Baltimore County, MD smARTS, 6 Jun 2018

Previous Meeting Next Meeting

⏯

youtube image

►

From YouTube: WTMD Saturday Morning Tunes

Description

An interview with Sam Sessa at 897 WTMD

A

( ♪♪♪ ).

A

The mission: to present concerts you can enjoy with your kids,.

A

Not just for your kids.

A

wtmd radio saturday morning tunes does just that.

A

With us on, smarts is sam sessa from wtmd in towson,.

A

A public radio station that broadcasts the independent music streak, 24/7.

A

Good to see you. thanks so much for having me.

A

well,. I find this all kind of fascinating these saturday morning concerts that you do.

A

That both kids and their parents can truly enjoy.

B

Well, kids' music has come a long way since I was a kid.

B

So there's more of it and there's better kids' music now.

A

It's got its own name., it's called kindie music..

A

This is a first for me.. I had not heard, kindie music., okay., indie, music for kids., right., okay. and there's all these bands that I grew up with.

B

Like lisa loeb and the presidents of the united states- and I think, third eye blind- might have one too- that now have second careers as children's musicians.

A

Because they're, older too., right. and they've got kids.

A

and they have kids and they say, "I want to enjoy this with my kids.".

A

Exactly. yeah. yeah.

B

When I was a kid,, we had the beatles and we had raffi.

B

And that was about it., whatever your parents were listening, to. but now,, it's legitimately good music in its own right.

B

It just happens to be for kids.

B

okay. alright.. Let's talk a little bit about.

A

These saturday morning experiences and I'm going to ask you to be because I know you're a parent.

A

So from the parent's perspective,, what it's all about and then also from the kid's perspective.

B

Absolutely., so the idea for the whole thing came: from...

B

I was a part-time stay-at-home dad and I was taking my kids to story time at the towson library.

A

And I wore my wtmd shirt and some of the other parents came up to me.

B

And said,: oh my gosh., we love wtmd., but we've got kids now. So we can't come to any of your concerts.”.

B

Yeah. we should explain., you do concerts at the station.

A

Where not only can people listen to it on the radio, but you can actually attend the concert at the station, which I think is awesome and you can get, what? 200 people in?.

A

B

So it's a nice studio, audience. yes., okay.

A

Sam:, but we do shows at lunch time, which is right before nap time.

A

And we do shows in the evening which is tough.

A

carolyn: you're not going to take kids., so you've decided to....

A

You came up with this idea. Then?.

B

Sam: I was like, yeah.. Let's do shows in the mornings on saturdays.

B

doors open at 9 am.”.

B

Every parent of small kids is up by 7:00 on a saturday morning.

A

Unfortunately, yes. right., sometimes even 5:30-6:00,, right?.

B

Sam: so 9:00, your day is like halfway done at that point.

B

And so doors open at 9:00., the show starts at 9:30.

B

We have a real short opening act about 20 minutes.

B

And then we have the headliner for about 40 minutes and after that, the kids are cooked.. That's plenty of time.

B

So we're out by 11:00, which gives you time to get home for lunch and nap time.

A

But I know a lot of kids,: they love their juice boxes..

A

So do you provide that as well? absolutely., okay. [laughing].

B

Absolutely. all organic, of course.

B

So organic juices and milks and fig bars and fruit strips. all organically grown.

A

Okay. all good,, healthy snacks that both the kids and the parents can enjoy,. I guess.

B

Absolutely. okay.

A

So you say it runs from about 9:00, 9:30, to...?, 11:00. 11:00., that's it..

B

So you're in and out of there.

A

And then what about,? I know that you do them onsite.

A

But sometimes you've even had bigger audiences, right?

A

for some of these concerts? yes.

B

We kind of dipped our toe in the water last december.

B

Which was brave because it's holiday season and there's a lot of holiday stuff going on for kids.

B

But we put on a concert at the senator theatre in belvedere square.

B

Thanks in part to live, baltimore helped us put it there and we got almost 550 parents and kids at that. Show.

B

Oh my goodness., the biggest complaint that we got afterwards, the only one was, please, next time,, no fixed seating., ( laughter ), so it was like, okay,. We can't do any more of that, and so we went to the lyric opera house. This past may.

B

And we did a mini-masquerade ball because everybody wants to...

B

You love your kids when they're dressed up.

A

It kind of feels like they're at their best, right?, but it's always for something.

B

A family this or some kind of obligation, so I thought,. Let's just do a dress-up dance party for kids., there's no strings attached.

A

So we had all these kids in like little tuxedos and suits and ties.

B

It was adorable and the parents were dressed up too.

B

And you're at the lyric opera house., so it's kind of a chi-chi..., what a fun thing.. It was nice.

A

Okay., so you talked about some very fun events.

A

tell me about some of the bands that have performed so far.

B

We try to keep it as diverse as possible, geographically and also musically.

B

We've had from the baltimore area,, the very first band to do. It was milkshake.

A

Carolyn:, I know them. yeah, sure., the gold standard of kids' bands in baltimore.

B

Lisa matthews who's their singer, after she did that, and it was a hit.

B

And the series started, we actually brought her on to do a family music show on wtmd called young at heart.

B

Which airs at 7:00 on saturday, mornings.

B

okay. before you come down to the radio station.

A

B

And we've done falu who's, this world music, star who's.

B

Performed with a.r. rahman, who did the soundtrack to slumdog millionaire.

A

Oh, wow., she came down.

B

She just had a kid about five years ago, so she put out her first children's album.

B

And it's all like kind of hindi-indie is what she calls herself.

B

Carolyn:, oh my gosh., and we had barry louis polisar who's from the area.

B

He had a song on that movie, juno and he's just this fantastic, absurdist kids' performer.

A

One of guys from they might be giants, came down and did one with us.

B

Oh my gosh., this is fantastic.

A

So if people want to find out,, do you have to get reservations.

A

To come to see the show?, how does that work?.

B

Some of them sell out in advance.

A

So it's good to kind of check it out ahead of time.

B

Carolyn: go online. and the website is saturdaymorningtunes.com.

B

okay.. Do you have to have kids to be able to come to watch?.

A

[Laughing] no., I guess you should though.

B

You're always welcome. thank you., I'm a kid at heart.

A

But I think all the great things you're doing at wtmd,, my hat off to you.. It sounds like a great thing for families to do together.

A

so sam, thanks so much for coming and telling us about it..

A

Thank you so much for having me. you bet.

A

well,. This is smarts, the baltimore county arts and culture show.