There's no detail on the website at the moment, but The Green Apple Festival, a 3-city 200-artist music and arts festival schedule for Earth Day weekend (April 20-22, 2007) will include a free concert featuring The Laurie Berkner Band and Brady Rymer and the Little Band That Could. Rymer will open up the Sunday, April 22nd show in New York City's Central Park at noon, with Laurie headlining at 1 PM. Should be pretty cool...
No word on who's scheduled to shout "The Sounds of Silence!....." into the deep Manhattan night.
Shows are also scheduled for Chicago and San Francisco -- I can think of a few bands in both places that might be a good Earth Day backing band...
Seattle, San Francisco... Anyone Else Want To Host (or Play In) a Kids Music Festival?
Well, spurred in part by my challenge to the West Coast to come up with some hootenannies and kids' music festivals of our own, at least two people have offered to organize something:
Eric Herman doesn't even live in Seattle and is offering to organize something for Northwest-area artists. (Live in Vancouver? Portland? If Eric can drive 4 hours, so can you!) If interested, drop Eric a line at ericATbutter-dogDOTcom (you'll obviously have to unSPAMify that e-mail address).
Loyal reader Deb in SF has also offered to organize an event in the Bay Area. If you're in the area, contact Deb at
debraunATsbcglobalDOTnet (again, unSPAMify that).
Are any of you interested in traveling out to Phoenix? You know how to reach me...
I'm the Ted Williams of Live, Kid-Friendly Music
Ted Williams was the last person to hit .400 for a baseball season, and now I'm duplicating the feat (using my own, very narrow, self-selected definition). 5 shows, 2 with our family's attendance...
-- Trout Fishing in America: They played here the weekend before last. I know that Trout's music appeals to all ages, but the fact that they played at the auditorium smack-dab in the community of Sun City -- which prohibits kids from living there -- amused me slightly. In any case, it's a long drive out there from our house, and since we were co-hosting a Chinese New Year's party that night, we took a pass. Hopefully next time...
-- Baby Loves Disco: All four of us attended the soiree in Scottsdale this weekend and had a fun time (again). I'll have more on this maybe next week.
-- The Terrible Twos: Argh. This show was schedule at the very last minute, so late that there was zero confirmation of the show except on the band's myspace page. We had guests visiting that afternoon, and shooing them out the door a little early so we could see a show that no human had actually confirmed seemed, well, my wife drew the line at that. And, yeah, that would have been bush-league. (So needless to say, I was a little disappointed when the venue's owner called up later that night and said that, yes, the show did indeed go on.) Hopefully next time...
-- Dan Zanes: Sunday, April 22nd, Tucson. We are there. I can't wait. I'm bringin' the uke.
-- Finally, some radio show's hootenanny in Brooklyn on March 24: Either that or the Park Slope Parents CD-release party on March 25th would be a lot of fun. It would also be terribly inconvenient, geographically (not to mention I'm already out of town that weekend).
So are you listening, West Coast? San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Portland -- I'm talking to you -- each of you have enough kids' artists that you could put together a pretty good hootenanny yourself. (Or if you all want to come out to Phoenix, let me know...) Don't let the East Coast Bias win!
Mr. David A Bit 'Jumpy' About His New Album
Yes, it's all about making punny headlines that don't really make sense in the context of the article around here.
Anyway, for those of you wondering what's next on the plate of San Jose-based Mr. David, he notes on his show page that his next album, Jump in the Jumpy House, will be released in June 2007. And for those of you wanting to hear songs off the new album, get on over to Technology Credit Union in San Jose next Tuesday, March 6th to see Mr. David in concert.
So... I'm wondering... is it "jumpy house" on the West Coast? Because we call 'em "bouncy houses" 'round these parts... Is this like a "cola"/"soda pop" thing here?
Multimedia Notes From All Over
I know that bar on the right side of the main homepage is a bit on the long side, but it's time for some updates...
Planet KidVid is a new enterprise from longtime Friend of Zooglobble Monty Harper and kids' musician Mr. Billy. If they keep up with the posts, this could be a website that causes lots of families to go over their allocated "screen time."
The Harper family is evidently trying to take over the web as Monty's wife Lisa and her daughter Evalyn have established the Kids Music Planet podcast. What is slightly different about this podcast from many other kids' music radio shows is that they play multiple selections from a few albums. So if for some reason my review of an album isn't clear enough you can decide for yourself. ;-)
Belinda and Hova finally seem to have settled on a new internet location for their Greasy Kid Stuff playlists. If you go to their website, you can also find out all about their Mar. 18th "Grease Ball" with Captain Bogg & Salty, The Jellydots, and The Sprockettes. You can also hear They Might Be Giants' penned-just-for-Belinda-and-Hova "Greasy Kid Stuff."
I've also added Fred Koch's new children's music-related blog to the sidebar. Fred is another longtime listener and reviewer of kids music and I'm glad to see him start up a blog.
Regular readers will certainly be aware of Amy's appearance on WNYC's Soundcheck on Tuesday. Amy made a lot of excellent points (and ones I mostly agree with) and is to be commended for always sounding coherent, a not at all easy thing to do live on the air. Listen to the 20-minute segment here.
Finally, children's media publicist (and, well, fan) Beth Blenz-Clucas talked about a couple of her clients and other kids' musicians and topics on Vicky and Jen's Grammy-related podcast. The podcast also includes discussions with Richard Perlmutter (he's working on Beethoven's Wig 4, apparently), Dan Zanes, and Ezra Idlet from Trout Fishing in America. (Beth was also kind enough to mention this website as a good resource...)
Shows Possibly Worth Driving Through Ten-Foot Snowdrifts For
By the end of March those of us in Phoenix are typically slathering on sunscreen and complaining that summer and 110-degree weather can't be far away. The fading days of spring would be made considerably more tolerable if we had a few Elizabeth Mitchell concerts to attend.
Unfortunately for us, Mitchell lives in New York state and as a result those folks get some sweet music to go along with their March (and April) snowstorms.
To wit: Mitchell and Uncle Rock will be playing at Levon Helm's awesome Midnight Ramble series on March 31st. The good news for the kids is that it's not at midnight, but rather at 2 PM. The bad news is that it's already sold out. (Unless you have tickets, in which case I ask you not to lord it over us.)
But fear not, Mitchell fans, for she's also helping to organize a Family Concert Series at the High Meadow School. Besides the wonderful Hayes Greenfield doing his Jazz-A-Ma-Tazz program, the series also features Peter Schickele, creator of PDQ Bach. (Classical geek note: I once owned the PDQ Bach "autobiography." Hi-larious.)
Oh, and Mitchell's playing a show with Dog on Fleas on April 15th. That would be worth driving through a snowdrift of some sort, to be sure.
