Paul Tripp (February 20, 1911 – August 29, 2002) was an American children's

musician A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who wri ...

, author,

songwriter A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music gen ...

, and television and film actor. He collaborated with a fellow composer, George Kleinsinger. Tripp was the creator of the 1945 " Tubby the Tuba", a piece of

classical music Classical music generally refers to the art music of the Western world, considered to be distinct from Western folk music or popular music traditions. It is sometimes distinguished as Western classical music, as the term "classical music" also ...

for children that has become his best-known work. He authored several books, including ''Rabbi Santa Claus'' and ''Diary of a Leaf''.

Early years

Tripp was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. Tripp attended

Brooklyn College Brooklyn College is a public university in Brooklyn, Brooklyn, New York. It is part of the City University of New York system and enrolls about 15,000 undergraduate and 2,800 graduate students on a 35-acre campus. Being New York City's first publ ...

and City College of the City University of New York, and he held a master's degree in education. During World War II, he served in the Army Signal Corps.

Career

Early in his career, he was the host of '' Mr. I. Magination'', which was aired by CBS from 1949 to 1952 featuring him as a train engineer who took children through a tunnel to meet with representatives of different occupations. Tripp later co-hosted ''Birthday House'' with singer-composer

Kay Lande Kathryn Lande Selmer (born November 6, 1930) is an American composer and singer who is best known for her compositions and performances for children, which include three operas, many songs, and appearances on television, including as co-host of th ...

, a live (later taped) daily morning children's show on

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that aired in New York for four years, starting in 1963. A book of his, ''The Christmas That Almost Wasn't'', was produced as a

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1966 Events January * January 1 – In a coup, Colonel Jean-Bédel Bokassa takes over as military ruler of the Central African Republic, ousting President David Dacko. * January 3 – 1966 Upper Voltan coup d'état: President Maurice Yaméogo i ...

, for which Tripp provided the

screenplay ''ScreenPlay'' is a television drama anthology series broadcast on BBC2 between 9 July 1986 and 27 October 1993. Background After single-play anthology series went off the air, the BBC introduced several showcases for made-for-television, fe ...

and played a lead role. Tripp and his wife, Ruth Enders Tripp, used many avenues to engage children in educational activities and collaborated on many educational programs for children. Among those programs, they hosted a TV news magazine for teens titled ''On The Carousel'', which was seen Saturday mornings on the CBS TV network from June 5, 1955, to September 26, 1959. Every week the Tripps would engage their viewers and studio audiences in craftmaking, hobbies, science projects, art, history, and musical and dramatic offerings...including a live presentation of "Tubby The Tuba". ''On The Carousel'' won the NYC

Emmy The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

for "Best Children's Educational TV Series" in 1957. Tripp hosted two children's TV shows - ''It's Magic!'' which was seen Saturday nights on CBS TV during the summer of 1955, and he also would serve as the second host and performer of the WOR TV Channel 9 ''

Looney Tunes ''Looney Tunes'' is an American Animated cartoon, animated comedy short film series produced by Warner Bros. starting from 1930 to 1969, concurrently with its partner series ''Merrie Melodies'', during the golden age of American animation.

Show'' weekday evenings from Monday January 12, 1959 to Friday July 10, 1959. In 1963, Tripp and his wife created ''Birthday House'', on which one fortunate New York area child would get to celebrate his or her birthday with their friends at a fictitious enchanted cottage where the Tripps led them in educational games, introduced them to celebrities, sang songs, and enjoyed gifts and a birthday cake wheeled out toward the end of the show. ''Birthday House'' aired from April 1963 through September 1967. It earned

a special award at the 1964

Emmys for quality children's programming. Ruth Enders Tripp died in 1999. Tripp's final recording project was released in 1996 on

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EMI Records EMI Records (formerly EMI Records Ltd.) is a multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It originally founded as a British flagship label by the music company of the same name in 1972, and launched in January 1973 as the succ ...

as ''Tubby the Tuba and Friends''. The orchestral tracks "Tubby the Tuba", "The Story of Celeste", "Adventures of a Zoo", and "Peepo the Piccolo" were recorded by the Radio Orchestra of

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under the baton of

Stephen Gunzenhauser Stephen Charles Gunzenhauser (born April 8, 1942) is an American conductor of classical music. He was the music director of the Lancaster Symphony Orchestra for 40 years, retiring after the 2019–20 season. In 2005, he founded the Endless Mounta ...

. A final track, "Tubby the Tuba Meets a Jazz Band", was recorded in New York City with Bob Stewart on tuba, Jimmy Owens on trumpet, Paquito D'Rivera on clarinet,

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on trombone,

Chuck Folds Chuck Folds is a musician living in North Carolina. He is the younger brother of the piano playing pop/ rock star Ben Folds. Chuck has played bass in a number of bands since the late 1980s, including Bus Stop with Evan Olson, Britt " Snuzz" Uzzell, ...

on piano, John Thomas on percussion, and Oliver Jackson on drums. Paul Tripp is the narrator on this recording. Several of the same instrumental tracks appear on a 2006 release called ''Play it Happy'' on

Koch Records MNRK Music Group (pronounced "monarch", formerly known as Koch Records and eOne Music) is a New York City-based independent record label and music management company. It was formed in 2009 from the music assets of Koch Entertainment, which had b ...

that features

Meredith Vieira Meredith Louise Vieira (born December 30, 1953) is an American broadcast journalist and television personality. She is best known as the original moderator of the daytime talk show '' The View'' (1997–2006), the original host of the syndicated ...

on "Tubby the Tuba" and "Tubby the Tuba Meets a Jazz Band"," and Tripp on "The Story of Celeste". He also acted in other dramas on television, in the theater, and in movies. Among his television appearances were two 1962 roles on the TV series ''

Perry Mason Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a c ...

'', which starred

Raymond Burr Raymond William Stacy Burr (May 21, 1917September 12, 1993) was a Canadian actor known for his lengthy Hollywood film career and his title roles in television dramas ''Perry Mason'' and '' Ironside''. Burr's early acting career included roles ...

. First, he played Howard Langley in "The Case of the Lonely Eloper"; then, he played Steven Banks in "The Case of the Double-Entry Mind". Tripp also appeared in ''

The Twilight Zone ''The Twilight Zone'' is an American media franchise based on the anthology television series created by Rod Serling. The episodes are in various genres, including fantasy, science fiction, absurdism, dystopian fiction, suspense, horror, su ...

'' as an extraterrestrial in "The Fugitive" (Season 3, Episode 25). Tripp also appeared on an episode of ''

The Dick Van Dyke Show ''The Dick Van Dyke Show'' is an American television sitcom created by Carl Reiner that initially aired on CBS from October 3, 1961 to June 1, 1966, with a total of 158 half-hour episodes spanning five seasons. It was produced by Calvada Product ...

'', "Sally Is a Girl". Tripp played the part of Ted Harris, a would-be boyfriend for Sally Rogers.

Broadway

Tripp's Broadway credits included ''The 49th Cousin'' (1960), ''Seeds in the Wind'' (1948), ''Temper the Wind'' (1946), ''Army Play-by Play'' (1943), ''Jeremiah'' (1939), ''An Enemy of the People'' (1937), and ''Cyrano de Bergerac'' (1936).

Death

On August 29, 2002, Tripp died in Manhattan of natural causes at 91. The Tripps had two children, Suzanne (Jurmain) and David.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Tripp, Paul 1911 births 2002 deaths Angel Records artists 20th-century American musicians 20th-century American male musicians Brooklyn College alumni