I Love Toy Trains - The Music!
For more than a decade James Coffey has been delighting children and adults with his original music and modern arrangements of classic songs.James is known as a train song troubadour, with two award-winning CDs on his own Blue Vision Music label: "Come Ride Along with Me" and "My Mama Was a Train." Each of these collections of train songs won Parents’ Choice awards for "outstanding contribution toward enriching the lives of American children." The Wall Street Journal featured him as one of the nation’s top children’s recording artists, and Working Mother magazine named Come Ride Along with Me one of the best CDs of the year, among many other accolades.   James’ recording "Animal Groove," a wild collection of original and favorite tunes in a range of musical styles, won awards from Parents’ Choice and the Children’s Music Web.After earning a Bachelor’s Degree in Music and a Master's in Science Education from Indiana University, Jim taught elementary public school for 12 years. During that time he developed a love and respect for the unique musical needs of children. In 1994, he turned all his attention to working full-time in children’s entertainment. And in those few years has earned a national reputation for quality and craftsmanship that has made him one of the most sought after children’s performers as well as a music producer for a wide range of talented people and companies.As musical director and producer of Pittsburgh’s Center for Creative Play’s Time to Sing! at Christmas and Time to Sing II CDs,  he created tunes that sparkle musically while allowing everyone to join in the sing-along.James has also composed music for dozens of videos from TM Books & Video, one of the nation’s leading producers of train and toy train videos. TM’s award-winning children’s video series I Love Toy Trains all feature James Coffey’s original songs. Coffey also wrote the music for TM’s documentary video A Century of Lionel Trains, recently screened at the New York International Film Festival.James performs his original children's music all over the United States.