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EntertainnH
■■P'l %'K
TV's Captain Kangaroo
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Making , ”
Kangaroo Music
The door-mounted bell at the Runcible Spoon,
a boutique in Newport, R. 1., rings as shoppers bustle in and our, perusing
the selection of elegant linens, artisan tableware anti imported ceramics
as Bill Thomas, 62, works the register.
Most customers don’t know that Thomas, whose wife, Joan, owns
and operates tlte store, is one of the creative minds behind a whole gen
eration of popular children's music.
From 197-1 to 1985, he composed songs fix tile TV series Cttptain
Kangitm, tlie longest-running children's program in tlie history of com
mercial network television (1955-1992). The show, which starred its soft-
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spoken creator, Bob Keeshan,
and a menagerie of colorful
characters, featured hours of
feel-good, kids-world-view
music written by Thomas
and other composers.
"It was a great job and I loved doing it," Thomas
says. "The beauty of it was, 1 wasn't restricted. I could write a song
about almost anything."
Thomas liad just gotten out of tlie Navy in 1969 and was sing
ing at a |x)|xilar harbor |xib in Newport wlien a friend asked him to
compose music for an independent film. One of the folks involved also
worked for Captain Kangtm in New York. Coincidentally, Thomas
had just finished writing a pilot for a childrens radio show with Nixl
Paul Sttxikey of tlie folk trio Peter, Paul and Mary. "Tlie producers of
Captain liked the songs I had written," Thtxnas says, "and tliey wanted
me to help them update the show's song library."
Thomas was hired to compose songs to "fit" film fixxage from
various archival sources about everyday things. "Originally, I'd write
to whatever was on hand, he explains. He wrote dozens of songs and
married tlietn to various movie clips, creating something entirely new
in tlie process—“film songs” about how sunshine makes shadows,
being a friend and what toys do in the dark (reassuringly, they stay
where you leave them).
Little did he know tliar his Captain Kangaroo creations would turn
exit to be forerunners to content that years later would become tlie
bread and heater of cable channels MTV and VIII. "I guess ycxi ccxikl
make the leap atxl say the songwriters tor tlx- show came up with some
of the first music videos,” lie says with a smile.
One of his favorite pieces started with footage of a boy in a
yellow slicker walking through a soggy forest in the Pacific North
west. It originally was made as an ...
educational short film about lum
ber and foresting, intercut with j
shots of wildlife. Thomas edited 1
the frxitage into a new storyline
to support his song "Rainy Day *
Zoo,” about the joys of taking a
rainy-day trip to the city zoo.
"That’s one 1 remember with the
most admiration," he says. “There
was so much beauty and peace
in it; it seemed perfect
tor tlx- show '' ."a, L
T! mmas' music
went hand-in-hand A
with tlx* tranquil, J
feel-gtxxJ send- V
ments on which r‘
Keeshan insisted
fix the program. ™
“There was an
(Continued m page 18)
Bill Thomas wrote
songs for the popular
children’s TV series.
Page 16
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