "in concert." Bugs Bunny at the Symphony retains the most indelible moments from the original production, including Chuck Jones' inspired What's Opera, Doc? and The Rabbit of Seville, while adding in other Warner Bros. classics like Friz Freleng's Rhapsody Rabbit, and the virtuoso orchestral roller coaster ride of the Road Runner epic Zoom and Bored. Also new are special guest appearances of Tom and Jerry In The Hollywood Bowl, and other "guest stars" from the larger Warner Bros. animation family ... including The Flintstones and Scooby-Doo.

As with the original concert, the stars of this CD not only include Bugs Bunny, Elmer Fudd, Porky Pig, Daffy Duck, and the rest of the Looney Tunes gang, plus their voices as performed by the celebrated Mel Blanc and Arthur Q. Bryan, but even more importantly, the extraordinary musical genius of composers Carl Stalling and Milt Franklyn. As the composers and orchestrators behind the Looney Tunes, Stalling and Franklyn expertly composed scores that borrowed from classical music icons, as well as the popular songs of the day. They created some of the best-loved � and most adventurous -- American symphonic compositions of the last century, while at the same time introducing classical music to new generations through their sharp but loving reenactments of Rossini's "The Barber of Seville" (as "The Rabbit of Seville") and, amazingly, Wagner's entire Ring Cycle (condensed from four nights down to seven minutes in "What's Opera, Doc?").

"When it comes to 20th century American composers, Stalling and Franklyn are part of a very small and rarified upper echelon," said Daugherty. "Their Looney Tunes film scores are not only unforgettable and irresistible to audiences of all ages, but were composed with such skill and expertise that they are also irresistible to the most discerning symphony orchestra musicians in the world. There are very, very few composers in our musical world who cross all those boundaries so brilliantly."

Daugherty points out that this CD is the first major new recording of Stalling's and Franklyn's work to be released in almost two decades, coming as a successor to the original Bugs Bunny on Broadway album, as well as the critically-acclaimed Stalling Project and Stalling Project II. The CD contains nine full-length cartoon scores, excerpts and songs from 10 others, plus two full-length symphonic overtures which inspired the cartoons.