Totally psyched to be able to announce the addition of very special guests Mates of State to the Elizabeth Mitchell & You Are My Flower show on May 21 at the Eric Carle Museum.  To make the schedule work, we’ve shifted the show to 3:00 p.m. that day.

We’ll have some more formal followup from all of us organizers soon — keep an eye on kindiefest.com and our Facebook page, where we’re also posting links to photos, videos, etc.– but I wanted to take a minute to get some of my first thoughts down.

• It was a terrific year.  The panels, the music, the people, the everything — it was just a bucket of fun.
• If I were to try to summarize the themes I heard throughout the panels in one sentence, it’d be “Be who you are.”  Whether talking about branding or collaboration or social networking or PR, everyone seemed to come back to that core notion of authenticity.
• I really liked having some people who aren’t in the family music world on the panels — Jim Olsen has tremendous “branding” knowledge from his building Signature Sounds (and, incidentally, from being a huge part of making our station what it is), and Jonathan Coulton brought a ton of knowledge to bear on the social networking panel.
• Even the live acts, I realized as I was driving home, were utterly and purely authentic.  When I was introducing CandyBand, I mentioned that I once awarded them the entirely fictional award “Best Kids’ Rock Band That Actually Listens to Rock Music.”  They play the music they play — and they kick ass at it — because it’s who they are.  Same with the (otherwise completely different) Cat & a Bird, and The Pop Ups, and The Not-Its, Shine & the Moonbeams, and so on.
• Steph texted me early Sunday morning: “I feel like I was at one of the best concerts I ever saw last night.”  Man, was she right.  During every single act, I thought, “Man, I’d hate to follow that band.”  And then the next act would just kill it.  Same thing with Sunday.
• Shine & the Moonbeams: Gonna be huge. Write it down.
• There’s more, but I need to write an exam.  Thanks to everyone who attended, who participated, who rocked, who danced, who laughed, who hung out.  You’re awesome.

Our friends at Reelife Productions were at the Meltdown all day, and have posted a half-dozen videos of main stage performances.  Check ’em out (all in one video playlist):

One of the great delights of doing the show has been working with my friend Jarret J. Krosoczka for the last three years producing the Meltdown.  Well, this year, he’s both nominated for and hosting the Children’s Choice Book Awards, the only national award voted on by kids.  So we figured we’d have him on to talk about that, to give a little preview of the next couple of Lunch Lady books, and to talk about his new picture book, due this fall.  And to discuss his planned awards show wardrobe.

You can vote right now, if, y’know, you’re a kid.  Jarrett’s hoping they can break 500,000 votes this year — help him out!

We’ll air the interview a week from Saturday (4/16), but you can listen now:

Interview

Welcome to the second round of the Leadbelly Region for Zooglobble’s yearly friendly video competition.  Today we’ve got a great matchup between Key Wilde & Mr Clarke’s raucous “Big Pet Pig” and Caspar Babypants’s indie folk “$9.99.”  Watch them both — even if you think you know which one you’ll be voting for! — and then vote below.

Congratulations to Keller Williams and Recess Monkey for winning the regional.  Come back here next week for the next matchup, and, as always, read Zooglobble for details and announcements!