The original cut of this song is probably the version most of us remember best. The visuals changed every now and then, and I have to say, whoever shot the footage for this one must have just flown down to Cidade de Deus and yelled at children until they could effectively cry on camera. Like, seriously, what was the appeal of bawling children making their way through urban squalor?
In all honesty, actually, that was kind of the point of Sesame Street (not the crying). It was to give children growing up in the inner city somewhere that looked like their own environment where they could learn and have fun safely. That’s pretty cool. Since the 70’s, the Street has cleaned up quite a lot, perhaps to better reflect the Giuliani world of “every goes to prison, all the time.”
The music to “Can You Tell Me How To Get To Sesame Street” was composed by Joe Raposo (whom you may remember), with lyrics by Bruce Hart. Credited as writing the song are Raposo and Hart, with Jon Stone, who all contributed a great deal to the development of Sesame Street (seriously, look them up. They did all your favorite stuff.). Apparently the process of writing the song involved Raposo’s music, Stone’s [he was a producer on the show] idea of the repeated phrase “Can you tell me how to get to Sesame Street,” along with a couple of other lines, Raposo rearranging a couple of lyrics, and everything else by Hart, whose lyrics Stone despised. In his unpublished memoir, quoted in the excellent book Street Gang, he describes the song as “a musical masterpiece and a lyrical embarrassment.”
As to the music, Stone said:
[It] was just plain brilliant. It was melodic and simple enough for a child to recognize and even sing along to, but still had a musical sophistication. It gave the whole show a sound and an attitude, and it underscored the footage of joyful children running to the recurring line, “Can you tell me how to get to Sesame Street?” There was no other sound like it on television, and once the children learned to identify it with Sesame Street, the first few notes would bring her running from wherever she might be at the moment.
But the lyrics, built around Jon’s line suggestions, were “trite and thoughtless… platitudinous kiddie-show lyrics.”
Way harsh. I think the lyrics are pretty simple, but most of the things from the song we remember are from Jon Stone’s contributions, not Bruce Hart’s, but also who cares, it’s a decent song for a show kids love. Here are a couple of updates:
By the way, the fact that the theme song is sung by children makes a lot of sense, but it reminds me of the Most Unwanted Song study, where artists put together a song from people’s least favorite things in music, which included “children singing.” The result was far better than The Most Wanted song, but you have to really be willing to give it your full attention for 22 minutes.
