Over the Rainbow of The Wizard of Oz+Somewhere Over the Rainbow Song+NATS Musical Theater Audition

Over the Rainbow

*Brooks is the category 2-3 finalist at the 2023 SFBAC NATS Musical Theater, Commercial Music, Singer-Songwriter Auditions held November 4, 2023 at California State University East Bay in Hayward, CA.

For his distinctive performance, Brooks was selected by the concert grand jury to receive the Children/Youth Award.

He sings "Over the Rainbow" from 'The Wizard of Oz' by Harold Arlen and E.Y. Harburg. The accompanist is Daniel Lockert. Brooks is studying with Yuhan Sun.

The original video is from:    • SFBAC NATS 2023 Musical Theater, Commercia...  

*Lyrics in the video:
Somewhere over the rainbow
Way up high
There's a land that I heard of
Once in a lullaby

Somewhere over the rainbow
Skies are blue
And the dreams that you dare to dream
Really do come true

Someday I'll wish upon a star
And wake up where the clouds are far
Behind me
Where troubles melt like lemon drops
Away above the chimney tops
That's where you'll find me

Somewhere over the rainbow
Bluebirds fly
Birds fly over the rainbow
Why, then, oh, why can't I?

If happy little bluebirds fly
Beyond the rainbow
Why, oh, why can't I?

*"Over the Rainbow" is a ballad by Harold Arlen with lyrics by Yip Harburg. It was written for the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz, in which it was sung by actress Judy Garland in her starring role as Dorothy Gale. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song and became Garland's signature song.

About five minutes into the film, Dorothy sings the song after failing to get Aunt Em, Uncle Henry, and the farmhands to listen to her story of an unpleasant incident involving her dog, Toto, and the town spinster, Miss Gulch (Margaret Hamilton). Aunt Em tells her to "find yourself a place where you won't get into any trouble". This prompts her to walk off by herself, musing to Toto, "Someplace where there isn't any trouble. Do you suppose there is such a place, Toto? There must be. It's not a place you can get to by a boat, or a train. It's far, far away. Behind the moon, beyond the rain", at which point she begins singing.

*Background
Composer Harold Arlen and lyricist Yip Harburg often worked in tandem, Harburg generally suggesting an idea or title for Arlen to set to music, before Harburg contributed the lyrics. For their work together on The Wizard of Oz, Harburg claimed his inspiration was "a ballad for a little girl who... was in trouble and... wanted to get away from... Kansas. A dry, arid, colorless place. She had never seen anything colorful in her life except the rainbow". Arlen decided the idea needed "a melody with a long broad line".
By the time all the other songs for the film had been written, Arlen was feeling the pressure of not having the song for the Kansas scene. He often carried blank pieces of music manuscript in his pockets to jot down short melodic ideas. Arlen described how the inspiration for the melody to "Over the Rainbow" came to him suddenly while his wife Anya drove:

"I said to Mrs. Arlen... 'let's go to Grauman's Chinese ... You drive the car, I don't feel too well right now.' I wasn't thinking of work. I wasn't consciously thinking of work, I just wanted to relax. And as we drove by Schwab's Drug Store on Sunset I said, 'Pull over, please.' ... And we stopped and I really don't know why—bless the muses—and I took out my little bit of manuscript and put down what you know now as 'Over the Rainbow.'"
The song was originally sung in A-flat major. Arlen later wrote the contrasting bridge section based on the idea of "a child's piano exercise".
Italian newspaper Il Messaggero has noted a resemblance, both harmonic and melodic, between Over the Rainbow and the theme of the intermezzo (known as Ratcliff's Dream) of Pietro Mascagni's 1895 opera Guglielmo Ratcliff.

*The Wizard of Oz
The music was played on a particularly renowned Stradivarius violin.

*Recordings by Judy Garland
On October 7, 1938, Judy Garland recorded the song on the MGM soundstage with an arrangement by Murray Cutter. In September 1939, a studio recordingof the song, not from the film soundtrack, was recorded and released as a single for Decca. In March 1940, that same recording was included on a Decca 78 four-record studio cast album entitled The Wizard of Oz. Although this isn't the version that appeared in the film, Decca continued to release the "cast album" into the 1960s after it was reissued on disc, a 331⁄3-rpm album.
The film version of "Over the Rainbow" was unavailable to the public until the soundtrack was released by MGM in 1956 to coincide with the television premiere of The Wizard of Oz. The soundtrack version has been re-released several times over the years, including a deluxe edition by Rhino in 1995.

After The Wizard of Oz appeared in 1939, "Over the Rainbow" became Garland's signature song. She performed it for thirty years and sang it as she had for the film. She said she wanted to remain true to the character of Dorothy and to the message of being somewhere over the rainbow.

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