Grammy Award-winning children's musicians to perform at Loeb Playhouse

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - Back-to-back Grammy Award winners Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer will bring their children's show "Scat Like That! A Family Sing-Along Adventure" to Purdue's Loeb Playhouse at 3 p.m. Oct. 22.

Purdue Convocations is presenting the performance.

Fink and Marxer are folk singers who blend elements of music, comedy, instrument making, trick roping, American Sign Language and audience participation into a child- and family-friendly show. They have performed together for 22 years.

During the performance, Fink and Marxer play a five-string banjo, acoustic and electric guitars, mandolin and steel drum. They encourage the audience to get involved by singing jazz scat songs, yodeling, using American Sign Language, trying some musical tongue twisters and playing air guitars.

The show is recommended for children in kindergarten through fifth grade and emphasizes literacy skills such as phonemic awareness, sequencing, letter sounds, vowel sounds, rhyming and alliteration.

Fink and Marxer have entertained the Queen of Thailand, sung at the White House Easter Egg Roll, for the AFL-CIO and at hundreds of folk festivals, and appeared on the "Today Show" and National Public Radio. They have toured the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Israel.

Fink and Marxer won back-to-back Grammy Awards in 2004 and 2005 in the Best Musical Album for Children category for their albums "Bon Appetit!: Musical Food Fun" and "cELLAbration: A Tribute to Ella Jenkins." They returned to the Grammy Awards in 2006 with their newest album, "Scat Like That: A Musical Word Odyssey." The title song, "Scat Like That" took Grand Prize and the Lennon Award in the John Lennon Songwriting Contest in 2006. From scat singing to tongue twisters, limericks and Pig Latin, the album encourages reading skills and motivation and had been embraced by the PBS "Reading Rockets" Web site.

Tickets to the performance are available at the Elliott Hall and Stewart Center box offices at (765) 494-3933 or (800) 914-SHOW. Tickets also are available through Ticketmaster outlets.

Tickets are $14 for adults and $11 for children 18 years and younger, Purdue students and Ivy Tech Lafayette students. Group discounts for 10 or more are available by calling (765) 496-1977.

In addition to their public performance, Fink and Marxer also will be leading several educational activities. They will offer a matinee performance for local elementary students at 9:30 a.m. Oct. 23 in Loeb Playhouse. They also will present two workshops titled "Music in the Classroom for the Non-Musician" for teachers and the Purdue Student Education Association. To make reservations for these activities, call (765) 494-9712.

Purdue Employees Federal Credit Union is supporting this presentation of Fink and Marxer.

Source: Kerry Schutt Nason, Purdue Convocations director of marketing, (765) 494-9071, knason@purdue.edu

Purdue News Service: (765) 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu

Note to Journalists: A publication-quality photograph of Cathy Fink and Marcy Marxer is available.

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