Meet Kyser, a dog who loves to sing! Author Tommie Townsley of Lake Charles, La., narrates this fun tale written in rhyme, inspired by her own dear pet. Apparently, the real-life Kyser really can sing!
The picture book is available through Tommie’s company, Kid’s Kajun Tales and Ally-Gator Book Bites. Written for 3-6 year olds, it is written in rhyme and rhythm.
Kyser says, “Sing along with me, and you will see, it is so much fun, and when you are done—YOU CAN READ!”
Confetti Park is a community radio program out of New Orleans. We feature local storytellers and songs that kids love, songs created for kids, or created by kids, right here in Louisiana.
This medley of kids music shows the diversity of Louisiana musicians. Songs featured in this episode, in order:
Choo Choo Boogaloo – Buckwheat Zydeco
Choctaw Choo Choo – Confetti Park Players
Big Brown Cow – PH Fred
Ice Cream – George Lewis’ Ragtime Band
Music Memory Ben Schenk
Pig Latin Song – Leadbelly
La chanson ee cinquante Sous – Michael “Beausoliel” Doucet With Family & Friends
You Are My Sunshine – Confetti Park Players
Circle Of Life – Johnette Downing
Confetti Park is coming to Arnaudville this weekend! On June 18 and 19, Confetti Park host Katy Hobgood Ray will be at the NuNu Arts & Culture Collective. While in the area, Katy seeks to record musicians, storytellers, folklorists and others, including talented young children. Please contact confettipark@gmail.com to get on the schedule.
The Confetti Park radio program and podcast features children’s music and stories from Louisiana. Recorded music, field recordings, in-studio performances and interviews with musicians, authors, folklorists and other cultural representatives from across Louisiana are incorporated.
Katy curates commercial recordings as well as personal songs that well-known musicians may have created for their own kids, as well as small projects from after-school programs, churches and community groups. Each show is sprinkled with field recordings and childhood music memories of Louisiana musicians, as well as occasional bits of Louisiana folklore.
Confetti Park is currently broadcast on community radio stations in New Orleans (WHIV 102.3 FM) and Hammond (KSLU 90.0FM) and is being offered to other community radio stations around Louisiana for free. It will soon be will distributed internationally through PRX. Segments of the show are available in a free podcast on iTunes at http://bitly.com/confettiparkpodcast.
Katy and her family will also be at the Friday night potluck social at the NuNu. They are very excited!
Confetti Park is a community radio program out of New Orleans. We feature local storytellers and songs that kids love, songs created for kids, or created by kids, right here in Louisiana. This medley of kids music shows the diversity of Louisiana musicians. Songs featured in this episode, in order:
I Love Nachos – Philip Melancon
A Tisket-A Tasket – The Swing Setters
Song of a Creole Slave – Terrance Simien
Les Tils Yeaux Noirs – Nancy Tabb Marcantel
Music Memory – Rockin Dopsie Jr
Joyeaux – Lee Benoit
The Louisiana Catahoula Leopard Dog – Don Abney and his Catahoulas
Snoball Chant – Confetti Park Players
Snoball – Katy Ray
The Confetti Park hosted by Katy Hobgood Ray, features music and stories spun in Louisiana. It showcases songs that kids love, songs created for kids, and songs created by kids. Sparkling interviews, in-studio performances, delightful music medleys, jokes, local author storytime, and a little surprise lagniappe make for an entertaining show!
In this episode of Confetti Park, Johnette Downing narrates her wonderful trickster tale, Why the Crawfish Lives in the Mud.
Long ago, the Crab and the Crawfish used to be best friends. But one sweltering day, Crawfish is feeling lazy and decides to take advantage of Crab’s generosity. Young readers will enjoy the colorful collage art while they learn a lesson about the consequences of tricking other people.
This narration, which is available on Johnette’s Reading Rocks CD, is for sale as a book and available from Pelican Publishing on Amazon.com and from Johnette’s website. There is also a fun activity book associated with this story!
Johnette Downing is an award-winning and internationally recognized singer and songwriter. Her many accolades include Parents’ Choice Awards, iParenting Media Awards, and National Parenting Publication Awards. She is a favorite guest and contributor to Confetti Park!
Angela Russell is a violinist from Shreveport, Louisiana, who trained in NYC and who has played in symphony orchestras and rock bands around the United States. She has also taught hundreds of students a love for stringed instruments. Currently, Angela lives in Los Angeles.
