Development The film was partly based on a series of
Peanuts comic strips originally published in newspapers in February 1966. That story had a much different ending: Charlie Brown was eliminated in his class spelling bee right away for misspelling the word
maze ("M–A–Y–S" while thinking of baseball legend
Willie Mays), thus confirming Violet's prediction that he would make a fool of himself. He then screams at his teacher in frustration, causing him to be sent to the principal's office. (A few gags from that storyline, however, were also used in the 1967 TV special ''
You're in Love, Charlie Brown''.) Finance was raised from
Cinema Center Films.
Music The film also included several original songs, some of which boasted vocals for the first time: "Failure Face", "
I Before E" and "Champion Charlie Brown" (Before the film, musical pieces in Peanuts specials were primarily instrumental, except for a few traditional songs in
A Charlie Brown Christmas.)
Rod McKuen wrote and sang the title song. He also wrote "Failure Face" and "Champion Charlie Brown". The instrumental tracks interspersed throughout the film were composed by
Vince Guaraldi and arranged by
John Scott Trotter (who also wrote "I Before E"). The music consisted mostly of uptempo jazz tunes that had been heard since some of the earliest
Peanuts television specials aired back in 1965; however, for the film, they were given a more "theatrical" treatment, with lusher horn-filled arrangements. Instrumental tracks used in it included "Skating" (first heard in
A Charlie Brown Christmas) and "Baseball Theme" (first heard in ''
Charlie Brown's All-Stars''). When discussing the augmentation of Guaraldi's established jazz scores with additional musicians, Lee Mendelson commented, "It wasn't that we thought Vince's jazz couldn't carry the movie, but we wanted to supplement it with some 'big screen music.' We focused on Vince for the smaller, more intimate Charlie Brown scenes; for the larger moments, we turned to Trotter's richer, full-score sound." Guaraldi's services were passed over entirely for the second
Peanuts feature film,
Snoopy Come Home, with Mendelson turning to longtime
Disney composers, the
Sherman Brothers, to compose the music score. The segment during the "Skating" sequence was choreographed by American figure skater
Skippy Baxter. A segment during the middle of the film, in which Schroeder plays the entire 2nd Movement of Beethoven's
Sonata Pathétique was performed by
Ingolf Dahl. Dahl also performs the excerpts of the 1st and 3rd movements which appear in the film and are also played by Schroeder. Only the 3rd Movement (Rondo: Allegro) can be found on
A Boy Named Charlie Brown: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack and only as a shortened bonus track. The film also features a
Jew's harp, which Snoopy plays to help Charlie Brown with his spelling. Vince Guaraldi's songs were mostly from other specials and included (in addition to "Skating" and "Baseball Theme") "Blue Charlie Brown", "Oh Good Grief", "Air Music", and "
Linus and Lucy" (several renditions are featured, including 2 slowed down renditions, one in minor key, featured while Linus was looking for his blanket and of course, the traditional rendition when he finally finds it). Guaraldi also plays a rendition of "Champion Charlie Brown" in the opening credits on the piano. The French-language version replaces Rod McKuen's vocals with a French version sung by
Serge Gainsbourg, "". A
soundtrack album with dialogue from the film was released on the
Columbia Masterworks label in 1970 titled
A Boy Named Charlie Brown: Selections from the Film Soundtrack. The first all-music version was released on CD by Kritzerland Records as a limited issue of 1,000 copies in 2017, titled
A Boy Named Charlie Brown: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack. == Reception ==