Western Animation / Razzberry Jazzberry Jam

Come on and join the Jazzberry Jam!

Come on and join the jam

Grab anything you can

All you need is to clap your hands

So bring all your friends and fam!

— The theme song

Razzberry Jazzberry Jam is a 2008 musical Edutainment Show produced by Trapeze Animation Studios and distributed by CBC. The show is mostly animated but contains live-action segments.

The show revolves around the Jazzberries, a band of anthropomorphic musical instruments who live and perform in the House Of Jam. The band consists of bandleader and trumpet Louis, wise string bass RC, empathic upright piano Ella, flashy electric guitar Billie, and Buddy and Krupa, the Drum Brothers.

Each episode, the Jazzberries are joined at the House Of Jam by a unique guest instrument, who will perform with the band in a musical number at the episode’s end. Until then, the Jazzberries and their guests have fun, encounter and solve the problem of the day, and hopefully teach their audience a thing or two about music along the way.

As mentioned above, every episode has two live-action segments (which might as well be one segment split into two parts) wherein a guest musician will go to whatever school agreed to host the show that episode and give a lucky music class a demonstration of the Instrument Of The Day, as while as a chance to play that instrument themselves. These segments could be cut out entirely without affecting an episode’s plot in any way.

Tropes In Razzberry Jazzberry Jam include:

