Written by Christopher Cerf and Norman Stiles and sung by Ernie (Jim Henson).
This segment was directed by Jon Stone and was taped on January of 1983, and the puppeteers included Jim Henson (Ernie), assisted by Ed Christie, with Cheryl Blaylock (the Blue Honker), Brian Muehl (the Purple Honker), Martin P. Robinson (The Dinger), and Kathryn Mullen (Mr. Honker) The song takes place on a farm from the looks of the set and the characters costumes and bandannas. This song was from Season 14.
A cartoon by Bud Luckey and written by Bud Luckey and Don Hadley and sung by Jerry Nelson. It was from 1971. I think this was one of Bud Luckey's last cartoons he ever did for Sesame Street.
Written and sung by James Taylor, this is one of the few Sesame Songs videos that features celebrity guests, the other was Dance Along. Jellyman Kelly was from Season 14 and it was also featured on the Sesame Street pledge-drive special, Put Down The Duckie. No, not the song, but we'll get to that later. This song is quite cute, it has James Taylor playing guitar and Howard Johnson on tuba and the kids singing backup.
Written by Lee Pockriss and Emily Perl Kingsley and sung by Polly Darton (Fran Brill).
One thing that confuses me was that Fran Brill was completely uncredited despite the fact that her voice was in this particular song. So, I can only assume that maybe Karen Prell probably did the puppetry for Polly Darton while Fran dubbed it in later. Fun fact I should note is that the character of Polly Darton was conceptualized by Emily Perl Kingsley. This song was from Season 12 (1980-1981)
Not much to say about this song, except, it is a short song that didn't need lyrics. It features the Honkers, the Dinger, Oscar's pet elephant, Fluffy, and an orange martian, who I think is performed here by Kevin Clash. This mini-segment was arranged by Dave Conner and was from Season 17 (1985-1986). After that, Forgetful Jones says "Now that was spinach!" But that's not the right word. And he walks off to try to remember.
This song was written by Stephen Lawrence and Cathi Rosenberg-Turow and was performed by Oscar the Grouch (Carroll Spinney) and Grundgetta (Pam Arciero).
Bet you didn't know that this song was taken from Episode 2596, where Gina babysits Irvine while Oscar and Grundgetta are at the particular ball, however, that episode was more focused on Snuffy than Gina and Irvine. Anyways, after this song, Forgetful comes back but still can't remember the word, silly.
This song was written by veteran Sesame Street song writer, Jeff Moss, and was performed by Jim Henson as the lavender Jamaican singer.
I don't know who directed it, but since it looks like this was from Season 15 (1983-1984), I can only assume that the late Lisa Simon directed this segment, since her name was in the credit.
Also fun fact: Martin P. Robinson and Richard Hunt were the backup singers. But I can still hear a bit of Jeff Moss singing along. At the end of the song, we see The Count count seven bananas while his bats are flying around.
Another cartoon! This time, it was animated by Buzzco Associates and was written by Jeff Hale and Anna Dibble. Jeff Hale for those who don't know was the person responsible for the animation for the Jazz Number series, Pinball Number Count, The Typewriter, and the Ringmaster among others. This song was also performed by Jim Thurman, who was featured on several Sesame Street cartoons, mostly the Cliff Roberts ones, and he also served as one of the writers for The Electric Company. This cartoon was from Season 20 (1988-1989).
It all starts with Don Music having trouble finding a word that rhymes with snow, Kermit the Frog comes in to help him, trying out different efforts, like fleece being yellow as the sun, canaries, blue canaries, until finally ending up to a bicycle that was painted red as fire, and whenever Mary wanted to take a ride, the bicycle had a flat tire. This quickly results into a Big Band rendition of the song that was written by Sam Pottle and David Korr and performed by Don Music (Richard Hunt), with backup vocals provided by the Monotones. I can hear Christopher Cerf as one of the backup vocals, by the way. Oscar the Grouch found that segment to be yucky. This segment was from Season 6 (1974-1975)
Another song that was written by Bud Luckey and Don Haldey, only this time, it was perfomred by Steve Zuckerman.
For those who don't know, Steve Zuckerman is a composer responsible for the music for Winnie the Pooh and a Day for Eeyore, as well as writing some songs for Sesame Street , like "Imagination Rain," "The Lowercase N," and my personal favorite, "I in the Sky."
Okay, only one more to go.
The closing number of the video! It was written by Christopher Cerf and Norman Stiles and performed by Jim Henson (Ernie) and Kevin Clash (Hoots the Owl). But this isn't the average Sesame Street song here, since this is a Christopher Cerf song, there has to be celebrities, and this song really pulled it off. I mean look at it, it's got people like John Candy, Andrea Martin, Mookie Wilson and Keith Hernandez, Jane Curtin, Madeline Kahn, Joe Williams, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Wynton Marsalis, Celia Cruz, Itzhak Perlman, Gordon Jackson, Jean Marsh, Paul Simon, Jeremy Irons, Pete Seeger, Danny DeVito, Rhea Perlman, The New York Giants, they even got Paul Reubens in there, how the heck did that happen?
Fun Fact: Noel MacNeal assisted Ernie doing his right hand, and David Rudman provided puppetry for the lavender drummer.
This was a great song and a perfect song the end the entire Sing Yourself Silly! video.
If you want to see the video for yourself, go ahead and check it out here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P00QCZfpF7A
This sing-along video is a production of the Children's Television Workshop.
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