| Genre: | Children's |
| Creator: | Jan Younghusband Collingwood O'Hare |
| Director: | Tony Collingwood |
| Producer: | Christopher O'Hare |
| Voices: | Dudley Moore (Oscar) (Series 1–2) David Holt (Oscar) (Series 3) Colin McFarlane (Thaddeus Vent/Tank) Elly Fairman (Rebecca) Michael Kilgarriff (Mr Crotchet) Murray Melvin (Lucius) David de Keyser (narrator) Rik Mayall (Young William Tell) |
| Theme Music Composer: | Jan Younghusband |
| Country: | United Kingdom France |
| Language: | English French |
| Num Series: | 3 |
| Num Episodes: | 39 |
| Runtime: | 30 minutes |
| Company: | Tony Collingwood Productions Limited |
| Network: | BBC (UK) France 3 (France) |
Oscar's Orchestra is an animated series that ran from 1995 to 1996 comprising a total of three series and 39 episodes as a BBC competitor to ITV's Budgie the Little Helicopter. The series was produced by the popular British animation studio Tony Collingwood Productions Limited in association with Warner Music Vision and Europe Images, and was originally shown on the BBC as part of their children's block CBBC. It also aired on the British children's cable networks The Children's Channel (TCC) and Nickelodeon and has broadcast in over more than 100 different countries worldwide such as ARD in Germany, France 3 in France, ABC in Australia and syndication in the United States.
According to the first episode, The show is set in the distant future, "in the year 735 squillion, 22 million, 381 thousand, 6 hundred and 4" in a city called New Vienna, and is about a talking piano called Oscar, who rebels against the evil dictator of the world, Thaddeus Vent, who has banned music.[1] Oscar and his fellow musical instruments plot against Vent and his henchmen, Lucius and Tank, and his soothsayer, Goodtooth. Their mission is to overthrow Thadius, save the world and bring back music. The voice of Oscar was provided by Dudley Moore.
Other members of the orchestra included Monty the violin, Trevor the tuba, Sylvia the flute and Eric the triangle. Based on an idea by Jan Younghusband, Oscar's Orchestra was designed to inspire children with the delights of classical music and incorporates famous orchestrated works from the great composers in each episode such as George Frideric Handel, Johann Sebastian Bach, Ludwig van Beethoven, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Frédéric Chopin.[2] The programme's opening music is Mikhail Glinka's Overture to Ruslan and Lyudmila. The episode titles continue the theme, for example 'Bach to the Future'.
Other characters in Oscar's Orchestra are the instruments that are part of Oscar's orchestra, who include Monty the Violin, Eric the Triangle, who is Oscar's best friend and a very avid talker (actually a Bermuda Triangle capable of creating a portal through space and time by touching his two ends together), Trevor the Tuba, Sylvia the Flute, who has a crush on Oscar, Louis the Oboe, who joined the Orchestra from France, and Jan and Stan the Cymbals.
Other instrument characters not in the orchestra include Ken the Keyboard (created by Tim Wall the winner of a Blue Peter competition, to design a new character), Hannah the Harp, Monty's American brother Murray the Violin, Viiola the Viola, Mañana the Guitar, a Spanish friend of Monty's who likes his siestas, the Spanish castanets, Captain Den the Pirate Drum and his two instrument pirate mates, who run a pirate radio station, Scheherazade the Violin from New Arabia, Chordelia the piano, a pink/purple grand piano who Oscar is implied to have a crush on, Chordelia's grandfather Claude, and Sammy the piano, a turquoise small grand piano who is younger than Oscar and Chordelia.
Other human characters include the townspeople of Old Vienna, who are on Oscar and his Orchestra's side, Thaddeus's nephew Tobias Vent, who seems to reciprocate Rebecca's feelings for him and joined the Orchestra's side during the episode Star Crossed, Thaddeus's Spanish Vice Dictator, Big Sam the boss of Chicago, Ali Babwa and his forty thieves, Rheena, who's an opera singer, Thadius's old piano teacher Kevin, who was one of the only people to treat Oscar as a friend when he was Vent's piano, Thaddeus's mother Thadweena, who is the former ruler of the world, and William Tell and his father William Tell.
Other characters in the show include Reg the bumblebee, Plutons (aliens on Pluto), an alien from Jupiter, Martians(aliens on Mars), mechonomen, or robots, created and programmed by Goodtooth for the purpose of destroying Oscar's Orchestra, giant tunnel rats and the Rat King, who allied with Thadius Vent in exchange for smelly cheese and live in the underground tunnels underneath Old Vienna, the Mountain King who lives in the mountain underneath Thadius Vent's castle, and the inhabitants of Count Jugula's castle.
Johann Sebastian Bach, Ludwig van Beethoven, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart have all appeared in the show as humans in the past, when Oscar and his Orchestra go back in time via Eric.
Series 1 & 2 were released on DVD in 2010:
Oscar's Orchestra 3rd Series (Episodes 27 to 39) : No record to date of these being released on DVD.