Thanksgiving Songs: If You’re Happy and You know It

If You’re Happy and You Know It is a children’s song that reminds us of what to be thankful for and how to express it. The song is credited to Dr. Alfred B. Smith.  He wrote the song in the mid-1900s and the song was published in a variety of places.  Often the song was Read More

You Are My Sunshine

You Are My Sunshine is one song that I know can break through the bonds of dementia or connect with children. I was surprised to discover the origins of the song, though. The song was first recorded in 1939 by Jimmie Davis and Charles Mitchell.  Davis and Mitchell are credited as the songwriters and own Read More

Frosty the Snowman

After Gene Autry found success with Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer, he was looking for another seasonal hit.  He recorded the song with the Cass County Boys in 1950. The song was written by Walter Jack Rollins and Steve Nelson, who also wrote Peter Cottontail.  The men brainstormed for months before deciding the song should be Read More

Behind the Song: Oh My Darling Clementine

This was sung on an old movie I was recently watching and I wondered where the song originated. This song is believed to have been inspired by Down by the River Liv’d a Maiden by H. S. Thompson. It is considered an old western folk song. The song is believed to have been written by Read More

Behind the Song: Oh Where, oh Where Is Mine Little Dog Gone

Oh Where, oh Where Is Mine Little Dog Gone is a fun folk song we all learn as a child. The song was written by Septimus Winner, a teacher, musician, music publisher, critic, arranger and composer. He wrote the lyrics to a German folk tune, “In Lauterbach hab’ ich mein’ Strumpf verlor’n“. The German lyrics Read More

Behind the Song: Rudolph, the Red Nose Reindeer

Bob May had not lived an easy life.  As a child he was bullied and called names. Life seemed to be looking up when he graduated college in 1926, married his sweetheart and secured a job at Montgomery Ward, as a copywriter, during the years of the Great Depression.  Then the couple was blessed with Read More

Behind the Song: Over the River and Through the Woods

The popular children’s song, Over the River and Through the Woods,  was written by Lydia Maria Child as a Thanksgiving poem. The lyrics represented in the song is often associated with cold.  In the early 19th Century, New England winters were colder and had earlier winters than they do in the present day. The poem Read More

The Untold Story of the Song: Beauty and the Beast

After finishing with their animated feature, The Little Mermaid, Walt Disney’s animation department turned their attention to their next project. In 1987, they decided to adapt the fairy tale of Beauty and the Beast into their next animated feature film. The Disney CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg, ordered the script be re-written in the style of a Read More

Jesus Loves Me

Jesus Loves Me is the best loved children’s song of all time. The words were written by Anna Bartlett Warner, who was born in 1827. Warner could trace her lineage back to the Puritan Pilgrims on both sides. Her father was Henry Warner, a well known New York City lawyer originally from New England, and Read More

Here Comes Peter Cottontail

    As a child I learned to sing, Here Comes Peter Cottontail. So who is Peter Cottontail? Thornton W. Burgess wrote a series of books using the name Peter Cottontail. In 1957 Pricilla and Otto Friedrich wrote The Easter Bunny That Overslept. In 1971 an Easter television special was made based off of this Read More