Barney & the Backyard Gang is an American direct-to-video series produced by The Lyons Group and released in periodic installments from August 29, 1988, to September 21, 1991. The first installment in the Barney franchise, the series' success led to the launch of the children's television show, Barney & Friends, which in its original run aired on PBS from April 6, 1992, to November 2, 2010.[2]
The first three episodes from 1988 and 1989 include Sandy Duncan as Michael and Amy's mother. (At the time, Duncan was starring on the NBC sitcom The Hogan Family.) Music for the Barney & the Backyard Gang videos was created by Stephen Bates Baltes and Phillip Parker (as with the television series), and Lory Lazarus wrote the first original song produced for Barney, "Friends Are Forever", sung by Duncan. In the first five videos, "I Love You" was sung at the beginning. Although "I Love You" was sung at the end of Barney Goes to School and Barney in Concert, and later frequently sung at the end of all episodes of Barney & Friends, it was not featured at the end of Rock with Barney.
The series was a regional success, but only a moderate success throughout the rest of the country.[citation needed] Then one day, in 1991, Larry Rifkin, then head of Connecticut Public Television, rented a Barney video for his daughter Leora.[3] He liked the concept and talked to Leach about possibly putting Barney on television through the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). Rock with Barney was the final video in the series before the television show debuted. Also, only four of the kids from the videos (Michael, Derek, Tina, and Luci) were carried over to the television show.
