Mouth Noise Art

One rabbit trail my kids have gone on, especially, my 11 year old, as a result of their enjoyment of animated cartoons and videogames is an interest in voice actors.  They pay attention to the people who do the voices for the different characters.  They admire Mel Blanc and Frank Oz.  This has also extended to creating sound effects.  They learned about Fred Newman from watching Between the Lions.   My 11 yo frequents Fred Newman's site and had taught himself a lot of sound effects noises as a result.  Sometimes it can be a little annoying to live with, I'll admit.  But right now it is his passion.  He and his older brother also think  Dee Bradley Baker rocks.

A while ago we all got into Bobby Mcferrin.  My 11 year old took it one step further and is now very much into beatboxing a la Taylor McFerrin.  He works at it frequently, though we do keep requesting him not to beatbox at the dinner table!  He knows all these technical terms and he sounds like a speech therapist when he talks about vocalized or aspirated sounds and using your voice box, etc.  It actually takes a lot of thought, effort and practice to get those sounds and beat right!

All this creativity with mouth noises reminds me of my favorites:  Mel Torme and Ella Fitzgerald.  I loved scat when I was growing up.  I saw Mel Torme's son, Steve in concert at a nightclub a long time ago.  I also saw Ella once.  I had lawn tickets at an outdoor theater.  It was pouring rain the whole time and I totally ruined my clothes standing there but no one left because of the weather.  If you were a fan of Ella, a little rain wasn't going to stop you!

My kids enjoy scat as well.  Currently my 15 yo is into Scat Man John.

 So from watching such shows as Bugs Bunny, Phineas and Ferb, Between the Lions and getting into video games, my kids have explored all kinds of things:  animation, production, music, etc.

This listing here is just a small slice of all the interests, passions and learning that have unfolded from watching some TV shows; a little example of how TV has broadened and enriched our family life.