The More We Get Together

he's slowing down time. And once he's sure he's got all eyes on him, he begins. The more we get together together together, the more we get together happier. The more we get together, the happier will be talk about a hopeful statement. I can hear you singing already. Oh the more we get together together. Hearing this song now with little kids singing in the background, it's almost too much, coming off nearly two years of isolation. Who doesn't want

to get together? It's so obvious that this is what we're missing togetherness. I'm gonna sing it again and I'll see if I can get every single person in the whole place to sing, and maybe even the chairs will sing with this the more we get together. This guy is Raffie Kabukian, but you might know him is just Raffi. He's one of the most famous children's musicians of all time. He's like the Beatles of kids music. Raphy has released

twenty four albums albums that went gold and platinum. He played for presidents the Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela, Ring Ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, ring, Banana Phone. He had a sold out show on Broadway, was nominated three times for a Grammy. The Simpsons even based a character after him. Something about this guy and his music is captivating. Down by the date where the Lotos go back to my home, I dare not go or if by dude, my mother will say, did you

ever see a goose kissing a moose? Down by the bait down by bab Ralfie embedded himself in the childhood memories of his fans, and he showed adults that kids should be taken seriously, that their voices are just as important. Thousands of preschool teachers played Rafi's cassettes on repeat for sing a long time. His songs about the joys and wonders of growing up are universal and infectious. That's because Raffie, with his playfulness and patience, was making connections with his audience.

Maybe he even connected with you. But here's a thing, there's a lot more in that music than you think. For decades, Raffie has been telling us to wake up to the needs of our children, to the kitten side of us into the destruction of our planet. From the beginning, he saw our potential. He believed in our capacity to grow. Now, you wouldn't necessarily know that by listening to opals and

bononas or shake your sillies out. You need to talk with his old friends and collaborators, the people who built movements around him, and the man himself. I'm Chris Garcia and this is Finding Raffie, a ten part series for My Heart Radio and Fatherly in partnership with Rococo Punch about the life, philosophy, and the work of Raffie, the

man behind the music. I'm a stand up comedian. I'm used to late nights and dark, crowded bars with an over served audience, but now this is how I spend my evenings free during the pandemic my wife, Val and I decided to make things even harder. We decided to have a kid, or at least start trying, and before we knew it, Val was standing in the bathroom holding a little stick with two pink lines on it, and a long came Sunny, Yeah, you're my best girl. I

have sweet dreams. Okay, m sweetie. There was one aspect of being a dad where I felt confident music. I'm a music snob. I love music. My vinyl collection is slowly taking over the house. It's important to me that Sunny knows good music. So I began with my personal favorites Creed, Limp, Biscuit More, Creed, just Kidding, stuff like Brian Eno and Jazz. I tried music made for kids. A friend made me a mixtape Casper Baby Pants, Blippy, Elmo sings Hamilton's Let's No. I couldn't do that to

her or me. And just when I was feeling really desperate, Bell introduced me and Sonny to Raffie about Sam Jim, one for me and one for David md Jim. I grew up listening to Raffie for a very long time. I mean, I didn't remember how many songs that I knew until I started listening to them with her, and I was like, oh, I remember this one. Oh yeah, this one. Oh the corner grocery store. Oh, you know,

beats and barley and all that stuff. And there was one day where she was being super fussy and a Raffi song came on the rotation and she immediately shut up and started smiling. It was like the baby whisper appeared out of the speaker and magically calm, sunny down. There was something to this. I had no idea what is it. Raffie's voice, the melody, the simplicity, whatever it was. I watched my daughter and my wife become entranced. It makes me think of summertime for some reason, and early

sure why. It just makes me think of like being young and fun, carefree, listening to like sweet songs. As we talk, I see val snap back in time to a warm, comforting place when her parents played Raffie cassettes to help her fall asleep. I wish I still had my cassette of One Night, One Son, that would be sweet to player. Do you think your dad is it? Honestly, I would not be surprised if he still had that somewhere. It would be so sweet to play vows old Raphi

cassettes for Sunnis, you know, so we call up her dad. Jeff, you know, it's funny because we had several of them, and I said that to Mom the other day. I wonder what happened to those tapes and the answer is I don't have a clue. But that's not the same thing. I thought it would be come full circle that you could be playing those for Sunny. You used to play music before I go to sleep, right? Was that some of that? It was like, Willoby Wallaby an Elephants sat

on you? Will it be Wallaby Woozing an elephant sat on Susan graphs? The best names for those songs? Will it be Wallaby Wanny an elephant sat on Bunny? Will it be Wallaby, Witness an Elephants sat on Dennis. I'm listening in awe. Jeff hasn't heard those songs in thirty years, but just the mention of Ralphie's name makes him break out into song. Jeff's six ft five professor from the Midwest. His idea of a fun Friday night is watching Turner classic movies. He thinks Will Ferrell is too goofy. But

