Confetti Park Children's Workshop

Tag: george lewis

  • Music Melody of Kids Songs from Louisiana: Ice Cream Scream

    Music Melody of Kids Songs from Louisiana: Ice Cream Scream

    Ice Cream

    This is Confetti Park,  a magical playground of music and stories for kids everywhere. What’s unique about these songs, and these stories, is that they all come from Louisiana.

    Today you’re going to hear songs from all corners of the state, and across a century of time. This is music that has touched generations of children…. I’m talking about songs that were popular when your grandparents were kids, that are sung by children today. Like “Skip to My Lou,” a song that has stood the test of time and is sung for you by Johnette Downing. And “Bye Bye Blackbird,” by the great New Orleans’ banjoist Danny Barker.

    And there is new stuff, too… “King of the Sea” is a rap written and performed by New Orleans school kids through the Young Audiences of Louisiana arts and education network. Thanks to their teacher, Michael Patrick Welch, for recording it!

    Featured in this episode:

    Also featured in this episode is a childhood music memory by guitarist and music producer CC Adcock, and the Louisiana folktale, The Girl Who Danced with the Devil, narrated by Catherine Golden.

    The Confetti Park hosted by Katy Hobgood Ray, features music and stories spun in Louisiana. We are in states from Alaska to Maine. Look for the full broadcast schedule here.

    Support for Confetti Park comes from the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Foundation and Music Rising at Tulane University.

     

  • Music Memory from Tommy Sancton

    Tommy Sancton. Photo by Sébastien Chaillot
    Tommy Sancton. Photo by Sébastien Chaillot

    In this episode of Confetti Park, Tommy Sancton shares one of his earliest music memories from Preservation Hall, a musical venue in the French Quarter founded in 1961 to protect, preserve, and perpetuate traditional New Orleans jazz. There, Tommy heard the sound that would guide the course of his life.

    Tommy Sancton has had an illustrious career as a journalist and musician. After studies at Harvard and Oxford, which he attended as a Rhodes Scholar, he began a 22-year career with Time magazine as writer, editor, and Paris bureau chief. Music has always been part of Tommy’s life. As he traveled the world, he never stopped playing his clarinet.

    He also never stopped feeling the pull of home. In August 2007, Tommy left Paris for New Orleans. He now teaches at Tulane, continues to write, and plays and records frequently with numerous traditional jazz bands. Visit his website to learn more.

    Tommy has a beautiful memoir called Song for My Fathers: A New Orleans Story in Black and White, published in 2006, which recounts his experiences at Preservation Hall and explores his childhood apprenticeship with clarinetist George Lewis and other musicians, as well as his relationship with his own father.