Amazon has teamed with Grammy-winning hip-hop band The Roots and their Passyunk Productions to develop an animated children’s series, South Street Sounds (working title), along with a live-action children’s series. Both projects will be executive produced by The Roots’ Tarik Trotter and Ahmir Thompson, their manager Shawn Gee (Soundclash) for Philly Films, and Brian Sher (Boss) for Category 5 Entertainment.

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Written by Becky Friedman (Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood) and featuring music by The Roots, South Street Sounds follows three friends growing up in the most musical of neighborhoods, where the birds tweet to a beat, every shop-keeper, pizza-maker and crossing guard dance perfectly in time, and having a bad day means literally singing the blues. With such musical surroundings, it’s only natural that these three friends have formed a band called “South Street.” Together, creative-scatterbrain Zora, future-entrepreneur Nick, and disaster-averse Tyson, pride themselves on playing gigs for any occasion: no event is too big or too small! No details are being provided about the live-action series.

“As we venture into the world that is film and television production, we couldn’t think of a better partner than Amazon to help us develop these first two children’s projects,” Ahmir “Questlove” Thompson said.

Added Tarik Trotter, “Our love for music started as young kids, and we hope to inspire a generation of future artists, musicians and music fans through the stories we tell and the music they hear on these shows.”

The Roots Crew, which serve as the official house band on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, consists of Black Thought (MC), Questlove (drums), Kamal Gray (electronic keyboards), F. Knuckles (percussion), Captain Kirk Douglas (electronic guitar), Damon Bryson (sousaphone) and James Poyser (electronic keyboard). They have won four Grammys, including “Best R&B Album” for Wake Up!.