It’s hard for anyone to get to sleep these days. Kids have fevered imaginations and parents have dreams of 2021 vaccines. But the entire family can agree that a good bedtime story sets the right mood for relaxing slumber. Enter the Story Pirates with their new sketch and music theater experience, SLEEP SQUAD. Aimed at kids from 4 to 12, the production recently launched with a discounted “10-day pass” running through February 21 that gives each family their entry date into a world of inventive play.
The Story Pirates have a history of adapting children’s ideas into fully-realized experiences and SLEEP SQUAD continues that work. Tony nominee Lilli Cooper (SpongeBob SquarePants, Tootsie) hosts the production as the Dream Queen, who guides audiences through different scenarios. The 45-minute episode includes a visit to a desert island (“Stuck Island”), a dinosaur’s birthday party (“Spinosaurus’ Birthday”), and an intergalactic nightclub (“30 Moons”), and comes with an additional 15 minutes of supplemental music. And just when your charges get all amped up, SLEEP SQUAD winds them back down with soothing music to ease them into a sleep zone to produce their own nighttime fantasies.
The Story Pirates continue to adapt material from young contributors and may break the production into three 20-minute episodes in 2021. The show’s theme song, “30 Moons,” written by nine-year-old Julien, has just been released as a single featuring singer Ellen Winter.
Performances are available on the date purchased starting at 7 pm ET and can be viewed any number of times for 14 days thereafter. Buy tickets here.
With the holiday season fully underway, it’s time to count your blessings and look ahead to better times in the new year. Genevieve Goings, former star of Disney Junior’s Choo Choo Soul, has an EP coming on February 8 and recently debuted the first single, “Grateful.”
Choo Choo Soul existed long before Disney Music acquired the property. But those four seasons of original music and exposure opened the door for Genevieve to expand her own imprint as well as carry on the worldwide mantle of Choo Choo Soul.
The lyrics for the funk-rock “Grateful” plainly state what everyone feels when people try to see each other:
It can be a Zoom party or a Facebook feed
As long as we’re together it doesn’t matter how we meet
We’ll be alright,
Even if it’s on Skype
The 2021 EP is amusingly titled Great Indoors, which everyone can relate to. “Grateful” is available to stream and download via Spotify, Deezer, Pandora, Apple Music, and Amazon.