Willoby Wallaby woo. These words come to him in an instant. He doesn't miss a beat, and all this time Val has carried good feelings about Ralphie's music too. There's something emotional happening here, something really deep. The idea that Sonny can hear an old song decades from now and tap into a warm childhood memory that blows me away. And it seems like a cheap code something Sunny could rely on. If I couldn't be there to console her, maybe there

was something for me and Ralphie's music too. Here we are awesome. Well, it's so nice to see you and um talk to you, Raffie. Thank you so much for making the time. Let me first ask you, what is your daughter's name? Oh, my daughter's name is Sunny. Sunny, Yeah, beautiful. We named her after the song by Bobby heb We named her after that song. Well, let's dedicate this whole podcast series too Sunny and her bright future, because that's what we all want for the children we love. Not

to brag, but that's me talking with Raffi. He lives in Canada on Salt Spring Island, off the coast of Vancouver. When I googled it, it looks like an idyllic place where the forest meets the sea, a place where you'd go to find serenity or hide the body Raphae seventy three now, and looking at his face on my computer as we talk, I realized I could see a bit of me in him. And it's not just because we're both fans of Hawaiian shirts or we both have beards.

He kind of looks like me from the future, and he seems gentle and sensitive. I immediately feel at ease. I wonder what's driven him to make children's music all these years. Very early on, actually, I sort of steep myself in an informal education of what is childhood? Who are these impressionable young beings who happened to be fun and spontaneous and at times more than we can handle? You know, who are these beings? And what do they need? And so on? You know, And I think I gained

a sense of my own self as a child. You know, what did I feel when I was younger and so on? It was not all rosie for me in my childhood. Mocked and humiliated at times, and I was hit and I couldn't square that with the fact that I knew I was loved, So why didn't I feel respected for who I felt I was? Respect This is a word that kept coming up over and over again in my conversations with Raffie. It's a word he studied, dissected, even meditated on. It's not enough to say we need love.

As the Beatles song said, all you need is love, which is true? What kind of love do we need? And the word respectful came up. This connection between love and respect is something Raffie's devoted his lifetime exploring. Ralphie's father, Arto, was an enormous presence in his life. Arto was a well known portrait photographer and he was a perfectionist. He had him possibly high standards for his work and his son. Ralphie says that his parents saw him as an extension

of themselves. They didn't see him as his own person, and that was painful and confusing. It turns out that Raffie and I have a lot more in common than just our looks. Rafi grew up in Egypt, but his family moved to Canada when Rafi was ten years old. This wasn't the first time the Cabukians fled their home in search of a new one. They'd already survived the Armenian genocide in Turkey. My parents escaped an oppressive regime in Cuba, eventually settling here in Los Angeles in search

of a better life. When you grow up like Raffie and I did, with one foot in the New world and one in the old, it can feel lonely. I must say, I relate to you as um. A thing that I believe we have in common is that our parents are exiles and immigrants from you know, a different country, and you raised in Canada. I was born in the

United States, and that was a sensitive child. And although I did feel loved, I was confused a lot by the way with which I was loved, because my parents had a certain expectation of what a young man was supposed to be, or what is interests are supposed to be. My father's a tough, masculine machinist, where I use the word journal as a verb. You know, I was very emotional, and I don't think they could understand how a boy born in Los Angeles in freedom could cry if he

was moved by a movie or something like that. So a lot of the times I felt misunderstood or like I couldn't even express these emotions. Did they not ask you what you wanted to be when you grew up? Um? No, I don't think they really did. I think they were just like. May I say about respect, Chris, I think it's the word that is going to be in this Finding Ravy series of podcasts. It's going to be the word because, if you think about it, every human being

