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To Yohe, the stories and most other aspects of the animated shorts are timeless too. “Except the bell-bottoms” some of the characters wore, he said, laughing. Hence last year’s release by Rhino Records of a four-CD boxed set of all 50 original “Schoolhouse Rock” songs, a new book, “Schoolhouse Rock--The Official Guide” by Yohe and co-creator George Newall published last April, the series of videos and four CD-ROMs based on the show. The creators decided that each number should get its own song, but Dorough learned this after he'd already combined 4, 6 and 8 into one song.
America Rock, Season 3 (1975–76, 1979,
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An abbreviated VHS, featuring 25 episodes (ranked on the tape in order of popularity) and "I'm Gonna Send Your Vote to College," was released at the same time. In 1997–1998, for the show's 25th anniversary, Walt Disney Home Video, which became a sister company to ABC after their purchase in 1996, released five segments on VHS, along with "Money Rock" being released in 1998. The other four releases in the 25th anniversary collection each ended with a Schoolhouse Rock! In 1994, ABC/King Features sold exclusive licensing rights for apparel to Coastal Concepts, Inc. of Vista California, the first company to produce Schoolhouse Rock! Tom Yohe worked with contemporary artist Skya Nelson to create over 50 new designs and update the Schoolhouse Rock! Image for a new market, which sold $1.1 million in its first year and exploded selling over $12 million the next year.
Disney Mickey Mouse
Debuted as a series in January 1973 with Multiplication Rock, a collection of animated music videos adapting the multiplication tables to songs written by Bob Dorough. Dorough also performed most of the songs, with Grady Tate performing two and Blossom Dearie performing one during this season. General Foods was the series' first sponsor; later sponsors of the Schoolhouse Rock! Segments also included Nabisco, Kenner Toys, Kellogg's, and McDonald's.[7] During the early 1970s, Schoolhouse Rock was one of several short-form animated educational shorts that aired on ABC's children's lineup; others included Time for Timer and The Bod Squad.
‘Schoolhouse Rock’ Moves On to College
"'Flocabulary' started in 2005 on the simple premise that it's easy to memorize rap songs but difficult to remember the definition of a vocabulary word like 'obsequious'," co-founder Alex Rappaport said in 2017 of the company. In keeping with the bicentennial excitement of the mid-1970s, the show's creators themed the third season America Rock. The second season of "Schoolhouse Rock!," themed Grammar Rock, aired between 1973 and 1974. It includes one of the most popular and widely recognized "Schoolhouse Rock" songs of all time, "Conjunction Junction," which was written by Dorough and performed by Merv Griffin's former trumpet player, Jack Sheldon. Newall came up with the visual concept of the rail cars hooking together.
Original series
In 2002, the team once again reunited to produce a new song, "I'm Gonna Send Your Vote to College" for the release of the 30th Anniversary DVD. The last of the original series were four segments about the then-novel personal computer technology. The shorts featured two characters by the name of Scooter Computer and Mister Chips, and so these were the only episodes in the series to feature any recurring characters. The Walt Disney Company acquired Schoolhouse Rock in 1996 along with its acquisition of ABC owner Capital Cities/ABC Inc.; Schoolhouse Rock was one of only two non-Disney children's shows (The Bugs Bunny and Tweety Show being the other) to continue airing (albeit in reruns) after the transition to One Saturday Morning.
Before the idea grew into an animated short series, McCall's original concept was an album called "Multiplication Rock," so that became the theme of the show's inaugural season. The first four songs to air were "My Hero, Zero," "Elementary, My Dear," "The Four-Legged Zoo" and "Three Is a Magic Number," all written and performed by Dorough. Starting in 2002, the team once again reunited to produce a new song "I'm Gonna Send Your Vote to College," written by George Newall and performed by Bob Dorough and Jack Sheldon for the 30th Anniversary VHS and DVD releases. Election Collection, which centered on songs relating to American history and government. In 1973, Capitol Records released a soundtrack album of Multiplication Rock (SJA-11174), featuring all 11 songs. Two tracks, "My Hero, Zero" and "Three Is a Magic Number", had been edited for TV to keep each video within three minutes.
