Interview: Tyler Stewart (Barenaked Ladies)

Tyler Stewart was the last of the founding members of the rock group Barenaked Ladies, which means he's only been with the band for 18 of its 20 years of existence. He's been the band's drummer ever since. Stewart chatted by phone last week about what his kids listen to (Neil Young and High School Musical, just to begin with); his views on the relative merits of Barney, Sesame Street, and Beethoven; the genesis of their first kids' CD Snacktime; and what's to come for the band. (Photo courtesy Wikipedia.) Zooglobble: I'm going to start the with the question I always ask whenever I interview someone and that is -- what were your musical influences growing up? Tyler Stewart: Well, my parents are pretty young so they were into popular and good music. My dad was a big fan of British rock bands like the Who, Led Zeppelin, and the Rolling Stones, and my mom was really into Motown music and soul. There was always good music playing in my house. Specifically, what do you listen to with your kids? Well, my kids, their dad's a musician, so it's a pretty varied catalog, and my wife, too, has pretty good taste in music. My iPod has 14,000 songs on it, they run the whole gamut. Recently my daughter Millie was saying, "Gawd, I'm so tired of this old people's music -- I don't want to hear any more Neil Young." My daughter's nine. "I like Neil Young, but not all the time." Yeah, I'm guilty of that. Right now they're heavily into High School Musical. High School Musical 1 and 2 is like the Grease of today. Both my daughters really like Alison Krauss and her fiddle music. Of course they love the Beatles, the universal music of all time. And we really love to listen to They Might Be Giants, their three kids' albums, together. They know every word, and they love 'em. Do they listen to the Alison Krauss-Robert Plant CD? You know, I haven't gotten that one yet. I can't believe I haven't... They like the live record she did, the 2-CD one she put out 4 years ago -- they really like that one a lot. My kids, they run the gamut, they like all kinds of different music. That's sort of my goal. When I got them iPods, I filled them with all kinds of varied different kinds of music so that nothing seems surprising. I don't want them to have any musical prejudices or fears at that age. So that when they want to listen to Hilary Duff, OK, we'll put on Hilary Duff... But that's their own choice, and they've listened to everything else...

Interview: Tor Hyams

I've been sitting on a bunch of interviews from my trips to Austin last September. With the music world once again congregating in Austin for SXSW, it's high time I transcribed and shared them with you. Given the South By Southwest connection, I thought it appropriate to kick things off with Tor Hyams, who will be speaking at a kids music panel at SXSW Friday. Among the many roles that California-based Hyams has is producing the Kidzapalooza stage at Lollapalooza and the Austin Kiddie Limits stage at the Austin City Limits Festival, not to mention the Little State stage at the Big State Festival. It was backstage at ACL 2007 that I caught up with Hyams and talked about producing those events and his thoughts about the future of kids music festivals. Zooglobble: What's been the best part about the Austin Kiddie Limits stage? Tor Hyams: The best part about the Austin Kiddie Limits is, I have to say, Austin. People are really different. There's no airs about anybody, they're very open and honest and willing to have a good time, and that makes what we do a lot easier. You produce Kidzapalooza, Austin Kiddie Limits, and the kids stage at the Big State Festival. Big State is more country, while the other two are more rock. How did you decide who you would try to get for Kidzapalooza as opposed to Austin Kiddie Limits? In Kidzapalooza, we go a little harder-edged. It's just a different energy to that place than here. This is more of a roots-rock kind of energy, where Kidzapalooza is more of hard-rock kind of energy. Some bands fit into both, like the Sippy Cups. Some bands don't work in both. For example, we had the Blisters, Jeff Tweedy's son's band, at Kidzapalooza, but they're from Chicago, and they're kids. It would've been hard to get them out here. I think they would've done well here, but it's just a different thing. So it's really who fits more the roots-rock mold or even country crossover acts do well, but Austin's such a dynamic city that I think you could any kind of act on stage here and it would work. I saw a quote from Charles Attal, the head of C3 Productions who sort of described the festival circuit as a land grab -- there are a lot of opportunities in a lot of other places to establish these festivals. Do you think a kids stage is something C3 or other entities would be looking towards doing?

