YouTube Gold: Tito Puente Drops By Sesame Street

A fun fight between exuberance and grouchiness

Sesame Street affected a lot of us because the various Muppets were so much fun that you didn’t notice you were learning stuff. Cookie Monster was the greatest, but Big Bird was fun, Telly was cool and for the younger set, Elmo took it to a new level.

But Oscar the Grouch was an underrated resident of Sesame Street. A Grouch who lived in a garbage can, Oscar was only happy when he was not, which was a real conundrum that Sesame Street gleefully played with.

The best part of Sesame Street though was often the musical guests. Stevie Wonder did an incredible version of Superstition; Los Lobos had a wonderful appearance. Paul Simon came through to play Me & Julio. Johnny Cash even dropped by.

The combination of the grouchy Oscar and the irrepressible Tito Puente was hard to beat though: the setup was that the grouches were having a meeting and had no time for Puente’s music. He challenged them to see if they could keep from dancing while he played and let’s just say, as it turned out, even grouches can boogie. Who could turn down Tito Puente?