The Douglas Coleman Show VE with Sam Tsui and Casey Breves

Okay, hi Sam and Casey, how are you guys? Good I'm gonna assume that Casey you're the one on the I'll be my left. Yeah, you're Casey Okay, well nice to meet you both happy to have you here And I saw your book cover right away. I want to dive into this. This is why do we sing now? When you say why do we sing do you mean why do you two sing or why do we? human race Generally speaking saying we mean why do we as humans sing? What are the reasons that motivate every every human culture throughout history? Yeah, the collective we okay. Well, then why do we sing? Oh, well, that's you know a simple question But there are a lot of answers to that which we explore in the book, you know Obviously to entertain and to perform but that's only one reason we sing there's also telling stories connecting to our culture creating community and we want kids to you know Know that there's no single one reason and that any reason you feel motivated or inspired to open your you know Mouth and sing a song is a good reason. What do animals sing? bird songs, you know, there's a You know animal calls. I think that's a form of music in its own way I think there's a good a whale song too. I guess there's a good argument to that that song as a as a embodiment of meaning is important in in different parts of the animal kingdom, but human singing is Is such a fundamental part of how we communicate and how we express ourselves that yeah I think and from a very young age, you know, I think kids Even very young kids have an obvious affinity for not only music But especially vocal singing because the first music you often hear is your parents or your caretakers singing lullabies to you So there's something deeply ingrained in our minds to connect through through the voice and through song So we wanted to tap into that a little bit with this book. Well, it also Invokes a different emotional response if somebody is talking to you It could be quite boring depending on what they're talking about and it ends up sounding like man In your in your head, but when somebody is a singer particularly a good one it puts you in this sort of euphoria almost Activates whole different areas of your brain, right? Yeah Go on. Yeah. Oh It's just it's such a valuable tool for communicating an idea the and that you know you remember these songs from when you were a kid and And and the lyrics of songs that you would never you would never just retain that information, you know without the music So we want kids to think about yeah song and music not just not just as fun But as something that's really powerful and built into our society and our culture and there's so much you can do with with a voice So it says on your bio that you guys met While going to Yale and you were both in an a cappella group together. Yeah Yeah, we met we met singing in the same a cappella group at college and we've been singing together every So music has been a part of our story since day one So who sang at the wedding? You know, we we got a lot of our very talented musician friends to sing and after the wedding We created an original song and music video with our wedding footage, but we actually we didn't sing it We thought maybe that was Okay, well you guys also have a tick-tock channel that Let's see. It says one song from every country that you're doing and yeah Now tick-tock only allows you to do a one-minute video Right. No, it's longer more now if you can do up to like three or longer. Yeah, but we're doing cuts of the songs But yeah, we're trying to sing one song from every single country on the planet Which has been a real challenge, but a pretty exciting one for us. It was sort of, you know, I think online creating content It's always good to set a challenge for yourself so that every day you get up and you say, okay I know what I'm working on next and I think we we we bit off a lot actually with this one There's so many different kinds of music and obviously we're singing in lots of different languages in this But we definitely do our best to do our due diligence and do a lot of research into what songs are kind of the most Iconic from any given country and you know doing our best to not Completely butchered some of these languages and accents and it's really cool to see the response From a lot of these these countries who wouldn't have expected us to maybe be Listening and trying their kind of music and it's it's really been rewarding So how many countries of you are you up to now? I think we're in the 80s or 90s now So we're only about halfway there from the you know, we're trying to get to 195, right? That's the goal, but we'll be picking away in a ton of languages and yeah learned about learned about singers and and songs and Traditions that we knew almost nothing about so it's been pretty really really cool for us as just fans of music and yeah Students to learn some stuff about music. So where do you find the songs? It's a lot of it's a lot of research online sometimes honestly through the comments, you know Whenever we post one of these tick tocks you get hundreds thousands of comments of people saying do one from you know Can you do one from