Skinnamarink: Beloved Children’s Entertainers Sharon and Bram Talk Music, Longevity and Appearing at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival

Sharon Lois and Bram

Never mind Michael Jackson, Madonna or Whitney Houston. For a toddler in Toronto in the early ’80s, there were no bigger musical superstars than Sharon, Lois and Bram. 

Of course, four decades on, expressing this sentiment to members of the legendary children’s group — Sharon Hampson, 80, and Bram Morrison, 82 — can make for an awkward moment. 

As Bram quipped: “People who say ‘I listened to you at my mother’s knee,’ who now has grey in his beard, is a problem for me.”

The trio — Sharon and Bram, along with Lois Lilienstein, who passed away in 2015 at the age of 78 — started out as individual musicians who teamed up in 1978 to, as Bram noted during our recent Zoom interview, “put our heads together, our memories and our creative abilities, and make a record.” After funding the endeavour with money borrowed from family and friends, the trio printed 5,000 copies of One Elephant, Deux Elephants — which was all that they could afford. They sold every one of them.

“The first terrible thing that can happen is not selling your records. The second terrible thing that could happen is selling them and running out and not having any more to sell for a while,” Sharon added in the same Zoom interview. “The goal was to make a good record for children and families. We did not understand we were starting a career. We certainly didn’t anticipate that we would be doing music together this many years later.”

The group hit it huge in the ’80s with their CBC series The Elephant Show, immortalizing classic tunes like their trademark “Skinnamarink” for a generation of young fans. They continued to perform and record for decades, billed as Sharon, Bram and Friends after the passing of Lois. Bram eventually retired from touring in 2019.

 

Sharon Lois and Bram
Sharon, Lois and Bram in ’80s, at the beginning of a run that would continue for the next four decades and counting. Photo: Erin Combs/Toronto Star via Getty Images

 

Now, however, Sharon and Bram are set to celebrate the group’s 45th anniversary this Sunday at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival (TJFF) with an event called A Skinnamarink Afternoon With Sharon, Lois & Bram. The event includes a screening of their 1979 TV special Sharon, Lois & Bram Downtown, which was filmed in Toronto’s Kensington Market, as well as live music from Sharon and Bram and a short look at an upcoming new broadcast special they filmed at the city’s historic Winter Garden Theatre. And yes, Elephant will be there too.

If that weren’t enough, the group also has an album of country songs dropping this month. 

Ahead of the TJFF event, Sharon and Bram spoke with Zoomer about their career, longevity, memories of performing, favourite songs and future projects.

 

 

MIKE CRISOLAGO: You’re performing at the Toronto Jewish Film Festival to celebrate the 45th anniversary of your group. How does it feel to reach that milestone and to still have people excited to watch you make music?

BRAM MORRISON: Well, it’s always interesting that we have lasted this long. Cause I’m not that old [laughs].  

SHARON HAMPSON: It’s thrilling, actually, Mike. We never anticipated the kind of run that we’ve had. And the fact that people come to us, the music is still in their hearts and they, like you, share it with the next generations. We’re thrilled by that, of course.

 

MC: Speaking of the next generations, it’s amazing how your music resonates with people of all ages. When my daughter, who is 16 months old, listens to a song of yours like “I Had an Old Coat,” she loves it. And I do too, but on a different level.  

BM: For the little, little kids, the ones that you’d call babies, what they respond to first is the rhythm. They get the beat. And as they grow older, they start hearing melodies. And a little older than that, they start hearing the words in the story. So it’s a gradual thing. It builds. And then, once you get to be an adult and you have your own kids, it all starts again.

SH: And different children respond to different songs. I mean, every now and then someone will say, ‘My child’s favourite song is blah blah’ and it’s a surprise because it hasn’t been a favourite of lots of other children. Or, maybe it is and we just don’t know.

BM: And some kids, I think they’re probably mostly boys, like the one about Little Bunny Foo Foo and “Bash ’em on the head” [laughs].

 

MC: What do you both think it is about your music that gives it that staying power across generations?

BM: I have very clear ideas about that. And one of them, and an important one, is that we decided right from the very, very beginning that we weren’t going to do anything trendy, because trends come and then they go. And we were going to do things that had power to last all the generations … Stuff like, “She’ll be coming around the mountain when she comes.” That’s a classic. It was around for generations before and it will be for generations afterwards. And that’s the kind of thing that we aim for in addition, of course, to what appeals to us personally.

 

MC: It’s like recording the Great American Songbook, but for children’s songs.

BM: Right. They don’t go out of style.

SH: And also it was always our goal that our music should be for the family. And I don’t know for sure, but I think that part of what makes it lasting is that adults have a feeling that’s connected to the memory of sharing the music with their families … They have happy memories of those times. And partly I think it’s because it was a family shared experience.

