The Wiggles

The Wiggles are a children's musical group formed in 1991, currently comprised of Anthony Field (born: ), Lachlan Gillepsie (born: ), Simon Pryce (born: ) and Tsehay Hawkins (born: ). The Wiggles are best known for their trademark colored shirts (blue, purple, red and yellow) and for the songs Fruit Salad, Hot Potato, and Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga Big Red Car. 
== History ==
The founding members of the Wiggles were Field, Jeff Fatt, Phillip Wilcher, Murray Cook, and Greg Page. Jeff and Anthony were previously members of The Cockroaches. Originally conceived as a one-time project, their self-titled debut album sold 100,000 copies. Wilcher ended up leaving the group in 1992 due to personal reasons.
In the following years, The Wiggles' live performances, accompanied by supporting characters Dorothy the Dinosaur, Henry the Octopus, Captain Feathersword and Wags the Dog, brought in crowds of 'astonishing numbers' that pushed them to quit their day jobs as teachers to pursue performing full time. In 1993, The Wiggles released their first home video special, Wiggle Time to great success. The following annual video and album releases set sales records, including Big Red Car in 1995, which won the group's first ARIA award. After being discovered at a concert at Disneyland in 1998, The Wiggles entered a deal with Lyrick Studios, which led to Wiggles videos selling in American stores and, by 2001, were internationally successful.
In 2006, Greg had left The Wiggles due to his waning health and was replaced by longtime understudy Sam Moran. This iteration of the Wiggles saw new ventures such as digital distribution, spinoff TV shows, and elaborate circus-style shows in large tents to commemorate the group's 20th Anniversary in 2011. A year later, in 2012, after a financial reassessment, Moran left the group, and Greg rejoined to surprising controversy. Greg, Murray, and Jeff later announced their retirement from the group and were to be replaced by Emma Watkins, Simon Pryce, and Lachlan Gillespie, with Anthony remaining as the only founding member still in the group. 
This new lineup formally started touring in 2013 and though not initially as popular as the original group, eventually found its success. Emma, the first female Wiggle, proved especially popular, to the point she got her spinoff TV show and line of merchandise. In 2016, the original members (Greg, Murray, Jeff, and Anthony) performed adult-only reunion shows for charity to wide acclaim. A new character, Shirley Shawn the Unicorn, was introduced in 2019; originally presented as female, but was later re-established to be non-binary. In January 2020, after another reunion performance to raise funds for Bushfire Relief, Greg Page suffered cardiac arrest and was hospitalized. He recovered fully and is now a vocal advocate for heart health and AED machines.
In 2021, The Wiggles released Fruit Salad TV, a YouTube-exclusive miniseries that introduced four new Wiggles: Evie Ferris, John Pearce, Kelly Hamilton, and Tsehay Hawkins. Later in 2021, Emma announced her departure from the group to focus on her Ph.D., and Tsehay took over her role in the main lineup. Longtime Wiggles cast member and choreographer Caterina Mete would eventually complete the Fruit Salad TV cast in March 2022. Kelly departed from the group in July 2022 and Evie assumed her place as yellow, while Anthony's eldest daughter Lucia Field became the second blue Wiggle.
== The Wiggles YouTube channel ==
Since 2007, The Wiggles YouTube channel has hosted several music videos, compilations, and exclusive content. An example of early exclusive videos was Minutes with Murray, a now-private series wherein Murray Cook, the "king of guitars" would discuss and play the various guitars from his collection, including some that were used on Wiggles albums. 
The rise of the YouTube Kids platform established the demand for more content catered to that demographic. The Wiggles Nursery Rhymes was uploaded in late 2016 - the first of many full-length Wiggles projects made especially for YouTube. A sequel video, The Wiggles Nursery Rhymes 2, filmed at the YouTube Space in New York, was released two years later in 2018. In that same year, segmented uploads of The Wiggles' original videos started appearing on the channel. 
In June 2021, the first episode of the long-lost Spanish language Wiggles TV show, retroactively titled Los Wiggles, was posted to the channel. Uploads of the other episodes in the series would follow every other Friday. New videos featuring two of the Spanish Wiggles, Frank Madrid and Zoe Velez would also appear on the channel.
== Trivia ==
* The first ever video of The Wiggles uploaded to YouTube was by the user girlofgod23, and contained home video footage of Fruit Salad being performed live in concert. Greg Page was absent for this particular performance, and backup dancer Brett Clarke was singing in his place.
*The Wiggles have collaborated with Sesame Street on two videos, both of which have the group singing their songs with Elmo, Cookie Monster and Abby Cadabby; Do the Propeller! in 2019 and Fruit Salad in 2021.
==References==
Category:Music YouTubers
Category:Australian YouTubers
Category:Users who joined in 2007
Category:One million subscribers
Category:Two million subscribers
Category:One billion views