Tropes A to M

• Abstract Eater: One of the Idiosyncratic Wipes used in “Music Is Universal” consists of a pair of giant castanets chomping away at the old scene to reveal the new scene beneath.
• Advanced Tech 2000: The device Buddy and Krupa gave Ella in “Helping Hands” that plays songs for her is called the Keymaster 3000.
• Agent Scully: Krupa has a tendency, in episodes with more… out-there topics, to insist that there must be a rational explanation. He spent most of “The Forever Song” trying to insist that bad luck wasn’t real (and being Instantly Proven Wrong every time he said it), and in “Phantom Of The Jam” he only agreed to go along with the ghost hunt because he wanted to prove that the ghost they were hunting did not, in fact, exist. (It did.)
• A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The Keymaster 3000 was already rather obnoxious when working (sort-of) as intended, but when Ella throws it down a flight of stairs (It Makes Sense in Context) it outright comes to life, runs off, and starts spreading its Unwanted Assistance all over the House Of Jam.
• Alien Episode: “Music Is Universal” in the second season. A pair of aliens (green castanets) accidentally crash their spaceship (which looks awfully like a disco ball) into a dumpster, where Billie finds it and, needing a disco ball for that night’s show, takes it into the House Of Jam. After being Mistaken for Special Guest (long story) and having to contend with the fact that the Jazzberries don’t understand their Starfish Language, the aliens finally get back to their ship (while the Jazzberries’ backs are turned) and leave, with the Jazzberries being totally unaware that their guests for that day were from outer space (though they do find out that they weren’t the real Dean and Jerry.)
• Alliterative Name: Quite a few guest instruments have names that alliterate with what they are. There’s Susie The Sousaphone, Xavier The Xylophone, Mike The Microphone, and, for objects that don’t end in -phone, Cyd The Cymbals, Herschel the Handsaw, Tesla The Theremin, and Kaz The Kazoo (although “Kaz” is actually a nickname, and her real name doesn’t alliterate.)
• Anachronism Stew: Downplayed, but still present.
  • Technologically, the show is all over the place decade-wise- TVs are bulky CRT screens, characters listen to music on phonograph records while CDs and audiotapes don’t seem to be a thing, and yet the Internet exists and is visited on modern-style laptops, Ella and Herbie once watched home videos of themselves when they were kids, supposedly super-old RC has a music video he was in when he was a kid play on a MTV-analogue (for further confusion points, the song in the music video was released on a record), and occasionally the characters use pieces of futuristic technology like the Talk Translator or the Keymaster 3000.
  • In “Music Is Universal”, the Jazzberries put on what’s supposedly a Disco performance, but which really consists of a mix of musical iconography from all over the latter half of the 20th century- while there is a disco ball and use of the "Staying Alive" Dance Pose, Buddy and Krupa’s kick drum has a peace sign on it (60s), Louis does the moonwalk (80s), and the fashions of the outfits they’re wearing range from the ‘50s to the ‘90s to the “that probably wasn’t ever an actual thing”.
• Animate Inanimate Object: Most of the characters in the show are musical instruments- Louis, Billie, Ella, RC, Buddy, and Krupa are, respectively, a trumpet, an electric guitar, a piano, a double bass, and two drums. Occasionally, other kinds of living objects show up, including a literal “fan” of the band in one episode and a handsaw (who obliquely mentioned some other living tools he used to work with) in another.
• Artistic License – Music: As much as the show tries to teach kids about music, it still gets quite a few things wrong.
  • Ella’s keyboard has a far smaller number of keys than an actual piano, although this was probably necessary as depicting her with the proper amount (88) would make her nigh-impossible to animate.
  • Generally, the notes characters are heard playing don’t correspond to the notes they look like they’re playing, While some level of this is probably necessary due to animation constraints, that doesn’t excuse the times when characters are shown to be playing while their instrument is not heard- or when they’re shown not playing while their instrument is heard.
  • Egregiously, despite the musical saw being the featured instrument of “Phantom Of The Jam”, not a single note played on an actual saw is heard (except in the live-action segments); instead, the supposed “saw noises” are produced either by a theremin or by a vocal imitation (read: some guy going “OOOOOOooooOOOOO”).
  • Stringed instruments are generally depicted with fewer strings than they actually have. Sometimes this is necessary (imagine how hard Persephone The Harp would be to animate if she had all 47 strings), but usually it’s just stupid- Billie has three strings out of a guitar’s 6, and RC has two (out of 4).
  • Xavier the “xylophone” has metal keys, which would actually make him a glockenspiel (xylophone keys are made of wood). All of his keys are also all the same size, despite the fact that real xylophone/glockenspiel keys are different sizes because each size produces a different pitch.