wants to feel respected without exception. I don't think you could ask that question of anyone, Um, would you like to be respected? I don't think anyone would say no. Or maybe I think people would say, yeah, I'd like to feel respected for who I feel I am. Respect can mean so many things. For me. It's tied to authority, kids respect adults. I hadn't thought about it as a two way street. And trust me, I thought about my childhood a lot as a stand up comedian. My parents

are the meat of most of my jokes. As a kid, I knew my parents loved me, but respect me. My mom's dope. She's adorable. She's tiny. She's four eight. Yeah, she's so small. She looks far away. She should have a little sign on it that says Cubans in the mirror, maybe closer than they appear. She's a lovely lady. She's very critical. We're hanging out recently. She's like, I don't like how you dress. You don't, I don't know. I don't like it. Too many buttons? Why the top button?

What are you hiding? You look like you look like a You look like a teacher that nobody respects. You look like I'm agician with no tricks. It's very sad. That's cold blooded. Mom. She's like, you need to dress like a man, like a Cuban man. I'm like, what's a Cuban man supposed to dress like? She goes like pit bull. I love piple, I respect people, but I'm not gonna dress like a tuxedo mannequin that won the lottery,

you know what I mean. My mom Anna is the real comedian in the family, and she doesn't hold back like a Cuban female. Don Rickles, like, don't you Rickles. She came up with ima that when she comes to visit, she always brings a gift. She thinks she could buy the love and affection of the baby to the baby. Oh we need that, I think, Yeah, a perfect growing up. My parents didn't play kids music for me. They played music they liked. We're Talking, Sonny and Share the Beatles

the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack in case you're wondering. My mom has no idea who Raffie is, so I play her one of his biggest hits, Banana Phone. I've got this fevering for us to get together. You like you say about whatever Anthony? She was hoping that I would play this Mark Anthony song that she loves so much. Ever since my conversation with Raffie, I've been thinking about the idea of respect and how that factored into my upbringing. I mean, even the thought of asking my mom if

she respected me. It feels awkward. What the heck I ask? Anyway, a significant significant if they don't need you know. It turns out my mom has this whole philosophy about respecting children. She says, to respect a child is to recognize their innocence, to embrace them where they are. I'm realizing that respect has always been at the heart of how she raised me. She's always seen me for me, an individual with my own thoughts and emotions. Oh no, didn't get it. Okay, okay,

whoa mom. Wow, my name is Anna Garcia and I'm running for president. Ok is waste that maduena public level? I'm overwhelmed listening to my mom. She says, of course she respected me because she wanted me. She chose to bring me into this world. I always joked that I was an accident because I popped out twelve years after my sister Laura. She was born in Cuba during a

particularly bleak moment in Cuban history. My parents probably didn't want to bring another kid into that chaos, so they had me once they could keep me safe here in the United States. It was part of their plan. They wanted more for me. This is not at all how my parents grew up. For a while as a kid, my dad was homeless, living on the street. My mom dropped out of school in the sixth grade because their

family couldn't afford books. Neither my mom nor my dad knew their fathers, and my mom's mom, Maola Caruca, was tough. She wasn't the nurturing type, more of a get your shoes on and hustle those sig rats on the corner so we can buy dinner kind of mom. She was single and funneled all of her energy and just surviving, so I don't think my mom had much of a childhood.

You're going to different, no mamas Amiga. She's saying that her mom is really strictum and she told herself that she wasn't going to be like that with us, which is true. It's interesting to think about how parenting skills and world views and traumas trickled down from that, and the amazing that she's so it doesn't seem to carry any of it, you know. It's just kind of blows me away. I get emotional about it. It's really little

special person. My mom's on her own now. My dad died four years ago from Alzheimer's, and sitting here talking to her, knowing all that she and my dad had been through, I'm realizing that they had to invent what it meant to be parents. And what really amazes me about my mom is she always finds humor, especially in the toughest times, like when we cremated my dad, she asked the funeral director for a senior discount just so

I would laugh. I'm not sure how she ended up this way, but I am, hands down a reflection of where I come from. I mean, you heard my stand up. Maybe Raphae's music reflects who he is too. M my mom says, but it's hard for me just I think this is my favorite Raffi song. I wonder if I'm growing. It taps into a feeling from my childhood. My parents left for work early in the morning, so they dropped me off at my friend Leo Vlone's house long before school.

