Running in parallel with the powerful wave of transformation that occurred with the advent of recording technology in the 1800s, children’s music has been a critically important part of the evolving pace of modern culture. Through the entire body of children’s music, few have truly deviated from the normal harmonic and melodic structures of past composers. This is about to change in the fall of 2017 as West Coast Get Down co-founder Ryan Porter will present Spangle-Lang Lane, a collection of music that revamps and puts a facelift on some of the world’s most beloved children’s songs. The ethos of Spangle-Lang Lane equally lives in the visual realm, coupled with puppets and a flm series that takes on the life of the West Coast Get Down and various jazz luminaries. From episode to episode, you can expect to see main characters Ryan Porter and Crazy Jake, along with puppet versions of Duke Ellington, Kamasi Washington, Louis Armstrong, Brandon Coleman, Tony Williams, Terrace Martin, Miles Davis, Thundercat, John Coltrane, and many others. As the in?uence of Sesame Street started to flter into Ryan Porter’s dreams, he quickly sought out the right tools and knowledge for creating his own puppets. Ryan adds more detail on how the puppet world of the album formed. “The vision for having puppets as part of Spangle-Lang Lane came from the in?uence of the magical world of Jim Henson, but I also had a dream where I could see all of these puppets so vividly playing gigs and recording. I had these dreams so much that I looked into puppet making classes so that I could learn how to make these characters that I saw so vividly in my dreams. After a few years of learning how to make puppets, which is not an easy thing to do, I fnally made prototypes of the puppets that I had seen in my dreams. These puppets are the ones that I use to flm in my videos to help teach kids music lessons and history about older musicians that aren’t with us any longer. The type of musicians that made a huge impact on how music sounds today, revamped through the power of puppetry.” For the Spangle-Lang Lane record release event, Ryan Porter will take the puppets he’s created and the momentum of the video series for a special concert in Los Angeles this fall. The puppets will take the stage with Ryan to perform the music off the LP, striving to create a unique concert experience the jazz world has never seen. This fall will serve as a very special stretch of time for Ryan Porter and Spangle-Lang Lane, bringing to light a lifelong pursuit that will have the power to beneft thousands of people across current and future generations. SpangleLang Lane is an achievement unlike any other, serving as the latest chapter of the West Coast Get Down’s growing legacy and the beginning of Ryan Porter’s tenure in the spotlight.
