Friday, November 14, 2014

Toon Rock: (Open Your Heart &) Let the Sunshine In (1965)

Hanna-Barbera missed out on a golden opportunity to do a soundtrack album from The Flintstones, that much is clear.

Consider that in addition to Fred doing the occasional number (with either Henry Corden or Duke Mitchell as a singing double for Alan Reed), you had Barney & Betty (Mel Blanc & Bea Benaderet) doing a duet in one episode, Ann-Margret and the Beau Brummels as musical guest stars, and, to top it all, they had Pebbles & Bamm-Bamm doing their first number, 6 years before their elevation to teenagers and forming their band, the Bedrock Rockers.

And, so, we present our preschool pop stars, performing "(Open Your Heart &) Let The Sunshine In", which was used as a closing theme for some episodes in the final season.

4 comments:

magicdog said...

I always liked this song! Although the group, Frente! did my favorite cover of the tune back in the 90s.


I was surprised how many versions of this song there are out there - either by gospel groups, country artists, or pop singers!

I definitely agree that a Flintstones soundtrack should have been released. Hoyt Curtain, Ted Nichols, et al left a great bunch of material on that show.

hobbyfan said...

The Frente cover came out in 1995 on the Saturday Morning's Greatest Hits. It was originally a gospel-tinged record that peaked at #8 on the charts some years earlier.

Anne Murray also covered this track. Go figure.

Jennifer L. Schillig said...

And don't forget that wonderful "Yabba Dabba Doo" song Hoagy Carmichael did...

hobbyfan said...

If that shows up on YouTube, it's going up here.