Interview: John Flansburgh (They Might Be Giants)

They Might Be Giants were my first musical discovery. Meaning, up through and including most of high school, I was a fairly straight-laced, MTV-watching, Columbia-House-12-for-a-penny-ing music listener. And, then 20 years ago this September, they released Lincoln on the Bar/None label and that was the start of an entirely new musical direction for me, one where I actually sought out music rather than taking whatever was most easily consumed. I take that brief personal detour for two reasons: 1) In one sense, the fact that I've got this website charged with finding great music for kids and families is due, in some small way, to that 20-year-old album. 2) It provides an interesting perspective to me as I consider the words of John Flansburgh, who founded the band as a duo with John Linnell 25 years ago and who now navigates with Linnell both a very independent course as a band but also one that has them working with many large media corporations. Flansburgh, who, along with Linnell and the rest of TMBG, has released two excellent album in the past 12 months -- the adult-oriented The Else last summer and the kids-focused Here Come the 123s last week -- took some time out from his busy schedule to answer some questions about the new CD/DVD set. Read on for Flansburgh's thoughts on the influence of "Sesame Street" on their work for kids, how they went about picking animators and directors for the video, the future of the Podcast for Kids, and much more. Zooglobble: What sort of music did you listen to in your childhood? John Flansburgh: My mom avidly listens to a bunch of quite specific music that is very non-rock and very non-kid: Noel Coward, Joan Baez, Louie Armstrong, Lotte Lenya (which was very mysterious to me as a kid). West Side Story and Cabaret were routinely played at top volume to inspire housecleaning. I had some Beatles and Monkees albums I bought with birthday money that I essentially memorized, and some very odd kiddie albums I inherited from a distant relative that were truly strange. One was called Happy Birthday to You! and even at a very young age I was suspicious it was a bit of a rushed effort. Side two got pretty grim. You've mentioned Sesame Street as an inspiration for your kids' CDs -- is that the music, the visuals, or both? Both. Personally, as abstract or maybe as obvious as this sounds, when we first embarked on kids' stuff I felt it was important that it be focused directly to kids. I know that notion contradicts what a lot of people say is our kids' stuff's fundamental appeal, but for me it was the essential difference from our adult efforts. I never wanted anyone to walk away from the kids' stuff thinking we were rock guys some how goofing on kids or kids' stuff. No inside jokes for adults allowed, and no pandering. Sesame Street was very good at avoiding any kind of pandering vibe that poisons so much kids' stuff. Also, Sesame Street, and specifically the Muppets on Sesame Street, established this perfect tone. They balanced educational material with very original ideas and actual entertainment. It's breezy. Did you primarily write the songs for the album in a concentrated burst, or was it a case of polishing up song snippets you'd written sporadically over the past few years?

Interview: Joel Rinsema (Phoenix Bach Choir)

I've talked to a few Grammy winners and nominees here at Zooglobble -- Dan Zanes, Ralph Covert, the incomparable Ella Jenkins -- but with the Grammy ceremon(ies) set for Sunday, I hope you'll indulge me another Grammy interview. No, it's not kids music, but it's also not every day that a friend gets nominated for 4.4 Grammy Awards (yes, 4.4 -- see below).

Joel Rinsema is the Executive Director and Assistant Conductor for the Phoenix Bach Choir. (Here he is rehearsing the Phoenix Bach Choir.) Their recording with the Kansas City Chorale of Grechaninov’s Passion Week, led by Artistic Director Charles Bruffy, was nominated for four 2007 Grammy Awards, including Classical Album of the Year. Joel is also the music director at our church and is always up for talking about cooking good food. He was kind enough to talk about what it was like hearing about the nominations, their music, and where to get designer fashions on the cheap. To some extent, there are some parallels here between Joel's comments on the impact a win for the Choir and Chorale would have on the classical music category and what wins for independent artists in the children's music categories mean. So go ahead and read -- you'll enjoy it... Photo credits: Tim Trumble Zooglobble: Where literally were you when you heard about the Grammy nominations? Was there lots of jumping and screaming involved? Or did you just go back to getting the kids ready for school? Joel Rinsema: The kids were off to school, and I believe that the televised nominations began at 9 AM Arizona time (8 AM Pacific), so instead of making my way to the office, I booted up my laptop and worked while the nominations were going on. Charles Bruffy lives in Kansas City and we do a lot of our work via AOL Instant Messenger. He wasn’t on, but Donald Loncasty, the Executive Director of the Kansas City Chorale was, and we immediately began to IM back and forth while watching. Of course, they announced all of the “major” nominations to the press corps, but when they got to the end (without announcing any of the classical ones!) and announced that a full list of the nominees was available “at the back of the room” we were both ready to throw things at our TVs. Instead, I began to frantically type in www.grammy.com. So did, it seemed, thousands of others were doing the same thing, as the website was frozen. I kept on hitting refresh…and there it was…the list of the 50th Grammy Award Nominees. I remember quickly scrolling down the list, and clicking on the word Classical. The first field that appeared was Category 98: “Best Classical Album of the Year.” Alphabetically, ours is listed second, right after the Cherubini Mass with Ricardo Muti conducting. Shaking wildly…so much so, that I knew that I couldn’t type, I picked up the phone to call Kansas City. Don answered the phone and I just remember screaming craziness into his ear. (Something like “Oh My God! Best $(*^&^^% Classical Album of the Year!) I went back to the computer as Don was still trying to access the site. I just knew that if we were nominated for best Classical, that there were other nominations. Sure enough, we were given nods for four additional Grammys including Best Choral Performance , Best Engineered Album -Classical, and Best Surround Sound Album. Also, our producer Blanton Alspaugh from Soundmirror in Boston was nominated as Best Classical Producer. Two of the five discs he submitted for consideration (Passion Week and Eternal Rest) are ours. [Ed: Hence, the additional 0.4 nominations.] Did you have any idea that you'd be nominated for four awards? Any rumors? We heard that Passion Week had made a good impression on the voters. We had no idea though, that we would be up for Best Classical. That was SO far removed from our thinking. What are the big "firsts" associated with the nominations? (Besides "first Grammy nominations for Joel Rinsema")