Angela shares how she first discovered the violin in this childhood music memory.
In this episode of Confetti Park, Katy Ray interviews jazz vocalist Jayna Morgan about her newest New Orleans band, the Swing Setters, a fun, energetic group that plays kids music jazz-style!
(Is this a great name for a jazz band that plays kids music, or what?!)
The Swing Setters truly fill a void in the New Orleans live music scene with their polished treatment of classic American songs, folk songs, and Disney favorites that kids love.
Says Morgan, “There’s not many jazz bands in New Orleans that play children’s music…we were trying to think of names of other people in New Orleans that have a great personality [that aren’t grumpy!], very affable with children, who wouldn’t mind being silly once in a while!”
The band is comprised of professional jazz musicians including Morgan on the vocals, Alex Owen on trumpet, Greg Agid on clarinet and saxophone, David Phy on trombone, Ted Long on guitar, Joe Kennedy on piano, Alan Broome on bass, and Gerald French on drums.
The band recently released their first CD, called Swingin’ at the Playground, available for purchase online at http://11thcommandmentrecords.com/store/ This podcast includes several previews of songs from that record, including “Look for the Silver Lining,” “The Glow Worm,” “This Old Man,” and “A-Tisket A-Tasket.”
Have you seen the Okra Man around New Orleans?
Mr. Okra is a fruit and vegetable vendor who travels the city of New Orleans vending from his truck. His unmistakable call over his P.A. system—“I have cantaloupes! I have tomatoes!”—can be heard from blocks away, and people await him on their front porches so they can buy their fresh produce for the week. Learn all about Mr. Okra in this article by Ian McNulty for New Orleans Magazine.
The Confetti Park Players are so delighted to feature Mr. Okra on a song on their CD, We’re Going to Confetti Park. More info at confettipark.com/music
This is a traditional adapted by Katy Hobgood Ray and Arthur Robinson (Mr. Okra). The song was produced by Katy and Matt Aguiluz and recorded at Marigny Recording Studio in New Orleans.
Featuring: Scott Albert Johnson, harmonica; Arthur Robinson, vocals; David Rosser, guitar. Kids chorus: Lily Bell, Luna Bell, Elisa McDonald, Charleston McLean, Millie Moffett, Hrilina Ramrakhiani, Sadie Strong, and Virginia Strong.
The Confetti Park Players is an all-ages children’s choir in New Orleans, Louisiana. Our home base is in Algiers, on the West Bank of the Mississippi River. Led by songwriter Katy Hobgood Ray, the Confetti Park Players meet weekly to sing, make rhythms, learn traditional New Orleans songs, and practice the craft of songwriting. The songs we sing are a mixture of fun and whimsical originals by contemporary Louisiana songwriters, classic folk songs, nursery rhymes, jump rope jingles, fairy tales, and natural lore.
Confetti Park is a community radio program out of New Orleans. We feature local storytellers and songs that kids love, songs created for kids, or created by kids, right here in Louisiana. This medley of kids music shows the diversity of Louisiana musicians. Songs featured in this episode, in order:
When facing off with a cockroach in the shower, what would you do?
Some people would scream. Some people would hurl the shampoo bottle at the little sucker, and then run.
But Ben Schenck? He wrote a song for the cockroach.
“I was raised with a strong care module, so I cared deeply about this cockroach, but at the same time I didn’t want to touch it…. I set him free and then wrote him a song at the breakfast table.”
Here’s Ben on clarinet and vocals, performing with the Panorama Jazz Band of New Orleans on the “Cockroach Song,” which he wrote when he was 17.
Sing along, everyone: “Ya Ya Ya, Wally Wally Wah!”
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.
Award-winning Louisiana children’s musician and author Johnette Downing shares with Confetti Park another marvelous trickster tale—this time about a possum! (Also listen to Why the Oyster Has the Pearl.)
When hungry Deer asks Possum how he stays so plump during the long dry season, the sly marsupial gets an idea. It wouldn’t take much for Possum to help Deer; he could just climb that ol’ persimmon tree and knock down the fruit. But Possum is just plain lazy and he’d rather trick Deer into doing the work for both of them. Once Possum decides to take advantage of his starving neighbor they both become marked forever.
This narration of Why the Possum has a Large Grin is available on Johnette Downing’s Reading Rocks CD, and in book form by Pelican Publishing. It is also available for purchase on Amazon.
Audio used by permission.
