Mr. Rogers Gets a Remix
What happens when you mix the childhood comfort of seeing Mr. Rogers in his green sweater, tying his shoe and asking you to be his neighbor with today's ramped-up technology?
A viral video that you can't stop watching.
Called " Garden of Your Mind," the video is a musical mash-up of classic scenes from the PBS children's show "Mr. Rogers Neighborhood," remixed and played over and over to a slow tune.
Even more captivating is that the three-minute YouTube video gives Fred Rogers, Mr. Rogers himself, the Auto-Tune treatment, using an electronic processor to alter the pitch of voices in the clips.
"You can grow ideas in the garden of your mind," Rogers, who died in 2003, "sings" in the song's chorus.
The show went off the air in 2001, after more than 30 years of Rogers signing off with his signature, "Won't you be my neighbor?" goodbye.
PBS Digital Studios saw the video, posted it to YouTube on Thursday as a way to pay tribute to a hero, the station said, and found an unlikely Mr. Rogers fan in the world of music to produce it.
"When we discovered video mash-up artist John D. Boswell, aka melodysheep, on YouTube, we immediately wanted to work together," PBS Digital Studios explained in a statement on its YouTube channel. "Turns out that he is a huge Mr. Rogers Neighborhood fan, and was thrilled at the chance to pay tribute to one of our heroes."
Perhaps more intriguing is that PBS says the Mr. Rogers remix is just the first of several iconic personalities from PBS shows that will get the Auto-Tune treatment, meaning Sesame Street in Auto-Tune could be next.