  • In “Super Sounds”, Ella is able to pop her soundboard◊ out of her “head” and play her strings like a harp. Needless to say, real pianos do not work like that at all.
  • Billie is very clearly an electric guitar, but is never portrayed as having to be plugged into an amp to play. This could be handwaved as being because she’s an Animate Inanimate Object… except that the guest instrument in “Jazzberries Unplugged” is an electric guitar who is depicted as needing electricity to play.
• Ascended Fangirl:
  • Annie becomes one at the end of “Billie’s Biggest Fan” when she performs with the Jazzberries in one of their shows.
  • Kaz from the second season is another young fan of the band (although not a literal fan this time) who gets to be taught (very rudimentary) music theory by Billie and even performs with the band at the end of the episode.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Kaz, all the way. Most of the episode she’s in consists of the Jazzberries attempting to find a way to hold her attention long enough to teach her how to read music.
• Audience Participation Song:
  • The Jazzberries do this in-universe at the end of “The Forever Song”, as they briefly leave their audience repeating the titular tune while they have a backstage chat, before coming back out and ending the song.
  • “When You Call”, from the episode “Calling All Jazzberries”, is also one, as the in-universe audience is brought into the song’s call-and-response pattern.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: This is pretty much Cyd’s whole deal- given a bit of time to think, she can solve almost any problem, from saving Louis from being carried away by a kite (It Makes Sense in Context… sorta) to figuring out how to make the workaholic trumpet finally take a rest. However, the “bit of time to think” part is important, meaning she isn’t very good at acting and reacting quickly.
• Banging Pots and Pans: “Billie’s Biggest Fan” and “Phantom Of The Jam” both have live-action segments where the music classes at the respective episodes’ schools march in a circle doing this, to go with both episodes’ Everything Is an Instrument theme.
• Black Bead Eyes: This trope is played completely straight on every single character; the most interesting thing to say about them is that some characters’ eyes aren’t actually attached to their bodies.
• Blatant Lies: Krupa produces some in “Phantom Of The Jam”, after Buddy jumpscared him with a Halloween mask:
  Krupa: I wasn’t scared, I was… surprised.
• Blowing a Raspberry: Ella does this in “Super Sounds”, after Herbie asks her to try
  Herbie: Just one new sound!
  Ella: Here’s one for you. (Blows raspberry)
  Herbie: Real mature.
• Birthday Episode: “Happy Birthday House!” is an odd version, as the Jazzberries celebrate the House Of Jam’s 100th “birthday” (that is, the 100th anniversary of when it was built.)
• Bookcase Passage: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, the Jazzberries discover a trapdoor leading to a secret subbasement which is activated by pressing on one of the bricks in the basement wall.
• Brand X: In “The ABCs Of Music”, first Billie and then Kaz make things out of “building blocks” which are very blatantly LEGOs.
• Bubble Pipe: Ella gives RC one in “Phantom Of The Jam” to go with his Hyperspace Holmes Hat.
• …But He Sounds Handsome: When Buddy has to impersonate Krupa in “A Bonnie Tale”, he can’t resist indulging in a bit of this.
  ”Krupa”: …but I think my very intelligent brother may have been right about something.
• By the Lights of Their Eyes: This trope is played completely straight when the power goes out in “Jazzberries Unplugged”. Interestingly, as the Jazzberries normally have Black Bead Eyes, their eyes appear as solid white discs in that scene.
• Call-and-Response Song: As the call-and-response song form was the musical topic of “Calling All Jazzberries”, the ending song, “When You Call”, is naturally one of these.
• Call-Forward: In “Join The Jam” (a Whole Episode Flashback) Xavier The Xylophone can be seen as part of the montage of rejected auditions.
• Ceiling Cling: At one point in “Helping Hands”, the Keymaster 3000 hides from Ella and Buddy in a narrow hallway by bracing itself between the walls just below the ceiling.
• Cheerful Child: Kaz The Kazoo from “The ABCs Of Music” is a perpetually upbeat bundle of (very distractible) energy who manages to even put Buddy, the Jazzberries’ resident source of cheerfulness and enthusiasm, to shame.
• Chirping Crickets: In “Super Sounds”, these are heard when the audience reacts unenthusiastically to the “J-Berries” (the Jazzberries trying out “new sounds”).
• Cloudcuckoolander: Buddy, full stop. Over the course of the show, he’s mowed a shag carpet that he thought was “getting too shaggy” (using a lawnmower he stole from RC, by the way), bought a gigantic seven-seater tandem bicycle because he thought it might be useful in a show (it was, but that’s besides the point), decided to randomly carry around a giant bowl of barbeque sauce (which ended up spilling all over Billie) and… accidentally used his drumsticks as chopsticks.
• Color-Coded Characters: The main cast is roughly in a rainbow arrangement; Buddy and Krupa are red (as is their drum kit), RC is orange, Louis is yellow (being a trumpet), Billie is dark blue, and Ella is purplish-pink.