 

MC: Now you’ve both been performing these songs for 45 years. Which are your favourites?  

BM: Well, I always liked “Bashing ’em on the head” [“Little Bunny Foo Foo”] but I knew Lois didn’t.

SH: Skinnamarink” is the all-time favourite. And I think we all feel that way. And we had no idea when that song came to us, that it was going to mean what it means to us. It came to us as a suggestion. Lois learned it from her cousin. And we put it on a record. And then we used it to close our first show and it became obvious that it was a perfect closer with a perfect message. And we’ve never done otherwise … It’s a song that gives us enormous pleasure.

 

MC: At the Toronto Jewish Film Festival this weekend they’re going to screen your Sharon, Lois and Bram Downtown film from 1979. What do you remember about making that film?

BM: Well, I have to tell you, my memory is only really vague. But I watched it within the last week or two and I was astonished by a number of things. Number one, it was very musical. It was all music actually. There was very little or almost no talk, which was really nice [laughs]. I like that a lot because we tend to want to talk. I think it may have been a decision on the part of the director.

SH: And it’s interesting when you look at it. I don’t remember much of it either, if any. The kids are bigger and older than one might have expected.

BM: That really stuck in my mind because when we started, the kids were about Grade 5 and 6. So we’re talking about 10, 11 years old. And as the years have gone by, the age has gone down, to our disappointment. I mean, we like the little kids too, but we liked that the older ones were interested too. And they still are, but apparently it’s not to the same extent.

SH: It changed dramatically when The Elephant Show went on Nickelodeon TV in the United States. Then, of course, it had a massive audience, but it was on at 11 in the morning or something like that. So, of course it was little kids [who were not in school who were watching].

 

MC: Aside from the 1979 doc that they’re showing at the TJFF, you’re also going to offer a short preview of a new broadcast special for which you performed at the Winter Garden Theatre. What can you tell us about that? 

BM:  It’s the two of us plus Randi Hampson, who is Sharon’s daughter, who’s a terrific singer, very enthusiastic. And she’s been involved with us for the last number of years, both musically and managerially. She’s been managing us really, really well. She’s making sure we stay out there.

SH: It’s true. I say, ‘I think my daughter’s keeping me working to keep me alive.’ And my girlfriend says, ‘As long as she doesn’t kill you in the process’ [laughs]. No, she’s a great manager. And that was her vision, for us to do a documentary. The concert that we did at the Winter Garden will be part of the documentary ultimately, or some of it will …

It was sort of a family concert because there are the three of us on stage [Sharon, Bram and Randi]. Bram’s brother, Jeff Morrison, is part of the band. Randi’s sons Ethan and Elijah — Ethan plays bass and is the band leader, and Elijah sang with us. And Randi’s partner Jim plays guitar. And our friend, Zach, was the drummer. So it really was a family affair, which has a very nice feeling.

Sharon Lois and Bram
Sharon, Lois, Bram and Elephant show they have fun behind the camera as well in a shot from 1988. Photo: Richard Lautens/Toronto Star via Getty Images

 

MC: That’s sweet because we’re talking about your music reaching multiple generations, but even within your own band you have multiple generations.

BM: Yeah. We figure out now that, among our audience, we’re up to five generations. And it’s kind of mind-blowing.  

 

MC: And you also have a new country album coming out too, which is a compilation of songs from throughout your career. 

SH: I love the name of it, A Little Bit Country. We have friends who work with my daughter Randi, who are grown-up fans like you. So they work on projects with us and they had the idea of the country album. They said, ‘You know, you got a lot of songs that qualify as country songs.’  

BM: Yeah. But none about ‘I lost my girlfriend and my dog died’ [laughs].

SH: Bram and I sort of come from the folky environment and a lot of what we sang in our lives over the years has that kind of spirit. And there are a lot of them on our albums, as it turns out.

 

MC: Looking ahead, how long do you hope to continue to perform and record?

BM: Well, I’m 82 now, and at the end of 2019 I said, ‘Okay, I’m done with touring now.’ I just don’t have the energy for it because it’s a very, very demanding kind of thing to do. So I said, ‘Okay, that’s it for touring.’ But things keep popping up [laughs].

SH: Bring him an interesting project and he’s there. And Randi’s very good at finding interesting projects. I mean, we have two books and a third one coming. And Bram and I are happy to participate to the extent that we feel comfortable doing it. And Randi’s very clear about not overdoing it and not asking too much.

A Skinnamarink Afternoon With Sharon, Lois & Bram takes place at the Hot Docs Ted Rogers Cinema on Sunday, June 4 at 1pm.

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