Finland and a lot of times those will come with recommendations? So we have a running list of whenever we see someone Suggest something we'll add that to the list for that country And then when we go to approach a country, we do as much research as we can to figure out What's one that kind of? Represents but you know, you'll never get one single song that represents a full country, but we do our best So now you've got a book why do we sing well what made you decide to write a book well our daughter who is a About to turn three loves loves to read and loves music and we've been reading with her since she was super tiny and I think she was the inspiration for us to to dive into this this world of Children's literature and and Sam's always been an artist and and illustrator, but I think for him This is a an amazing first. Yeah, it's just this project. It just makes so much sense to us Even the moment we started working on it. We're like this just combines everything. We love its music. It's singing. It's our family It's art So it just felt very like obvious to us and we're so happy that it's now finally able to be in people's hands So it's a kid's book. Yeah, it's a kid. Yeah yes, yeah gear towards young kids and inspiring a love of a love of vocal music and and singing and Allowing kids to see see people singing around the world Yeah, I think it's a great introduction for you know, if you're giving this to any of the kids in your life It's it's a way to introduce them to I guess all of the different kinds of music and vocal music and ways They can use their voice, which is I think a powerful thing. Does it come with a download for songs? We have a full official soundtrack album to this book that is streaming everywhere You find your music and that album has allowed us to dive into some of the genres that we showcase in the book We have a Bollywood dance inspired number mariachi trio campfire song K-pop it it's it's sort of a a tour of of all of a lot of different folk It's a companion you can read the book and then you know Turn on some of the tunes and it'll kind of bring some of those genres and different ideas We hope that that album is as enjoyable for parents and and caretakers to listen to as well as as kids Yeah, well now you guys do original music as well, right you right? Yeah Yeah, yeah composers and writers all this. Why do we sing? The album is all original kids music and yeah, we both write together all the time I want to ask you about writing kids music because I'm a songwriter have been for many many years But I've never written a kid song Is it different do you have to change your mindset to write a children's song I Think in some ways it's very liberating it's it's been really fun to just Take an idea a silly idea or a fun idea and and bring it to life and and try to imbue it with Important messaging but also let go a little bit of some of the ideas you have about songwriting Yeah, but I think a lot of the things that make a good song work still apply You know, in fact in some ways more so storytelling repetitions structure These are all things that kids really latch on to you know a song where you have a list and it's growing as the song Goes on where there's familiar things all of these are things that make a good song for anybody But I think especially approaching kids music you get to kind of play around a little more and that's been so much fun for us Yeah, well, the hook has got to be pretty good too to keep the kids Remember, that's true Exactly the sing-along ability. Yes, right. So what's next for you guys? Well, we're so excited to to be Performing some of the music from this album and and doing several book events We're doing a book signing in New York here tonight and then going to Philly and back to LA and then you know Looking forward to more more projects in the children Yeah, we've I mean we had such a great time working on this and I think it's you know Hopefully only the start for us in terms of making more, you know music and content for kids Especially as our daughter grows up, you know, like I'm excited to make more stuff for her in particular Are you strictly online or do you guys perform live? We perform live as well. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah We both you know with our own artists acts have toured a lot internationally and and all sorts of stuff So hopefully yeah, maybe you'll see us on the road with some kids music sometime soon. Do you guys get tired of each other? But I think being both creative collaborators and parents together It's you know, we've we figured out how to work together in basically any situation. Yes Well, I think we're just about out of time. Do you guys have a website that you want to give out or? Yeah, you can find us online. You know, we're on Facebook Instagram tick-tock and if you really just search our name Sam Shui TSU I and Casey Our book why do we sing is is out everywhere in the album you can find on Spotify Amazon music iTunes Yeah anywhere. Okay guys. Well, it was nice meeting you and best of luck with the book Are you gonna do a part two to this book or you don't know yet? Hey Yeah Okay guys take care best of luck. Thanks a lot. Thanks so much