• Comically Missing the Point: In one episode, Buddy comes across the other Jazzberries preparing for a birthday party but didn’t think any of them had birthdays coming up. (They didn’t; the “birthday” was the House Of Jam’s centennial.)
  Buddy: (To Krupa) Did I forget your birthday?!
  Krupa: Buddy, we’re twins. We have the same birthday.
  Buddy: This is terrible! I forgot my own birthday!
• Commercial Break Cliffhanger: The show manages to do this despite not having commercial breaks by cutting to a live-action segment (which don’t contribute to or really have anything much to do with the plot) when something shocking (well, as shocking as the show’s low-stakes plots can manage) happens.
• Conflict Ball: More than a few episodes tend to have characters argue or get mad at each other for petty, banal reasons that they really shouldn’t care about, while actual sources of character-driven conflict (such as Billie’s rampaging ego) are ignored. This reaches its crux in “Join The Jam”, where everyone (except RC and Louis) has some minor gripe that they all for some reason think is worth breaking up the band over.
• Continuity Nod:
  • In “Tuning In”, when Louis receives the Bandleader Of The Year award, Susie, Willis, and Macmanus all call the House Of Jam to congratulate him.
  • In “Jazzberries Unplugged”, the TV that Buddy and Krupa left on in their room is playing the Jazzberries’ performance at the end of “Phantom Of The Jam”.
  • In “Mixmaster Flash”, we see once again that Ella has a photo of Herbie on her dresser.
  • In “The Jazzberry Express”, at one point the Jazzberries try to play “Little Things” (the ending song of “Melody Makers”) but are drowned out by the trolley bells.
  • In “The Voice Of Change”, Buddy is seen packing the circular saw he had trouble using in “Happy Birthday House!” and the scary mask he was wearing in “Phantom Of The Jam”. Louis at one point also telephones the Jamporium, which was first mentioned by Juan in “Genre-Busters”.
• Conveniently Interrupted Document: In “The Forever Song”, the piece of paper bearing the lyrics to the titular song (which seemingly loops eternally a la “The Song That Never Ends”) was torn off after the second verse, relieving the song of its ending. Realizing this prompts the Jazzberries to also realize that they could potentially rid themselves of the eternal Ear Worm by writing it a new ending.
• Cool Old Guy: RC is the oldest Jazzberry (although exactly how old he is isn’t specified) and he’s calm, collected, generally fun to be around, and is often the Only Sane Man.
• Couch Gag: At the end of every episode, Krupa will utter a snarky comment (usually related to the episode’s events) about having to play the Ending Theme. For instance:
  Krupa: (At the end of “The Forever Song”) Time for another song we’ll never get rid of.
  Krupa: (At the end of “Mixmaster Flash”) Now it’s time for another very silly song.
• "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: At the end of “Helping Hands”, Ella realizes and admits that she could have avoided the entire plot if she had just admitted that she didn’t know the song they were going to perform that night.
• Covered in Gunge: In “A Royal Pain”, Billie ends up covered in barbeque sauce courtesy of Buddy’s giant bowl of the stuff.
• Creepy Basement: The House Of Jam’s basement is treated like this in “Phantom Of The Jam”, although honestly it’s not that creepy, being well-lit and fairly neat for a basement. That still doesn’t stop the ghost from showing up in it anyway.
• Cuckoo Finger Twirl: In “A Bonnie Tale”, Bonita does this when talking about her brother Woody’s tendency to make up elaborate stories about feats he supposedly achieved.
• Deadpan Snarker: Krupa is the Jazzberries’ resident fountain of sarcasm. It comes from a combination of being grumpy and usually being the Only Sane Man.
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: As shown in “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, “We Wanna Thank You” is not only the show’s Ending Theme but also how the Jazzberries close off their in-universe performances.
• Disappearing Box: This is inverted in “Disappearing Act”, where Tesla introduces most of the Jazzberries by having them step out of a seemingly-empty box (which is made larger each time someone exits), before (apparently) turning the box itself into Ella.
• Disembodied Eyebrows:
  • Herschel The Handsaw’s eyebrows float above his handle/head.
  • Certain characters (Louis, as well as more than a few guest instruments) have designs that exaggerate this- not only do their eyebrows float about their bodies, their eyes float above their bodies.
• The Ditherer: Juan from “Genre-Busters” is completely indecisive. His very first lines consist of him going back and forth about whether the House Of Jam is better than the Jamporium, and the plot of the episode revolves around him being unable to determine what genre “Can’t Pin Me Down” is supposed to be played in- cajun? Classical? Bluegrass?
• The Ditz: Buddy is… not exactly the brightest bulb in the shed, which when combined with his constant overflowing cheerfulness and enthusiasm makes him one doozy of a Cloudcuckoolander.
