- Person
- Carole King
- Lived
- b. 1942
- Field
- Songwriting
- From
- American
The story
Maurice Sendak, the author and illustrator of Where the Wild Things Are, grew up in Brooklyn. As a boy he watched a bold little girl who used to sing and dance on the stoop of her building, and she became the inspiration for Rosie, the heroine of his 1960 book The Sign on Rosie's Door. For television he combined Rosie with the characters of his tiny four-volume Nutshell Library of 1962: Chicken Soup with Rice, Pierre, One Was Johnny and Alligators All Around.
The result was Really Rosie. Rosie, the self-proclaimed sassiest kid on her block of Avenue P in Brooklyn, spends a hot, bored summer day directing her friends, the Nutshell Kids, in an imaginary movie about her own life. Sendak wrote the story and lyrics and directed the animation, and Carole King composed the music.
King also became Rosie's voice. The songs had been recorded first, and when the casting team struggled to find a child actor whose speaking voice would match them, King was chosen to speak as well as sing the title role. The half-hour animated special was broadcast on CBS on February 19, 1975. The soundtrack album, released by Ode Records that month, reached number 20 on the Billboard 200. AllMusic later called it a rare children's album with the wit to capture adult imaginations too.
The story then moved to the stage. An off-Broadway musical directed and choreographed by Patricia Birch, with designs by Sendak, opened at the Westside Theatre on October 14, 1980, and ran for 274 performances. The 12-year-old Tisha Campbell first played Rosie. The show has since become a mainstay of children's theatre groups, and it was revived off-Broadway in 2017.
Songs such as “Chicken Soup with Rice” and “Alligators All Around” taught children through rhyme and rhythm, and King's settings of the Nutshell Library songs reappeared in 2002 on a Scholastic video collection of Sendak stories. The comedian John Mulaney has named Really Rosie as a main inspiration for his Netflix special for children, John Mulaney & the Sack Lunch Bunch. The collaboration brought together two artists who grew up in Brooklyn, one from children's literature and one from popular song.
Why it matters
Really Rosie introduced generations of children to music, reading and playful learning through King's tunes and Sendak's words, and it is still performed by young casts today.
About Carole King
Brooklyn-raised songwriter of 1960s classics with Gerry Goffin who became a star in her own right with Tapestry (1971), one of the best-selling albums ever.
More about Carole King
- Carole King played free to 100,000 in Central ParkOn 26 May 1973 Carole King gave a free concert in New York's Central Park, drawing an audience of at least 100,000 people.
- The Beatles and the Drifters recorded Carole King songsCarole King's early songs were recorded by artists from the Drifters, who sang Up on the Roof, to the Beatles, who recorded Chains on their first album.
- Carole King wrote songs the whole world singsCarole King co-wrote her first US No. 1 before she was 20, then released Tapestry in 1971, which held No. 1 for 15 weeks, sold more than 25 million copies and won four Grammys.
Sources
- Carole King Wikipedia
- Really Rosie Wikipedia
Another act of tikkun olam. This is part of tikkun olam, the Jewish idea of repairing the world, and every one of us can add to it.