Dan Zanes

The tape was a hit locally – i.e. on the playgrounds where he and his daughter played – and Zanes realized that he liked making music that families could enjoy together, as opposed to music that is just for children or just for adults. So, he added a small number of women to his band, renamed it the Rocket Ship Revue, and began making a full-length homemade album, enlisting the help of some people he had met when he was a Del Fuego – Sheryl Crow, Suzanne Vega, and Simon Kirke, the drummer for Bad Company.

Through the late afternoon of July 7, 2012, Zanes performed at a free public concert at the L.L. Bean flagship store in Freeport, Maine, in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the famous Maine retailer. Dan Zanes performs at L.L. Bean, Freeport, Maine. July 7, 2012 Performing with his band, he entertained children and adults alike with several sets prior to Chris Isaak's headlining performance and monumental fireworks display later that evening.

In early 2009, Zanes' ¡Nueva York! (2008) won in The 8th Annual Independent Music Awards for Best Children's Music Album.

His seventh album 76 Trombones (2009) was a Broadway/Showtune themed album, featuring guest vocalists Matthew Broderick, Carol Channing, and Brian Stokes Mitchell.

In 2007, Zanes received the Grammy Award for Best Musical Album for Children for Catch That Train! (2006) and produced a children's reggae CD with Father Goose called "Its a Bam Bam Diddly", which also features songs performed by Sister Carol and Sheryl Crow.

In 2003, he played himself on Dragon Tales Let's Start a Band on TV film. The fourth album in the family series is House Party (2003), a rambunctious 20-song collection with a diverse instrumentation that, in addition to the usual guitars, banjos, upright bass and drums, includes such instruments as tuba, accordion, pump organ, djembe and saw. House Party was nominated for a Grammy in the Musical Album for Children category. Music video selections from the House Party album played during the Disney Channel's morning program suite known as Playhouse Disney from 2005–2007. New music video selections occasionally play on Nickelodeon's Noggin.

The album, Rocket Ship Beach (2000), was also a hit. The New York Times Magazine called it "cool", and added, "Mostly, though, Zanes' kids music works because it is not kids music; it's just music – music that's unsanitized, unpasteurized, that's organic even." Sheryl Crow and Suzanne Vega made guest appearances on the album. The second album, Family Dance (2001) is composed of dance songs from a wide variety of musical traditions and features Loudon Wainwright III and Rosanne Cash. The third recording, the more mellow Night Time! (2002), features collaborations with Aimee Mann, Lou Reed, John Doe, Dar Williams, and other established musicians.

Rolling Stone named the Del Fuegos "Best New Band" in 1984. Once, Bruce Springsteen jumped on stage to play "Hang On Sloopy" with them. With the Del Fuegos, Zanes made several records – The Longest Day (1984), Boston, Mass (1985), Stand Up (1987), Smoking in the Fields (1989) – and had a hit single, Don't Run Wild. In 1987, Zanes married Paula Greif, the director of the video for the Del Fuegos song, I Still Want You.

In 1981, Zanes went to Oberlin College in Ohio, where he was determined to start a really cool band. In the breakfast line on the very first day at Oberlin, he met up with former high school classmate Tom Lloyd. Zanes and Lloyd took their breakfast back to the dorm and immediately started a band and soon left school and headed to Boston ("It was between Boston and Austin," according to Zanes), where they became known as The Del Fuegos.

Daniel Edgerly Zanes (born November 8, 1961) is an American former member of the popular 1980s band The Del Fuegos and is now the front man of the Grammy-winning group Dan Zanes and Friends.

Zanes was born in Exeter, New Hampshire, in 1961, and spent his childhood in Texas and then in Fredericton, New Brunswick. His father was a teacher, as well as a poet and writer.