• "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: The show’s opening and ending theme songs are both performed by the Jazzberries.
• Dramatic Irony: In “Helping Hands”, Buddy and Krupa are unable to locate the Keymaster 3000, which the audience saw gain self-awareness and run off. Krupa, wondering what could have happened to it, says this:
  Krupa: It couldn’t have just gotten up and walked away!
• Drawing Straws: In “The Forever Song” Louis, Monica, and RC draw straws to determine who has to sing the song in order to figure out an ending (a hazardous task, as the song is A. insanely catchy, and B. cursed to bring bad luck to whoever sings it and then stops).
• Early-Bird Cameo: Herbie first appears in “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, the episode before his proper debut, both in the form of a photo on Ella’s nightstand, and calling her over the phone to tell the Jazzberries he can’t perform with them due to being sick.
• Ear Worm: In “The Forever Song”, the Jazzberries are beset by the eponymous eternally-looping tune. In addition to being annoyingly catchy, the song is also (supposedly) cursed so that anyone who stops singing it is plagued with bad luck
• Edutainment Show: The show is meant to teach children the basics of music, with each episode focusing on a specific musical topic such as tempo or tuning, although in some episodes it’s not exactly clear what the topic is supposed to be (hope you have a copy of the teacher’s guide), and one episode (“Phantom Of The Jam”) has a topic (“expression of emotions through music”) which A. isn’t in any way academic, B. was clearly shoehorned in to the non-educational story at the last minute and C. somehow got reused under a different guise (“music as a universal language”) for the second-season episode “Music Is Universal”.
• Ending Theme: The song that plays over the credits, “We Wanna Thank You” is one of these, naturally devoted to Thanking the Viewer. Interestingly, “Billie’s Biggest Fan” reveals that the song is also how the Jazzberries close out their performances in-universe.
• Every Episode Ending: Each episode of the show ends the same way: After closing the episode’s song number, the Jazzberries are thanked by that episode’s guest instrument. Buddy then comments on them having just been thanked, Krupa, knowing that this means they’ll have to play the Ending Theme, says something snarky (and usually relevant to the plot of that episode) about having to play the Ending Theme, and then the Jazzberries play the ending theme.
• Everything Is an Instrument:
  • Buddy’s “gift” in “Happy Birthday House!” is a conglomeration of wooden boards and metal pipes which he proceeds to play with his drumsticks; this was inspired by how Louis had spend the majority of the episode attempting to stop two obnoxious noises the House Of Jam had developed: Creaky floorboards and banging pipes.
  • In “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, Annie The Handfan is the guest “instrument” of the episode, and her “performance” consists of opening and closing herself to the beat. The episode’s live-action segment takes this to the extreme, as Special Guest Bob Scott drums on everything- an empty instrument case, a chair, the floor, himself...
  • “Super Sounds” inverts the usual setup of this trope- rather than drumming on random objects, Buddy and Krupa try to find their “new sound” by drumming on themselves using Everything As A Drumstick- brushes (which is an actual drum technique, for the record), spoons, pencils, even chicken drumsticks.
  • The guest instrument of “Phantom Of The Jam” is Herschel, a ghostly musical saw. The episode’s live-action musician, Gene Hardy, naturally also plays the saw, and in the first live-action segment he even gives the episode’s live-action kids (non-sharp) saws for them to try to play themselves (by hitting them with pencils, for some reason, bringing back the spirit of “Super Sounds”). (The episode’s second live-action segment starts with more of Hardy’s saw-playing but quickly devolves into the kids Banging Pots and Pans).
  Gene: How do you suppose we’re going to get a sound out of it [the saw]?
  Kayla: You can bing it?
• Everything's Better with Sparkles: The disco balls seen in “Music Is Universal” are surrounded by floating sparkle effects.
• Everything's Louder with Bagpipes: Macmanus The Bagpipes spends most of “Happy Birthday House!” demonstrating that he has two volume settings: Loud and louder. Fittingly, the musical topic of that episode is dynamics (what non-musicians call “volume”).
• Exploding Closet: In an early episode Buddy has a mop fall on him when he opens a closet door, and in “Music Is Universal” Billie opens a closet jam-packed with disco balls (It Makes Sense in Context) which all spill out into the hallway.
• Extendable Arms: In the Cold Open of “Tempo Trouble”, Buddy is somehow able◊ to stretch his Rubber-Hose Limbs to something like three or four times their length and loop them over themselves multiple times, mostly because it’s funny.
• Extremely Short Timespan: Most episodes take place over the course of a single day, or occasionally two days.
• Failure Montage: “Calling All Jazzberries” contains a rather Wile E. Coyote-esque montage of Louis’s various outlandish attempts to meet Salinger face-to-face (jetpacks and hot air balloons, among other things, were involved), and Salinger’s equally outlandish methods of thwarting him.
