Richard Kaufman and CSO follow Yellow Brick Road to ‘Wizard of Oz’

The 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago attracted millions of wide-eyed visitors to its so-called “White City” of grand neo-classical buildings designed by Daniel H. Burnham and Charles B. Atwood. Situated among the lush landscaping of Frederick Law Olmsted, their pale faux-marble facades illuminated at night by electric lighting, they evoked a semi-utopian vision of the world.

In the following years, while living at 1667 N. Humboldt Blvd., on Chicago’s West Side, L. Frank Baum began writing a kids’ book about an idyllic land with a sparkling Emerald City to which a young girl named Dorothy and her little dog Toto are whisked off in a Kansas cyclone. Published in 1900 as The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, it quickly became a best-seller — one that would spawn 40 spin-offs by Baum and other authors sanctioned by his estate.

“He would have been impressed by the architecture of the [world’s] fair. The White City may have been the inspiration for Emerald City,” William Stillman, co–author of The Wizardry of Oz: The Artistry and Magic of the 1939 MGM Classic,” told the Chicago Tribune in 2000.

But unlike the 1939 film adaptation starring Judy Garland. the book largely eschews darkness. Were that not the case, might a sunnier score and songs — by Herbert Stothart, with Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg — have been less musically interesting? The Chicago Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Richard Kaufman, will perform a live-to-picture presentation of “The Wizard of Oz in Concert” on Nov. 29-Dec. 1 at Symphony Center.

“I believe that the greater the contrast in the scenes, the greater the opportunity for contrasts in the music,” says Kaufman, who has for two decades guided the CSO through a variety of film scores, many (like “Jaws” and “Star Wars”) by the legendary John Williams. “The more threat there is to Dorothy and her trio of friends, the better the drama, and the resulting relief at the end when things turn out OK.”

The contrast to which Kaufman refers keeps things lively, but also makes the orchestra’s job more challenging: Their playing, and Kaufman’s conducting, must be in absolute sync with the visuals onscreen or the whole enterprise risks derailing.

"There are all sorts of emotions in ’The Wizard of Oz.’  It’s fun, it’s scary, it’s heart-warming. The timing needs to be right, but so does the spirit." —Richard Kaufman

“Some film soundtracks are pure underscore [creating a mood], which means there’s a certain amount of forgiveness if you don’t quite pinpoint the timing of where you’re supposed to be,” Kaufman explains. “And then there are films like ‘Wizard of Oz’ and ‘Singin’ in the Rain,’ where, along with underscore, you’re also accompanying singers. It’s like doing a Broadway musical.

For example, the Tin Man sings “If I Only Had a Heart” at one tempo, his aluminum body and his feet tap at two other tempos. "The goal is finding a median tempo that works for all three. You literally go back and forth, listening to his voice, watching his feet and trying to ignore the clanking! And when the Munchkins are singing, one bar is one tempo and the next bar is a different tempo. The challenge is to end up at the right tempo without driving the musicians crazy! 

"When you’re adjusting the tempos,” he adds, “it often feels like the orchestra is the Queen Mary. One second, you’re behind this massive ship pushing her to go faster, and then suddenly racing up to the front and pushing the other way to slow her down. It’s a challenge, but when you are prepared, and have a great orchestra like the CSO, it usually goes well.”

Kaufman has been studying, and will continue to study, the ‘Oz’ score daily so it’s embedded in his brain. Movie soundtracks may seem artistically less rigorous, compared to grand symphonies by Mozart or Beethoven or Tchaikovsky. Often, though, that isn’t the case. Beyond staying precisely on tempo to match what’s happening onscreen (granted, not overly hard for a world-class band like the CSO), film scores are often unfamiliar to musicians — not “in their DNA,” as Kaufman puts it, like centuries-old classics. Moreover, their playing needs to evoke certain emotions that patrons who’ve seen these films multiple times have come to expect.

“This is a creative endeavor,” Kaufman says. “And so, musically, while you’re making sure that the coordination of the timing is what it needs to be, at the same time your goal is to inspire an exciting musical performance. There are all sorts of emotions in ’The Wizard of Oz.’  It’s fun, it’s scary, it’s heart-warming. The timing needs to be right, but so does the spirit. What an extraordinary experience to hear this done by the Chicago Symphony.”