May 22 - Thurl Ravenscroft

Image courtesy discogs.com

On this day, in 2005, Thurl Arthur Ravenscroft passed away in Fullerton, California. Born in Norfolk, Nebraska on February 6, 1914, Thurl hit the road soon after high school, landing in Los Angeles, California. He began an art education at the Otis College of Art and Design. While at Otis, he became part of a singing quartet known as the Sportsmen Quartet. They could frequently be heard on Jack Benny’s radio show. Thurl’s first brush with the Walt Disney Studio came in 1940. The singing group he was a part of (it’s usually credited as the Mellomen, but that group didn’t form until 1948, so it may have been the Sportsmen) sang a song for Pinocchio called Honest John. The song was cut from the final film. Some sources claim it only ever existed for promotional purposes, but parts of the melody can be heard underscoring scenes with Foulfellow and Gideon, so who really knows anymore. Thurl himself got to remain in the film, though, as he had also been recorded as Monstro the Whale’s ‘voice.’ 

Image copyright Disney

In 1948 (as near as I can tell), Thurl got together with a few friends a formed a quartet usually known as The Mellomen (they recorded under a variety of names over the years). In addition to singing backup to the likes of Doris Day, Bing Crosby, Peggy Lee and Elvis Presley, the Mellomen made appearances in all sorts of Disney projects. You can hear them as the guards painting the roses red in Alice in Wonderland, pirates and native Americans in Peter Pan, the dogs in the pound in Lady and the Tramp, the elephant patrol in The Jungle Book, the trees in Babes in Toyland, singing the opening to Zorro, as the Honeypot Quartet in the Winnie the Pooh shorts and singing A Pirates Life for Me throughout the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. The group was also featured on several episodes of the Disneyland anthology television series and Disneyland Records albums. The Mellomen performed together well into the Seventies before running out of steam and harmonizing their way into the sunset. 

Image copyright Disney

Thurl not only racked up an impressive list of Disney credits with his quartet, but he holds iconic solo roles, too. In one of them, he actually gets the dubious distinction of being mistaken for Walt Disney more than anyone else, ever. Have you ever had someone try to tell you that one of the singing busts in the graveyard scene of the Haunted Mansion was Walt himself? It’s not. It’s actually Thurl (must be the whole mustache thing). And for those of you who wonder about that sort of thing, his bust has a name: Uncle Theodore. He is also the voice of the drunken pirate in Pirates of the Caribbean, Buff, the American bison head, in the Country Bear Jamboree, and the first mate on the Mark Twain Riverboat. Thurl can also still be heard every half hour or so in The Enchanted Tiki Room as Fritz, the German accented macaw.  

Image copyright Disney

Lest you think that Thurl only soloed when it came to Disney attractions, you might recognize his deep bass from any one of the following Disney films: Paul Bunyan in the short Paul Bunyan (what else), Captain the Horse in One Hundred and One Dalmatians, Sir Bart in The Sword in the Stone, Billy Bass, the Russian Cat, in The Aristocats and Kirby in The Brave Little Toaster series (while not created by Disney, they were distributed by the company). In 1995, Thurl was declared an official Disney Legend for all the incredible voice work he’d done over the years. 

Image copyright Kellogg's

Thurl didn’t do a whole lot of voice work outside of Disney, but what he did do is instantly recognizable. He is the uncredited singing voice of the Grinch in holiday classic How the Grinch Stole Christmas. He sang the song No Dogs Allowed for the 1972 Peanuts special Snoopy Come Home. But one of his most famous roles was one he first did in 1953 and continued doing until 2005, long after he’d retired from everything else. For 52 years, Thurl was the (until the end) uncredited voice behind Tony the Tiger, telling everyone how Grrreat! Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes are. He’s been replaced as Tony since then by Lee Marshall, but if you listen closely to the commercials, every once in a while you can still hear a recycled bit of Thurl. Only a few months after recording his last tagline, the great bass voice succumbed to prostate cancer at his home in Fullerton, California. He was 91.