Performances listed below are recommended for ages 4 to 10. They are 50 minutes in length. The fee is $225 plus a travel fee if more than 30 miles from North East, MD. Discounts are given for multiple library bookings on the same day in the same area, or multiple bookings on the same day at the same school.
The Ready for Reading Authors Program fee is $100 per class, which includes two visits to each classroom and the grade level assembly.
Available Performances
The Chef and His Dragon Adventure
A performance for 2024’s Adventure Begins at Your Library
The Chef and his Dragon Adventure is an original musical play about Chef Alfredo, who works for King Rupert. One night the King throws a dinner party for his friends, and the Chef makes the King’s favorite: pizza! Unfortunately, after sampling the main course, the King is not pleased and throws the pizzas out the window. If that’s not bad enough for King Rupert and his chef, soon there are reports that Edgaar the Dragon has turned mean and is terrorizing the kingdom. The King must find a way to save his subjects from the fiery menace without risking his own life. He turns to Sparks, his wizard. The wizard gets books about dragons from the royal library to seek a solution. He shares the books with the audience, but they can find no way to solve the King’s problem. Then, with the help of the bookworm who lives in his book of spells, Sparks concocts a potion that he is sure will turn Edgaar into a meek and mild sheep. After things don’t go as planned, the Chef and the audience figure out what is wrong with Edgaar and find a solution that returns him to his old self. The kingdom is saved!
During the performance, Rick plays the parts of Chef Alfredo, King Rupert, and Sparks, the wizard. He is joined by a cast of puppets: Ratay, the King’s pet, Basil the bookworm, a pirate, and Edgaar, a six-foot dragon! There will be songs with parts for the audience, and they will be introduced to several children’s books. Volunteers can also act as the King’s subjects, dodge the dragon’s fireballs, help make Sparks’ potion, and deliver the remedy to Edgaar that saves the day! The show will end with everyone joining in to sing Rick’s new summer library theme song.
King Rupert Greets the World!
King Rupert is hoping to bring the world closer together with stories we can share. He goes to the Royal Library to see what he can find. There, he discovers that many of the folk and fairy tales we are familiar with have versions set in other cultures. A West African Little Red Riding Hood! A Chinese dragon in Beauty and the Beast! A Middle Eastern Cinderella who loses her sandal instead of a slipper! The King plans to use these stories from other lands to show the children how much they have in common with children from around the world. He brings 6 story books, hand puppets, and instruments to share.
After identifying an excerpt from a new version of a familiar fairy tale, the kids meet one of the King's puppet friends. A dragon tells them about Tibet and shares her singing bowl. A turtle teaches the audience a Spanish song from the West Indies. Volunteers come up to see if they can play the kalimba, the shekire' or the doumbek. The audience tries to match foreign words with colors, foods, and family members.
Through puppetry, music, and fun your audience will learn about other cultures. The finale' invites the children to use clues to guess which fairy tale the King is singing about, and join him in singing One World, Many Stories. This performance will bring your audience a sampling of the diverse cultures with whom they share the world. All together now!
Ready for Reading
Author’s Program for Kindergarten through Grade 3
This is the perfect program to encourage young readers to exercise their emerging skills and develop a love of reading. Rick visits your school three times. On the first visit he goes into each classroom in the grade level for a half hour, to present a biography and an original song about an author chosen by the teacher. Rick teaches the song to the children and leaves a recording of it. Authors include Jan Brett, Eve Bunting, Eric Carle, Joanna Cole, Doreen Cronin, Tomie DePaola, Lois Ehlert, Kevin Henkes, Pat Hutchins, Ezra Jack Keats, Steven Kellogg, Leo Lionni, Arnold Lobel, Robert Munsch, Laura Numeroff, Dr. Seuss, Mark Teague, Chris van Allsburg, David Wiesner, Mo Willems, and Audrey Wood; but a new song can be composed for an author not on the list. Classes spend the next month or so enjoying books by the chosen author. On the second visit Rick returns to each class to review their song and introduce other songs about reading and books. The third visit is an assembly, during which each class presents their song to the other classes and invited guests. Rick completes the assembly by playing and singing interactive songs.
Entertain your young audience with water facts and fantasy. There is interactive science, songs to sing, puppets to enjoy, and books!! Kids will learn about buoyancy, the siphon principal, density, and the water cycle through a series of demonstrations with audience volunteers. Does an orange float? What happens when salt water and freshwater mix? How does water move from ocean to sky and back again? Are there ways to get more water for a thirsty world? All will be revealed!
