- #SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL FULL#
- #SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL SERIES#
- #SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL TV#
#SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL FULL#
When my kids were school-aged, I got the full “Schoolhouse Rock” DVD set for them, which is to say, I got it for me. The following seasons, about grammar, American history and science, added other contributors, including Lynn Ahrens, the future Broadway songwriter thanks to whom an entire generation cannot recite the preamble to the Constitution without breaking into song. (If your voice does not break singing, “A man and a woman had a little baby,” you’re doing something wrong.) The blissful “Three Is a Magic Number” isn’t just a primer on multiples it’s a rumination on the triad foundations of the universe, from geometry to love. The lyrics were sly and funny but could also detour, like a fidgety schoolkid sitting by the window, into daydreams. The jazz composer Bob Dorough wrote the banger-filled first season, “Multiplication Rock,” surveying a range of styles from the duodecimal prog-rock of “Little Twelvetoes” to the spiraling lullaby of “Figure Eight.”
Above all, there was the sophisticated music. That was the animation, psychedelically colorful and chock-full of rapid-fire slapstick gags. The facts and figures made it educational. Unlike the dutiful news interstitials that vitamin-fortified other Saturday-morning cartoon lineups, “Schoolhouse Rock” harnessed the power of comedy and ear worms. “I think you should buy it right away,” Jones said. Nostalgia for “Schoolhouse Rock” is now itself old enough to be nostalgic for.Īs Newell told the Times in 1994, they pitched the idea to Michael Eisner, then the director of children’s programming at ABC, who happened to be meeting with the legendary Looney Tunes animator Chuck Jones. Winona Ryder and company crooned “Conjunction Junction” and “I’m Just a Bill” in the 1994 generational-statement film “Reality Bites.” De La Soul borrowed “Three Is a Magic Number” as the backbone for their buoyant self-introduction, “The Magic Number,” in 1989. The musical shorts, which began airing on ABC in 1973, taught Generation X multiplication, grammar, history and, eventually, nostalgia. If you were an American kid around when I was (nineteen-seventy- cough), you probably have “Schoolhouse Rock” hard-wired into your brain too.
#SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL TV#
It was not the last time that watching too much TV would pay off for me, but it was perhaps the sweetest.
I’d like to credit hard work or the motivation of those golden fries, but in truth it was easy. Rhino Records issued a four-CD box set of Schoolhouse Rock tunes in 1996, and Disney produced a two-DVD set for the series’ 30th anniversary in 2002, featuring 52 of the 64 episodes.When I was in second grade, my teacher held a contest: The first students to memorize their multiplication tables would get dinner at McDonald’s. My Dear Departed Past - a memoir of his time on the road, life in the music business and, of course, adventures with Schoolhouse Rock - was published in 2017.įrishberg’s fellow jazz musician and Schoolhouse Rock collaborator Dorough died in 2018. Given his comedic bent, Frishberg was also a musical guest on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson and had bit roles on shows like Simon & Simon.
#SCHOOL ROCK IM JUST A BILL SERIES#
His songs were featured in Legally Blonde 2, the Burt Reynolds film Paternity and TV projects such as NBC’s Bennett Brothers and the Danish series Forbrydelsen. Rosemary Clooney, Shirley Horn, Anita O’Day, Michael Feinstein, Diana Krall and Mel Tormé are among the greats who have performed his work. He wrote and performed other memorable tunes in the series including “Walkin’ on Wall Street,” a song that describes how the stock market works, and “$7.50 Once a Week,” a song about saving money and balancing a budget.įrishberg’s most popular non-Saturday morning songs include “I’m Hip” (lyrics only, in collaboration with Bob Dorough), “My Attorney Bernie,” “Peel Me a Grape,” “Quality Time” and “Van Lingle Mungo,” a tune whose lyrics are simply the names of old-time baseball players.
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