Creation
of The Bandimals!
The Whos, Hows, Whys and Whens
Herb Bridgman is a songwriter,
arranger and author who calls Cherry Valley, in the San Gorgonio Pass
area of California his home.
As a lay minister and counselor at the Larry
Smith Correctional Facility in Banning, California, Bridgman found
illiteracy and the lack of positive values from early childhood to be
the most common handicap of prisoners.
This insight, combined with his love of music
and songwriting, led to thoughts of creating a positive musical resource
to benefit young people during their emergent years in reading and character
development.
They
began in a dream, with just the word, "Bandimals," about 2:00
AM, on a spring morning in 1988.
During
the following weeks, Herb brainstormed with Vernita DeRouen and other
friends, who helped give birth to the Bandimals family.
Animals,
they'll be, with fresh faces and appendages borrowed from musical instruments.
Kind of musical gardeners, given to sowing and nurturing healthy seed
in fertile minds.
Mic
Gillespie, the creation artist gave the Bandimals form.
Travis Hanson,
the illustrator, brought them to life.
Time,
the perfect tool, helped carve the niche for the family to reside in
and rest awhile as the storms of life settled.
While studying children’s literature and tutoring
students with reading difficulties, Bridgman settled on a proactive
format of publishing that integrates illustrated text with color coded
footnotes, for difficult concepts or words.
Each book concludes with music notation of the
songs included in the accompanying audio CD.
At the end of the CD the songs are included in
their “instrumental” version, allowing the listener to sing their own
“expression” into the mix.
A musical quiz and values/safety quiz, relating
to the text, are available on request. |