Interview: Dan Zanes

With Dan Zanes visiting Phoenix for the first time on tour with Dan Zanes and Friends less than two weeks from now, I thought it'd be a good time to catch up with the singer. I've done both these things before (seeing him perform in Tucson in April 2007 and interviewing him back in summer 2006), but nothing ever stands still in Dan Zanes' world these days. So I called him up in Puerto Rico and chatted a bit. Read on for his views on what makes a good Dan Zanes and Friends concert and what he does the first time he visits a city. (Phoenix-area readers, feel free to chime in with suggestions for what he should do here.) Find out about the upcoming album, ¡Nueva York! And even if you've never even been to Phoenix, you'll want to read the end of the interview where I find out exactly what he was doing in Puerto Rico and what Paul McCartney has to do with it. Trust me, it's worth the time. (And thanks to Dan for making the time.) Zooglobble: How would you describe a Dan Zanes and Friends concert? Dan Zanes: As much like a little Grateful Dead show as possible. I try to make the theatre feel like your living room. There's lots of people singing along, lots of people on stage, and as much roaming around, laughing, and crying as possible. And then the whole dissolves into a whole dance party. I want everybody who comes to feel like we're all in this together. What's your favorite part of the show? Two things: first, how much people throw themselves into singing. Are they singing their heads off? Second, what's the level of the dancing? Are the aisles filled? How many people are upfront? How much chaos? How intense does it get? I can't even remember the last show where people didn't dance. In the world of young people, it's so much how they relate... in a physical way.

Interview: Kevin Salem (Little Monster Records)

One of my favorite songs from the 1990s was the soaring alterna-rocker "Lighthouse Keeper," by a musician by the name of Kevin Salem. Fast-forward a decade, and in this brave new world of kids and family music, I was surprised and, well, pleased to hear that Salem had started up Little Monster Records, a label just for kids' music. Salem, who spends much of his time now producing others' records rather than recording his own, along with his wife Kate Hyams, who spent many years as a label executive, have put together an exciting roster of artists who show every sign of releasing music that is definitely not the typical kids' music fare. Kevin Salem recently took the time to answer a few questions. Read on for how views on kids in the recording studio have changed over the year, his vision for the label, how his least favorite baseball team inspired his label's latest record, and future projects... Zooglobble: What music did you listen to growing up? Kevin Salem: There were a few different sources for me growing up. My parents were Arabic and played a lot of Arabic music and I grew up in a small coal and steel town where there was a lot of rootsy music, so that stuff was always in the air. My dad was a jazz singer and trumpeter, so the first songs I sang were things like ‘Fly Me to the Moon’ and ‘Sunny Side of the Street.’ I lived with two sisters and my cousins who are quite a bit older than me and turned me on to a lot of the things I have loved all my life -- the Beatles and Stones, Dylan, Motown, Neil Young... all things countercultural. I remember watching the Beatles at shea stadium on TV and wondering what was wrong with all the teenage girls in my family. When I was 5, some teenagers from my family’s church had a cover band called ‘Grapes of Wrath.’ I saw them play 'Little Bit of Soul’ at a church picnic and decided on the spot that I was gonna be a rock and roll guitarist. It was the best decision I ever made.