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Dragon
Tales Thrills Preschoolers with a Special
Episode: Let’s Start A Band, featuring
Eykah Badu
by Stacey
Montgomery
 The
house is filled with chatter, laughter and the banging
of toys: the normal sounds of the home of a preschooler.
Then… no chatter… no laughter… no
banging. Suddenly, the quick pitter-patter of little
feet. What’s going on? The Dragon Tales
theme song!! “Emmy wished on a dragon scale.
And that’s what started Dragon Tales…Dragon
Tales, Dragon Tales. It’s almost time for Dragon
Tales….” Children all across the
country drop what they are doing and rush to the TV
upon hearing the familiar beat of the PBS favorite.
And now, a special Dragon Tales episode with
even more music! Dragon Tales: Let’s Start
A Band debuts in March, 2003. (Check local listings.)
The special episode features guest performances by
singer/songwriter Erykah Badu and children’s
musician Dan Zanes, along with Dragon Tales’
own Cassie, Ord and Zak & Wheezie.
Dragon Tales: Let’s Start A Band is
part of Sesame Workshop’s Music Works Initiative.
Partially funded by a grant from the American Music
Conference, the Music Works Initiative promotes the
benefits of music, music-making and music education.
The Music Works Initiative was conceived around Sesame
Street and launched in November 2001. At the
same time, parents and children had fallen in love
with the Emmy-nominated Dragon Tales and
its stimulating music. According to Dragon Tales
Project Director, Anne Gorfinkel, “we started
to get calls from parents asking ‘where can
we get the music?’” The Dragon Tales
music was so infectious that it had become a very
important part of the series. So, it was natural to
develop a Dragon Tales segment as part of
the Music Works Initiative.
In
Dragon Tales: Let’s Start A Band,
siblings Sara and Joey and their irrepressible babysitter
Nina make new friends and turn the whole neighborhood
into an all-star band. Along the way, they meet
Badu and Zanes, who show the kids how easy and how
much fun it is to make music. Part animation and
part live action, Let’s Start A Band
features 15 of the most beloved songs from the television
series, including “The Hello Song,”
“Shake Your Dragon Tail” and “Doodli-Do.”
Selecting
Erykah Badu to participate in this special episode
was natural. Around the time that Sesame Workshop
was developing Let’s Start A Band,
Badu had made a guest appearance on Sesame Street.
Everyone loved working with her. “She was
fabulous,” exclaimed Gorfinkel, “and
she has a wonderful voice.” Badu was excited
about participating and wanted to bring her 6-year-old
son.
Kids will love Let’s Start A Band
because there is so much music. They will sing and
dance and have fun. Of course, like all Dragon
Tales episodes, Let’s Start A Band
has a message. The driving curriculum behind Dragon
Tales is a journey of self-discovery that encourages
children to face challenges, overcome fears, accept
partial victories and understand that to try and
not succeed fully is a natural and valuable part
of learning. In Let’s Start a Band,
initially no knows how to play an instrument. But
the message is: Let’s try. Let’s make
a band.
Sesame
Workshop encourages parents to view Dragon Tales
with their children and then discuss the episode’s
lessons, e.g.--that it's OK when Emmy and Max make
mistakes, that Emmy and Max like to try new things,
and that they often succeed with only part of their
original plan. In addition, the “Caregivers”
section of the Dragon Tales website (http://pbskids.org/dragontales)
offers suggested follow-up reading for each episode.
For Let’s Start A Band, keep the
beat going with Thumb,
Thump, Rat-a-Tat-Tat by Gene Baer.
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