![]() He looked at them and then said, “Why don’t you have him do the music, too?” So then I wrote, for the most part, the song that became the Magic School Bus theme song. ![]() They talked to him for a while and his attitude was, “Well, why don’t you have this guy write the lyrics, and I’ll do the music.” So I wrote the lyrics. They were in talks with someone, a known celebrity who didn’t end up taking the job. By then, the fad for having celebrities write kids’ TV theme songs was really getting in gear. Two years later, it’s time to do a real theme song. Some of the melody was the same, and some of the lyrics were the same, but it was much more kid-like. It was an early version of the theme, and it had kids singing the whole thing. So two years before I wrote the song that ended up being the theme for the show, I wrote a song for the pitch, or the proof of concept, or something. When she sent me the book, I thought it was the greatest thing I had ever seen. Kristin called me and told me she had a new project. The Magic School Bus had a long and involved development process. It’s like a wormhole opened up: you get a shot at something, and after that, you’re someone who can do it, and then you’re interesting to other people who want someone who can do it. His wife, Kristin Martin, was one of the main producers on The Magic School Bus, so she was my contact there. The director of that show was Hugh Martin. “You get a shot at something, and suddenly you’re someone who can do it, and then you’re interesting to other people who want someone who can do it.” I got the job, and all of the kids’ stuff has flowed out of that. I’d never tried writing lyrics, but having spent my life as a wiseass, when I started, I was like, “Wow, this is actually kind of fun!” Music I’ve done all my life, and that has all kinds of baggage with it. So I got the show bible, which is the description of the characters and the aims of the show, and I just tried writing some songs for the characters. I spoke to them and they said, you know, just bring stuff that you have. I didn’t admit this to them until many, many years later. Any interest?” It was like a choir of angels appeared, and I was like, wow, this is what I’ve been looking for. Then someone else I had met at a party, Kathy Minton, who was the producer on Eureeka’s Castle, left a message on my phone one day saying, “Hey, we’re doing this puppet show for Nickelodeon. The Random House connection was from somebody I met at a party. A film strip, in case you didn’t know, was sort of a slideshow on a continuous reel of film. I did a couple of student films, which gave me a demo tape, which got me a gig doing film strips for Random House. When I came back to the U.S., I was looking get into some kind of film or TV scoring So I took a course in film scoring at the Mannes School of Music extension division. I worked at an opera house in Germany for three years out of college. My background is entirely early classical. He said, “Beware of your first success, because you’ll be doing it for the rest of your life.” How he boarded The Magic School BusĪ friend of mine-the person who did the sound for The Magic School Bus, in fact-once made a comment that I thought was great. Lurye’s comments have been condensed and edited for clarity. ![]() Hop aboard the Magic School Bus! You’re in for a wild ride. The Dot and Line spoke with Lurye about getting the gig, composing the song, working with Little Richard and Lin-Manuel Miranda, and more. But if there’s one song Lurye is perhaps most famous for among animation lovers and kids worldwide, it’s the theme song for The Magic School Bus. He’s even done work for film, including the song “Be True to Your Groove” from The Emperor’s New Groove 2: Kronk’s New Groove. Venable, to Stanley, whose theme song was performed by Baha Men. Lurye’s songs have been featured in TV series ranging from Eureeka’s Castle to Dora the Explorer to Bear in the Big Blue House, not to mention My Life as a Teenage Robot, where he worked with Samurai Jack’s James L. Composer Peter Lurye has been a mainstay in children’s animation for more than three decades thanks to a serious talent for earworms.
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