Chatting with Playhouse Disney's Imagination Movers Rich Collins

Last week, we caught up with Rich to talk about life, parenthood, and all that new with the Imagination Movers. We caught up with the happy father of 5 in Louisiana, playing with his newest addition, nine-month old, Hank on break from shooting the hit show, Imagination Movers, on Playhouse Disney. They have a special new Indiana Jones themed episode with some new rockin’ songs coming up this Saturday, March 21.

MsDCMama: Hi Rich, it’s been a long while. Since the White House Easter Egg Roll, and with so much new going on, would you share a little about the Movers show on Playhouse Disney.

Rich Collins: No problem. The show is designed to encourage kids towards creativity. The show features 4 musical friends that work together to musically have adventures, solve problems, model teamwork, respect for friends, creativity and innovation.

MDCM: It’s definitely a Saturday morning favorite at my house. I love to see my little ones singing along and rockin’ it to music. How do you come up with songs that kids and adults both love?

Rich: That’s awesome. We love to getting email (use the email link at www.imaginationmovers.com ) and feedback from viewers. (Sweetly enough, they still respond to every letter – so drop them a line.) Actually, we write and play all of our own music. A lot of it comes from the things we experience as dads everyday like someone being scared of the dark, sharing with you siblings and cleaning up your room. To have our music connect with people is really neat.



MDCM: So what’s new with The Imagination Movers?

Rich: It’s a great season for us. We’ve got a giant tidal waves of activities, (including) shooting the upcoming second season of the show with 25 new episodes, cool improvements to the show and just some all around good things. One neat thing is that we are wrapping up our first soundtrack (a May Target exclusive) of about 20 songs from the first season of the show called For Those About To Hop and a DVD from the same season.

MDCM : All Good Things. We loved y’alls live show, will y’all be coming back to town anytime soon?

Rich: Actually in the Fall, we will be starting our first big US tour, hitting major theatres around the country. We are bound to be somewhere in the DC area.

DCM: Well keep us posted. We would love to rock out again. With so much going on, how do you balance the demands of booming career and fatherhood?

Rich: I won’t lie it’s a hard balance. We’ve got 4 guys having the adventure of our lives and everything else keeps going like the carpool, laundry, ect. ect. Sometimes the burden falls on our wives, but they do the best they can. One thing that really works in our favor is the ebb and flow of the business. Sometimes we are very available, but then sometimes we are not. But something I really value is showing your kids how you can use your imagination and follow through with your dreams to create a job that you really want to do and love to do. Not just sitting behind some desk because you think you have to.

DCM: I can totally agree with that. It sounds like all good things are on the horizon for the Movers. We look forward to seeing where The Movers go from here. hear Henry calling. Thanks for spending time with us.

To hear more of The Imagination Movers music, visit www.ImaginationMovers.com and to see the hit show, that has become a family favorite in our house, check them out on Playhouse Disney.

5 Minutes with Playhouse Disney's Imagination Movers and CD Giveaway

On a bright, crisp Easter Monday morning, Capitol Moms spent a few minutes chatting with the funny and quite cool guys, Scott, Dave, Smitty and former Silver Spring local, Rich from the Imagination Movers, the world's first alternative rock band for pre-schoolers, currently playing on Playhouse Disney.

How'd y'all get started? Well, we've been together in one way or another for the last decade. A couple of us went to high school together, our wives are friends, between the 4 of us there are 8 kids, though most of them belong to Rich. We came up with the idea after Captain Kangeroo and the like left this world -- we realized that all the programming for kids were cartoons. We wanted to do something fun, that got kids up and moving we started there.

Has it been a smooth road thus far? It's been a long road. After we came up with the idea and some of the music, we played local sites and pitched the idea for a short show to Louisiana Public Broadcasting -- they loved it but couldn't sponsor to a new show and the people from Disney came out to come have a listen. It was a good match, but then Hurricane Katrina hit and our lives turned upside down. Three of us were standing in line for food stamps and trying to re-create our lives. It was nuts, but Disney came back around and the Writer's Strike hit and now we are wrapping up shooting new shows for the fall.

Oh cool a new show for the Fall, what else is coming up for the Imagination Movers? We've got a new CD - Juice Box Heroes (we've been listening to it for a few days now and it has all your favorites from Playhouse Disney including my Z's favorite Farm)

How do y'all balance band life and fatherhood? We are Daddies and Husbands first then a band -- but after being around these guys for so long -- they are family too. You learn alot about each other, but it works. Dave notes that it helps to make sure to spend time with your kids, either playing outside, singing together,

I love it and to wrap things up, what are some of the products that y'all love to use with your kids? Rich, a proud papa of 4 with one more on the way, loves his Baby Bjorn and swears by the Pack'N'Play. Dave has older kids, right now, they make their Wii, a family sport - racing to the finish line, and Scott says Boudreaux's Butt Paste (we swear by this one in our house too!)is the best.

To enter our GIVEAWAY for a copy of the Juice Box Heroes, simply sign-up for our newsletter and it automatically enters you for the April 4th giveaway. If you can't wait, it is available at www.imaginationmovers.com or in our Amazon store.

To hear samples and watch videos of the their family favorites, click here

Calling all Playhouse Disney Fans: Imagination Movers at the White House Easter Roll on Monday and Healthy Eating Help with BunnyTown

Playhouse Disney's hit alternative band for pre-schoolers, The Imagination Movers will be performing at the White House Easter Egg Roll this Monday (3/24) at 8:25 am and 11:30 am on the Easter Bonnet stage on the South Lawn. Imagination Movers have also released a new CD, Juice Box Heroes (too cute!), available at Disney Music.


Need a little help, encouraging a picky eater -- try a little help from Bunnytown's Healthy Food Pageant airing on Monday, 3/24, to see a clip, click here. Bunnytown is hopping into their new daily 10am timeslot. My Z loves rockin' out to the bunnies and learns little lessons about play, gets up and moving and drags Mommy and Daddy along.