The house was pitch dark and quiet, and I'd awkwardly hang out with Leo's mom in the kitchen until everyone woke up. I knew my parents were doing it so I could have a shot at a good education, but it made me feel insecure, like I didn't belong. There's something about listening to this song. There's a vulnerability in Raphe's voice. It takes me right back to Leo Valone's kitchen, sitting there so unsure of myself, and by the end of the song, rapew reassures us that everything is going

to be okay. It doesn't sound like a kid's song to me. Speaks to me now, and I think growing growing, and it's true, we're all still growing. I mean hopefully we are, and part of growing is making sense of where we've come from. Would you say that you're singing to yourself and is this a response to your own childhood?

That's a start a question. Clearly, our past informs are present, and you know, I think there's a measure of Catharsis in my career that has benefited my whole being, and certainly in recognizing that I didn't feel respected and love for who I felt I was. You know, it was a possessive love. But my parents dolled out, if you will again, They loved me greatly and I love them for that, but I certainly had to come to terms

with the difficulty of being their child, you know. And but every one of us actually is charged with making meaning of our life in our adulthood, and you're in that process yourself. You're you're actually in your comedic shows, as you say, you know, you're you're working through those emotions through humor, which is very interesting. Actually you're kind of doing your therapy and public as a stand up comedian. Yeah, that's literally all I do, and a lot of what

I'm working out deals with my sensitivity. To me. There's no such thing as a sensitive child. We're all sensitive because we have needs. And it's interesting to consider that the human infant of every culture is the same human being physiologically. Every child in the world at that early

stage has exactly the same needs. The universal, irreducible needs of early childhood are the best place to see how connected are human species is the fact that we can see the interconnectedness of human experience most vividly in early years should make us jump from the rooftops and well at these shout from the rooftops. This is exciting. Here we are. Here's where we are one. We are one in the human infant. This is where we can see

our our oneness. Isn't that joyful? Isn't that something to celebrate? I believe it is. I could see it in Sunny herself. Every morning I take her on a walk, and I'm observing the world through her eyes, so curious and so joyful and so spirited. My job is to hopefully guide her to maintain this for all of her years. But I wish I could bottle it and share it with

adults and kids alike. What she's giving you is a vibration of frequency of a light that you can't help but shine because you see it's worth and you feel yeah, excited. See those little birds I'm singing for still, I'm a little concert for you. My daily walks with Sonny ground me and remind me that there's still a lot of wonder out there. Like Ralphie said, our curiosities don't have to wither and die when we reach adulthood. So I'm trying to notice how I'm growing with these new experiences,

with Sonny's new experiences. It's a dog. Yeah, I'm telling it's so humbling to bring a child into the world, and at this tenuous point in history. She was born in the thick of the pandemic, and she doesn't know what's going on at all. She doesn't know that we had an insurrection or that the oceans are on fire. And I get to be her point of contact her father. I mean, as my mom said about me, Sonny didn't

ask to be here. It's my job to help her become a confident person capable of accepting love and giving love. At least that's what I want for her. No pressure right next time on finding Raffie. If you were to meet Raffie, you wouldn't say, Oh, my god, grandson of survivors of a cataclysmic genocide who is scarred for life. Rafi's music is like the happiest music on the planet. There were stories of survival of my family, survival from the massacres of the Ottoman Empire, stories of how arts

saved the day. Finding Raffie is a production in My Heart Radio and Fatherly in partnership with Rococo Punch. It's produced by Catherine Fennalosa, Meredith Hannig, and James Trout. Production assistance from Charlotte Livingston. Alex French is our story consultant. Our senior producer is Andrea Swahee. Emily Foreman is our editor. Fact checking by Andrea Lopez Cruzado. Raphae's music is courtesy of Troubadour Records. Special thanks to Kim Layton at Troubadour.

Our executive producers are Jessica Albert and John Parotti at Rococo Punch, Ty Trimble, Mike Rothman and Jeff Eisenman at Fatherly, and me Chris Garcia. Thank you for listening, and then I would end the song with Willoughby Wallaby Waffy, an Elephants sat on Raffie and I go whoa slide in my chair and gets squished and they loved it, and I was smiling too,