Roger Bourland
writes about music and life

Five months before I graduated from Harvard, Leon Kirchner had set up an interview for me to meet the composer for Sesame Street, Joe Raposo, who had also studied with Leon. Joe was looking for an assistant or someone to help write more music for Sesame Street. I ended up taking a job at UCLA instead and never had that interview. Joe died in 1989. I wonder from time to time what my life would have been like living in New York in 1983 instead of moving to Los Angeles.

Sigh…

IT’S NOT EASY BEING GREEN
(sung by Kermit)

It’s not that easy bein’ green;
Having to spend each day the color of the leaves.
When I think it could be nicer being red, or
yellow or gold-
or something much more colorful like that.

It’s not easy bein’ green.
It seems you blend in with so many other
ordinary things.
And people tend to pass you over ’cause you’re
not standing out like flashy sparkles in the water-
or stars in the sky.

But green’s the color of Spring.
And green can be cool and friendly-like.
And green can be big like an ocean, or important
like a mountain, or tall like a tree.

When green is all there is to be
It could make you wonder why, but why wonder why?
Wonder, I am green and it’ll do fine,
it’s beautiful!
And I think it’s what I want to be.