Rainbow Connection

"The Rainbow Connection" was written for The Muppet Movie and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Song in 1979. It is sung by Kermit as the movie's opening number and reprised by the whole cast of Muppets at the end of the movie.

Muppet Performances

 * Kermit made the song famous in The Muppet Movie (1979)
 * Kermit and Debbie Harry duet in episode 509 of The Muppet Show (1981)
 * A ballroom full of Muppets in The Muppets: A Celebration of Thirty Years (1985)
 * Kermit joins Raven-Symoné in The Muppets at Walt Disney World (1990)
 * Kermit on The Odyssey Channel series, Donna's Day (2000)
 * Kermit at Muppetfest (2001)
 * Me First and the Gimme Gimmes in the end credits of Kermit's Swamp Years (2002) (originally featured on their 1999 album Are a Drag)
 * Kermit on Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (2006)

Non-Muppet Performances

 * The Carpenters recorded the song in 1980, but it wasn't released until 2004
 * Kenny Loggins on his Return to Pooh Corner album (1994)
 * Willie Nelson on his Rainbow Connection album (2001)
 * Sarah McLachlan on the For the Kids album (2002).
 * Louise Gold, with Jason Carr on the piano, in the cabaret act LOUISE GOLD...By Appointment (2002, 2005).
 * Justin Timberlake and "Kermit" (Will Forte) on Saturday Night Live (2003)
 * The Dixie Chicks on the album, Mary Had a Little Amp (2004)
 * Willie Nelson and Paul Williams on the dual-disc DVD I'm Going Back There Someday (2005)
 * John Michael Higgins & His Symphony of Guys, a cappella version arranged by John Michael Higgins as heard during the ending credits for The Break-Up (2006)

Muppet Album Releases

 * The Rainbow Connection vinyl single
 * The Muppet Movie
 * Favorite Songs From Jim Henson's Muppets
 * Put Some Zing in Your Spring
 * The Muppet Show: Music, Mayhem and More
 * The Best of the Muppets

Trivia
On March 20, 1996, The Rainbow Connection was the basis of a bizarre crime in Wanganui, New Zealand. A twenty-one-year-old overly enthusiastic Muppet fan took a radio station manager hostage claiming to have a bomb and demanded to hear the song played nonstop on the air for the next twelve hours. Several buildings were evacuated due to the threat. When it was learned that the man had no bomb, police stormed the station and arrested him.