The animated openings of Sesame Street

[mikealan]

I remember seeing a couple of animated openings of the early episodes of Sesame Street. They play before the Sesame Street Theme Song. In 1969, when Sesame Street debuted, Jim Henson made the claymation series for the first season. Then in the early '70's seasons, the openings are animated. They play before the show until they end in 1976. In the late '70's, I think it's just the original SS theme song until the early '90's. In 1993, the theme song got changed, because it had Big Bird, Grover, Zoe, Cookie, the Count, Prairie, Natasha, Elmo, Ernie, Bert and Telly. Now, in 1998 or 1999, the theme song changed again, because it featured Big Bird follows the kids to Sesame Street.

My memories of the animated openings are...

Episode 1-the very first claymation opening with the two monsters and the upside-down U that has the name, "Sesame Street"

Episode 162-We see a hand putting the seeds under the ground until water lets them grow as the word, "Sesame Street" appears in different colors, then the passion flowers grow. After they all grow, the other flower grows, too, with the episode number, 162.

Episode 536- A red woodpecker makes the word "Sesame Street" on the tree. I remember seeing that at the Museum of Television & Radio on Veteran's Day. It's before segments like the Fat Cat song by Mahna Mahna, the eerie D song with the daisies with feet, Kermit and Joey sing the Cookie Monster alphabet, and the opening street segment with the scary steel-made muppet named Sam the Robot.

Episode 560- A robber takes off his boots first. Then he puts them next to the garbage can, and he flies off as the word, "Sesame Street" and the number 560 both appear.

Anybody remember the other animated openings from the early episodes?

[SillyRed]

There's a new opening where Big Bird and the little girl play with blocks, then the blocks get animated and come to life, and they, along with other kids chase them which also show scenes from Elmo's World, Monster Clubhouse, The Count laughing while confetti falls, Cookie Monster Eating, etc. At the end, Grover flies and bumps in to the street sign and the sign wobbles and Grover comes up and shows the show's number.

[Daffyfan2003]

Hmmm. I saw the new opening just the other day. I think the opening I'm the most familiar with showed kids playing in the park and the sequence varied from time to time. Sometimes Big Bird would join them. I also remember the 1993 opening that Mike mentioned. I remember that one had a more jazzy style of the theme song.

[mikebennidict]

Originally Posted by mikealan

I remember seeing a couple of animated openings of the early episodes of Sesame Street. They play before the Sesame Street Theme Song. In 1969, when Sesame Street debuted, Jim Henson made the claymation series for the first season. Then in the early '70's seasons, the openings are animated. They play before the show until they end in 1976. In the late '70's, I think it's just the original SS theme song until the early '90's. In 1993, the theme song got changed, because it had Big Bird, Grover, Zoe, Cookie, the Count, Prairie, Natasha, Elmo, Ernie, Bert and Telly. Now, in 1998 or 1999, the theme song changed again, because it featured Big Bird follows the kids to Sesame Street.

My memories of the animated openings are...

Episode 1-the very first claymation opening with the two monsters and the upside-down U that has the name, "Sesame Street"

Episode 162-We see a hand putting the seeds under the ground until water lets them grow as the word, "Sesame Street" appears in different colors, then the passion flowers grow. After they all grow, the other flower grows, too, with the episode number, 162.

Episode 536- A red woodpecker makes the word "Sesame Street" on the tree. I remember seeing that at the Museum of Television & Radio on Veteran's Day. It's before segments like the Fat Cat song by Mahna Mahna, the eerie D song with the daisies with feet, Kermit and Joey sing the Cookie Monster alphabet, and the opening street segment with the scary steel-made muppet named Sam the Robot.

Episode 560- A robber takes off his boots first. Then he puts them next to the garbage can, and he flies off as the word, "Sesame Street" and the number 560 both appear.

Anybody remember the other animated openings from the early episodes?

to bad i missed all of those. 1 of the 1970 SSU shows had them. BTW. hi there setta. the 2 of us a year ago belonged to a site called yeasterdayland witch was about popculture of the past. it also had sections for inividual TV shows, such as SS. i think this month marks the year long aniversary of YL shutting down. am i right setta? well anyway it's nice to be here. i hope there's a liink section here cause i have some good ones relating to SS and other PBS shows i'll post in the near future.

[ssetta]

I know! I still don't think they should have shut it down!

[matthewxel]

What was the music like anyway that went along with these openings?

[Xerus]

I remember these two from when I was a kid.

It first showed an egg. Then it hatched and out came a big yellow bird holding a box. Out of the box came a small blue bird holding a top hat. And out of the top hat came a pelican's head. When the pelican opened its beak, there was a tiny bird inside it. Then the words SESAME STREET appeared right next to the pelican and tiny bird.

Another one had a black screen and a neon colored panther appeared playing wild jazz on a trumpet. Then some letters started flying out of the trumpet spelling Sesame Street. Then the panther faints from exhaustion and vanishes and the episode number appears.

[Splurge]

Originally Posted by Xerus

I remember these two from when I was a kid.

It first showed an egg. Then it hatched and out came a big yellow bird holding a box. Out of the box came a small blue bird holding a top hat. And out of the top hat came a pelican's head. When the pelican opened its beak, there was a tiny bird inside it. Then the words SESAME STREET appeared right next to the pelican and tiny bird.
.

I guess as a lot of people here may already know, this cartoon appears on a Fisher-Price movie cartridge from 1973 called "On My Way To Sesame Street". Another one with a gong appears on "Shapes"..... if I remember properly.

Thanks to eBay, you can probably find these being auctioned - if not today, then in the future.

[Katzi428]

Ah HA! I knew I wasn't dreaming about these animated openings to Sesame Street! There was one that appeared on Fridays. It was a painter in a blue painter's cap.He was painting something,and when he held it up,it said "SESAME STREET".Then he made some indescribable noise.

[ssetta]

This is very interesting, but you know, I think they must have discontinued these animated openings in either 1974 or 1975. I know that starting in 1976, they just had the episode number on the screen at the beginning of the theme. However, I noticed that on hooperdusty's copies of episodes 810-815 from the 1975-76 season, they do not have episode number sequences on them. So, from what it seems, it looks like there was a point at which they did not show the episode number on the screen at all. I think this sounds reasonable that the episode number sequences did take up a bit of time, and I guess they thought they really didn't need to have the episode number on the screen. I mean, most people don't remember episode numbers, or even pay attention to them. But then I guess they thought after awhile, it was really helpful to have the episode number on the screen, but they didn't want to take up too much time either. So then, I guess someone finally came up with the clever idea to simply make the episode number as part of the opening theme, so it wouldn't take up any extra space at all. Sound reasonable?