Children will join Rick as we sing original songs. The Water Goes Round and Round invites four volunteers to bring raindrop puppets to life. Make a Splash! is about the watery places they can take their books on vacation. Teeth is the Pirate puppet’s song about how he lost so many. And The Undersea Library is the place where ocean creatures find their great reads! Rick will have books to share and fun for your audience!
Splashing Around the Library
The Dragon and the Chef
This show stars a 6-foot dragon puppet and Rick playing the King's chef. Rick also becomes King Rupert and Sparks, the King's wizard, in a story of how Edgaar the dragon goes from being a peaceful neighbor to a fire-breathing menace to the people of the kingdom. Ratay, the King's French rat, and Basil the Bookworm round out the cast. The audience helps the Chef make pizza, dodge "fireballs", and helps Sparks make his potion to try to rid the kingdom of the dragon's wrath. But, in the end, it takes a search through several children's books and a discovery by the kids to save the day!
In Search of the Reading Bug
Professor Nigel Netwinder will stir your audience's imagination, teach them some insect science, practice language skills, and introduce them to some great kids' books. The Professor is hoping to find the illusive Insecta Libratera in one of the curious garden boxes on stage. Each contains a children's book and an insect puppet that have the kids identifying excerpts, then completing limericks, unscrambling and spelling words, clapping patterns, and learning about the peculiarities of the insect community. In a surprise ending, the Professor and the children learn that they are all "Reading Bugs".
Sam Gets a Clue
Sam has an accident and he can't remember anything - amnesia!! Then he finds a small notebook in his pocket with the name “Sam” on it and some writing inside. He reads the first page, and the kids identify it as part of Green Eggs and Ham. After a look at Dr. Seuss's book Sam decides he must be a chef. But the recipe he and the kids put into a song proves Sam is a terrible cook! However, the book does provide him with a clue - the letter "B". Sam and the audience have a lot more books, songs, and laughter ahead of them, before collecting and unscrambling the letters that reveal his true identity. Your audience will eagerly await the next book that convinces Sam he is an insect biologist, a juggler, a pirate captain, a magician, and an artist. In the finale, the kids will sing “Get a Clue from Your Favorite Book”, about how books can give them endless possibilities for their future. This show highlights great children's books and encourages reading as it engages the audience with songs and audience participation.
The Build It Better Shop
Think, design, assemble, test, improve! In this program Rick is an engineer who runs a shop where people can bring inventions that aren’t working the way they had hoped. His first customer of the day is a dragon puppet. The dragon has made a little merry-go-round for her dragon amusement park. She shares part of Feivel’s Flying Horses by Heidi Smith Hyde with the kids, to show them where she got the inspiration for her merry-go-round. The dragon’s problem is that it won’t turn. Rick takes a look and, with suggestions from the audience, figures out that the top and the seats are resting right on top of the base, creating too much friction. We decide that we can use marbles, which act like ball bearings, to reduce the friction and set the ride in motion! Throughout the rest of the show, other puppets enter the shop to get help and share books with the kids. The dinosaur’s hoist that can’t lift his fossilized bones out of the ground, the lion’s one-note guitar, and the flower's quest for new colors all need assistance from the audience. At the end of the show, after being introduced to several books and principles of physical science and having fun designing like an engineer, the kids will join in singing Books Build a Better World.
Escape From the Great Books Mine
Mike is a miner for the Great Books Mining Company. As he explains how he digs books from the walls of the mine, an earthquake happens! Everyone is just fine but it will be a little while before the rescue crew can reach them. To pass the time, Mike shares a book he found in the mine. Before long, he's interrupted by a succession of tunneling puppets. Each one shares one of the books they have buried underground. The books lead to songs, jokes, and wordplay, as the puppets try to entertain the trapped visitors. The worm invites volunteers to help him with his song, "All Worms Dance". The ant shows them close-up photos of everyday objects to see if they can tell what they're seeing. A hedgehog engages them with some knock-knock jokes. A dinosaur skeleton puppet re-assembles himself with some help from a few of the kids. Finally, another miner breaks through and opens the way back to the surface. The visitors have just enough time to help Miner Mike sing "Dig Some Fun for Yourself"!
Space: The Final Funtier
It's time to celebrate Summer Library 2019 with books, music, a little space science and fun! This show will have children's books, sing-along guitar songs, puppets, and lots of audience participation. Four volunteers will join me to make alien limberjack toys dance to the music during my "Dancing Aliens" song. Two more volunteers will help with "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed the Sky". The audience will see why space-walking astronauts need protection from the vacuum of space and how aerodynamics apply to space flight. There will also be a visit from a robot comedian! Throughout the show, I will introduce several books to your young readers. And we'll close the show as the audience helps me sing my summer library theme song, celebrating space exploration and books!
