Jan
16

Week Fifty Two: Thank You for the Music

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Who are we kidding? We are way past week 52, but hey, this is our last song so go easy on us. That’s right folks, our last song. Thanks for listening!  We hope you enjoyed yourselves because we sure did. It’s been a hell of a ride!! Stay tuned in 2012 because we are still cooking up a medley to make up for all of the weeks that passed in 2011 without a song of their own. And who knows what else we might have up our sleeves…
- K

Thanks for tuning in! This was a terrific experiment that made us both very happy. And while this particular song-a-week project is over, we’re obviously going to continue to tinker and record. As with any project of this type, we have a healthy handful of works-in-progress that for one reason or another went on the shelf. You never know when something is gonna jump off the shelf and burst into song. And we’ll also be working on our Makeup Medley. And how about some Kristorm originals? Hmmmmm…
- N

Dec
18

Week Forty Nine: Baby, It’s Cold Outside

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This song comes along at a perfect time, as we recently woke up to a light blanket of snow here in Ithaca!  After three winters of rain in Oregon, we’re quite giddy about even the smallest flake.
- N

I am aware that this song is somewhat controversial, but I choose to believe that it’s all playful and innocent.
- K

Dec
12

Week Forty Eight: I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas

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Tonight, it was brought to my attention that this is one of the top hated Christmas songs. What?!!? I only heard this song for the first time a few years ago and I just can’t get enough of it!! Sorry if you are among the many who dislike the original, we hope our cover will win you over. Interesting fun fact: After this song’s release in 1953, 10 year old Gayla Peevey (the song’s original singer) was actually presented with a hippopotamus (paid for by the nickel and dime donations of children who were fans of the song) that she immediately donated to her local zoo.
- k

Four weeks left in the Kristorm-O-Rama song-a-week project!  We’re running full steam to get our 52 songs finished, and have a full schedule for the next four weeks.  Kristin has calculated that we managed to miss thirteen songs throughout the course of the year; not too shabby, taking into consideration the trials and tribulations of general life, plus a cross-country move in mid-year.  You’re probably saying:  “But they promised us 52 songs before the end of the year”!  Well, hold your horses, because we have an end-of-year medley surprise coming your way!!!  I can hardly contain my excitement.  For now, enjoy your hippo hero.
- n

Dec
04

Week Forty Four: Neat Little Domestic Life

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This song is funny because it’s true.

- N

Nov
14

Week Forty Five: Swimming

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The first of our recommendation picks, revealed! Thanks, Gloria for this excellent suggestion! This song is so beautiful and whimsical. Doesn’t it just bring you back to memories of your secret rope swing? In the middle of November, we all could use a little daydreaming about good old fashioned fun in the sun. P.S. the very awesome band that sings this song is called Breathe Owl Breathe. Give ‘em a listen, you’ll be happy you did.
- K

This song is beautiful and kind of haunting.  It really just sang itself.
- N

Nov
09

Week Forty Three: Mahna Mahna

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Like everyone else, we always thought this song originally came from the Muppet Show. As always, our song research took us down an enlightening path into the 60′s, where we found that this song was originally recorded by Piero Umiliani, an Italian composer who worked on a number of cult-ish films of that time. This particular song accompanied a campy sex scene in the 1968 Swedish film “Svezia, inferno e paradiso (Sweden: Heaven and Hell)”. The working title was: “Hooray for the Swedish Sauna”.

The story of how this was reimagined using muppets is a story I’d love to hear. Just another interesting window into the interesting mind of Jim Henson, I suppose.

- N

Oct
29

Week Forty Two: The Bean Bag Rock

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This song is from the album pictured above. One of my former and very gifted colleagues used to play this one in her classroom and it infected my brain!!  I’d regularly come home belting it out and Norm would exclaim, “What IS that song you’re singing!?!” And so it became one of the very first to be added to the song-a-week list-o-rama. The re-imagined ’80s video game inspired composition of this song was created by none other than our very own Norm. I dare you to listen to his song and not shake your bean bag!
-  K

This song was, in fact, the FIRST song on our song-a-week list.  Just a bit of very interesting trivia for you there.
The beepy sine-wave-and-drum-machine style of this song was inspired in part by Bruce Haack, who has been on the brain for the last few weeks ever since I scored one of his albums at the Ithaca Friends of the Library booksale. He was a sort of mad genius who built his own synthesizers and, interestingly, started off collaborating with Miss Nelson on a series of children’s albums.

Our request-o-rama is going well; thanks for your requests so far! We’ve been having fun listening the songs we know and the ones we’ve never heard before. Soon we’ll pick out at least one and perform it for your listening pleasure.
- N

Oct
17

Week Forty One: A Message from the Meters

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This week’s episode takes us, once again, back into the vaults. Waaaaaay back into the vaults, in this case, to a project started in 2005. I recorded the initial tracks while I was working at Harmonic Ranch, when Kristin and I were rocking the streets of NYC by day and cuddling with a family of mice by night.

This marks the first Kristorm-O-Rama song to feature real drums! They’re played by the one and only Kalin Mintchev, my colleague at the Ranch. (That’s me whacking on the tambourine in the background). Kristin and I polished off the additional vocals & instrumentation here at the Scott Mediaworks studios. Quite a bit has happened in the last six years, so this song was yet another nice trip down memory lane.

Do you have a request? A song you’re just dying to hear us sing? We’re taking them! Head on over to the Request-O-Rama page and weigh in.

- n

Oct
10

Week Forty: I’m Not Crying

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There were so many choices for a Flight of the Conchords cover, but this one was the final winner. When deciding on a song, we got sucked into a YouTube vortex watching all of their great works. I AM crying that this show is no longer on. I miss Murray most of all.
- K

Sep
25

Week Thirty Eight: Love is Strange

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I didn’t see Dirty Dancing until I was in college and by then I think I was too old to “get it”, but I was a huge fan of this soundtrack long before I knew anything about not putting Baby in the corner. Also, this song was apparently a number one hit in 1957, but only achieved B-side status in 1987.
- K

We went back to the land of karaoke for this one. The idea was to keep it simple, and have fun! I promise you, we will have some home spun, made-from-scratch zingers coming up in the final quarter of our song-a-week experiment. And we have some interesting ideas for our “make-up songs” (the 9 or 10 songs that we’ve gotten behind on over the course of the year.) Also, two interactive projects including YOU, coming right up!
- N

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