Also, the album version of "The Four-Legged Zoo" has a slightly shorter ending compared to the television version. Released with the album was a single (Capitol 3693) with the two Grady Tate–sung tracks ("Naughty Number Nine" b/w "I Got Six"). This album was re-released[12] on red/blue-colored vinyl on Record Store Day 2019. A fourth series, titled "Science Rock," followed in 1978 and 1979, and included a broad range of science-related topics. The first video of this season, "A Victim of Gravity," parodied elements of the hit film Grease and featured a rare guest appearance from a pop band, with recently reunited doo-wop group The Tokens providing the vocals. In addition to episodes describing the human body's anatomical systems (the nervous, circulatory, skeletal and digestive systems each received a music video), episodes describing physical sciences such as astronomy, meteorology and electricity were also included, as was "The Energy Blues," an environmentalism-themed video.
He was trying to figure out how to separate them out when he took a hiking trip with his daughter, Aralee, and her friend, Lisa. It was there that he got the idea for "The Four-Legged Zoo," which follows a class trip to the zoo. Dorough's voice is accompanied by a chorus of kids, including Aralee and Lisa, on the song's final recording.
ABC Updates
No shows were produced featuring the numbers 1 or 10 explicitly. In 2018, the Library of Congress inducted all songs from Schoolhouse Rock into the National Recording Registry for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". And just like the catchy commercial jingles that are stuck in your brain forever, entertainment and education melded into memorization.
That combination of the short, attention-grabbing visuals plus popular music set the stage for fun lyrics that packed a deceptively powerful punch. Through them, the eyes and minds of children were wide open for weighty topics like immigration ("The Great American Melting Pot"), global warming ("Report from the North Pole") and women's rights ("Sufferin' 'til Suffrage). Remember, "Schoolhouse Rock!" was created by advertising executives. In the beginning, they'd leave their day jobs and design storyboards on their kitchen tables at night. And just like that, a bunch of ad agency execs and a jazz musician were headed straight into Saturday morning television. "I don't know how I lucked out," Dorough told us when we spoke to him in 2017 when he was 93.
A fifth follow-up series, titled "Scooter Computer and Mr. Chips," featuring the titular characters (the only music videos in the series to feature any recurring characters), premiered in the early 1980s and comprised just four segments about home computer technology, then just emerging onto the scene. As the references and depictions became quickly outdated, due to the rapid advance of technology, these segments stopped airing after 1985 and were not released on home video until the 30th anniversary DVD in 2002. On August 26, 2002 Buena Vista Home Video released a 2-disc DVD featuring 51 of the 52 episodes (the only one missing being the presumed-lost Computer Rock segment) as well as many special features. An abbreviated VHS, featuring the "top 25" episodes plus "I'm Gonna Send Your Vote to College," was released at the same time. On September 23, 2008, the "Schoolhouse Rock-Election Collection" was released, including 14 songs about the history and the government and a "new to DVD" song.[6] On March 31, 2009, Buena Vista Home Video released "Schoolhouse Rock Earth" on DVD, which includes 10 newly written and animated songs.
Long before there was a way to record the program, government and lobbyists groups requested cassettes of "I'm Just a Bill" to train staff members. Medical schools did the same for "Telegraph Line" to help students understand the complicated inner workings of the nervous system. Winona Ryder and company crooned “Conjunction Junction” and “I’m Just a Bill” in the 1994 generational-statement film “Reality Bites.” De La Soul borrowed “Three Is a Magic Number” as the backbone for their buoyant self-introduction, “The Magic Number,” in 1989.
A variety of bands working with Rhino Records were furnished with newly minted Schoolhouse Rock! The licensing rights were expanded to include other manufacturers in 1996. After leaving the airwaves in 1985, the original team reunited to produce two more Grammar Rock segments ("Busy Prepositions" and "The Tale of Mr. Morton") for television in 1993 with J. J. Sedelmaier Productions, Inc.[8] This was followed in 1995 by a new series, "Money Rock," which discussed themes related to money management on both the personal and governmental scale.
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