Sesame Street - 50 years of music

Subject: RE: Sesame Street - 50 years of music
From: GUEST,Starship
Date: 10 Jun 19 - 10:43 PM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZSuY3lb94g0 Here's a start.

Subject: RE: Sesame Street - 50 years of music
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jun 19 - 07:57 PM

On one of my father's visits to our house when the kids were small I played the VHS tape of collected songs (painstakingly captured one song at a time on a handy tape over the course of weeks). He was surprised at what great songs they were, not just baby songs or something he might have imagined.

I think one of the first ones he saw was Pearly White Teeth. "I'm the king of toothsomeness" - such a great line in there, and so many of them, aimed at parents as well as children.

Subject: Sesame Street - 50 years of music
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Jun 19 - 11:55 AM

I looked through the search results in the forum to see if there was an actual discussion of the songs on Sesame Street, and am astonished that there isn't one. It isn't folk, but it is amazingly written and performed, engaging both children and parents/caregivers simultaneously to be entertained and learn.

Sesame Street: Tiny Desk Concert at NPR (National Public Radio) HQ in Washington, D.C.

My children were tiny when they started watching it, and Joe Raposo was at his zenith in writing classing songs for Muppets to sing. There have been many others contributing (hopefully further discussion will ensue). And when you start looking at the guests who came in to sing these songs - whew!

Tracking down the songs on YouTube means going through a lot of unrelated accounts that have loaded the songs to attract eyeballs to their sites. Here is a starting place to look: https://muppet.fandom.com/wiki/Sing:_Songs_of_Joe_Raposo

Other truly classic songs include this one, from Chris Cerf and Norman Stiles: Put Down the Duckie (and from the YouTube page, a list of the guest appearances)

An all star celebrity sing-along from the 1988 prime time PBS pledge drive special. The catchy song was written by Chris Cerf and Norman Stiles. The celebrities, in order of appearance: John Candy (as Yosh Schmenge from SCTV), Andrea Martin (as Edith Prickley from SCTV), New York Mets Keith Hernandez & Mookie Wilson, Jane Curtin (of SNL and Kate & Allie), Madeline Kahn, Joe Williams, Paul Reubens (as Pee Wee Herman), Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Wynton Marsalis, Celia Cruz, Ihtzak Perlman, Gordon Jackson & Jean Marsh (as Angus Hudson and Rose Buck of Upstairs Downstairs), Paul Simon, Jeremy Irons, Pete Seeger, Rhea Perlman and Danny Devito, and NY Giants Sean Landeta, Mark Ingram, Karl Nelson and Carl Banks.