Video: Three Is A Magic Number

This magical little ditty, as everyone must know by now, comes from the Schoolhouse Rock series that ABC-TV aired throughout the 1970s, starting in and around 1973.

The series director, songwriter and vocalist Bob Dorough, wrote and sang "Three Is A Magic Number," as well as many of the other 45 three-minute vignettes that include a whole series on numbers ("My Hero, Zero"), grammar ("Conjunction Junction") and American history ("I'm Just A Bill").

Outré jazz singers Blossom Dearie, Dave Frishberg and Jack Sheldon were among the other clever contributors to this wonderful series that kids of a certain generation - mine! - grew up on. Today, the whole series is available on DVD and 17 of the best tunes are compiled on a CD called The Best of Schoolhouse Rock (Rhino, 1998).

"Three" is, quite simply, a magical little song. Dorough sings his own enchanting lyrics that help you learn the importance of three and the multiples of three. It's a brilliant lyric that makes learning as easy as singing along and the song is so darned catchy, you can't help but sing along.

Dorough accompanies his warm and friendly vocalizations with an otherworldly soundscape made up of only electric piano, acoustic guitar, bass, drums, a goose-flesh raising guiro, two back-up singers and most notably, the African thumb piano known as a kalimba (which Maurice White introduced to many listeners around this time as part of Earth, Wind & Fire).

It makes for one of the best songs in a great series - and always one I looked forward to on Saturday mornings when I was a pre-teen. Bob Dorough's charming "My Hero, Zero" is another one of my favorites. I was surprised to get a hold of "Three" on Blue Break Beats Volume Four (Blue Note, 1999) a decade ago. But this set has remained in my collection solely due to the odd appearance of "Three," which is, funny enough, the fifth song on the set.

"Three Is A Magic Number" has been widely covered (Blind Melon, De La Soul, Jack Johnson) and even parodied by Jack Black in the film School of Rock, attesting to its timeless luminescence.

Also, for Schoolhouse Rock fans, who missed it, The Simpsons aired a hilariously brilliant parody of "I'm Just A Bill" in 1996 called "Amendment To Be," sung by Jack Sheldon, who sang the original "I'm Just A Bill," as part of the episode titled The Day The Violence Died from the show's seventh season.

For those that would like to learn about the number three, here are the lyrics:

Three is a magic number,
Yes it is, it's a magic number.
Somewhere in the ancient, mystic trinity
You get three as a magic number.

The past and the present and the future.
Faith and Hope and Charity,
The heart and the brain and the body
Give you three as a magic number.

It takes three legs to make a tri-pod
Or to make a table stand.
It takes three wheels to make a ve-hicle
Called a tricycle.

Every triangle has three corners,
Every triangle has three sides,
No more, no less.
You don't have to guess.
When it's three you can see
It's a magic number.

A man and a woman had a little baby,
Yes, they did.
They had three in the family,
And that's a magic number.

3-6-9, 12-15-18, 21-24-27, 30.
3-6-9, 12-15-18, 21-24-27, 30.

Multiply backwards from three times ten:
Three time ten is (30), three times nine is (27),
Three times eight is (24), three times seven is (21),
Three times six is (18), three times five is (15),
Three times four is twelve,
And three times three is nine, and three times two is six,
And three times one is three of course.

Now take the pattern once more:
Three! . . .3-6-9
Twelve! . . .12-15-18
Twenty-one!. . .21-24-27. . .30

Now multiply from 10 backwards:
Three time ten is (30 - Keep going), three times nine is (27),
Three times eight is (24), three times seven is (21),
Three times six is (18), three times five is (15),
Three times four is twelve,
And three times three is nine, and three times two is six,
And three times one...
What is it?!
Three!
Yeah, That's a magic number.

A man and a woman had a little baby.
Yes, they did.
They had three in the family.
That's a magic number.