• Falling Chandelier of Doom: In “The Forever Song”, one of these narrowly misses Krupa after he tries to claim that there’s no such thing as bad luck.
  Buddy: I didn’t know we had a chandelier.
• Fangirl: “Billie’s Biggest Fan” introduces Annie, a fan of the band and Billie in particular (as well as a literal fan) who spends most of her time onscreen squeeing over being backstage with the band. She eventually ends up becoming an Ascended Fangirl (see above).
• Floorboard Failure: Ella crashes through the floor at one point in “Tempo Trouble”.
  Ella: It sure wasn’t built for tap-dancing pianos.
• Four-Fingered Hands: Played completely straight. This◊ is what most characters’ hands look like.
• Foreshadowing: “Disappearing Act” contains some subtle clues as to who the real thief is: Buddy is missing a lawnmower he claims is his but which he was shown in the episode’s Cold Open to have borrowed from RC without asking; when asked by the other Jazzberries if he’s lost anything RC says he has but doesn’t specify what; and while Tesla’s theme was heard after each disappearance the instrument it was played on was not a theremin.
• Free-Sample Plot Coupon: In “Melody Makers”, Xavier The Xylophone’s keys are knocked out of him, and while most get sucked in to the House Of Jam’s air ducts (requiring the Jazzberries to run around the House Of Jam to find them), two just land on the floor in front of him.
• Friendly Ghost: Herschel The Handsaw from “Phantom Of The Jam” is completely nice, and only wants to perform in the Masquerade Ball.
• Friendship Song: The show has produced two: “Together We Rock” from “Join The Jam”, and “Me Without You” from “Bongo Mania”
• Furry Confusion: Animate Inanimate Object confusion.
  • Buddy and Krupa produce several inanimate percussion instruments (specifically, a castanet, two maracas, a tambourine, and a handbell) from Hammerspace at one point during the theme song.
  • There’s an inanimate violin in a glass case in the Jazzberries’ music library, despite most of the show’s characters being anthropomorphic musical instruments. Juan from “Genre-Busters” also continuously produces inanimate musical instruments from Hammerspace and plays them, and no one even seems to find this notable enough to comment on it.
  • A living electric fan is a minor character in “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, yet multiple other episodes have shown the Jazzberries using inanimate electric fans to keep cool (or an electric fan someone had accidentally left on blowing on a white sheet and making it resemble a ghost).
  • A living (well, ghostly) handsaw who mentions having worked with some other sentient tools appears in one episode, while the Jazzberries have used inanimate tools a fair few times.
• Gender-Blender Name: Both Billie and Sid/Cyd are girls with names traditionally associated with boys.
• Getting Crap Past the Radar: Inexplicably, the word in the trope name gets said out loud on what’s supposed to be a preschool show; in “Super Sounds” the best compliment Krupa can pay Herbie is
  Krupa: Not crappy.
• Ghostly Glow: Herschel◊ is surrounded by a glowing green aura. Interestingly, his arms are part of the aura rather than part of his body.
• Ghostly Wail: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, ethereal wailing echoes through the House Of Jam whenever the Jazzberries try to rehearse for their performance at the Masquerade Ball. This gets a big ol’ lampshade hung on it when they actually meet the ghost responsible.
  Herschel: OOOOOOOOOooooooOOOOOOooooOO!
  RC: Stop that.
  Herschel: It is a bit standard, huh.
• Gleeful and Grumpy Pairing: Buddy and Krupa are Polar Opposite Twins, with Buddy being the gleeful one and Krupa being the grumpy one.
• Gotta Catch 'Em All: In “Melody Makers”, the Jazzberries have to search high and low to find all of Xavier The Xylophone’s keys (which were scattered throughout the House Of Jam by a freak air vent accident) and collect them in time for the performance.
• Grail in the Garbage: In “Music Is Universal” Billie finds an alien spaceship (which just so happens to look exactly like a disco ball) in the dumpster behind the House Of Jam.
• Green Aesop: “Jazzberries Unplugged” has an electricity-related one, although it’s not exactly clear whether the message is about not wasting electricity or about using green energy sources.
• Halloween Episode: “Phantom Of The Jam” is clearly one, although the holiday is never mentioned by name. In it, the Jazzberries are preparing for a costume par- ahem, “masquerade ball”, and have to contend with a ghost haunting the House Of Jam (who turns out to actually be a nice guy, and even participates in their performance at the masquerade ball.)
• Hammerspace: The show plays this completely straight, as characters frequently produce items from nowhere. The most commonly-conjured items are Buddy and Krupa’s drumsticks, and the most egregious case was when, in “Bongo Mania”, Nestor and Cesar produce a box of records bigger than they are, and which they would have had no reason to carry around, from behind their back.
• Hamster-Wheel Power: In “Jazzberries Unplugged”, Buddy thinks he can power the House Of Jam after the generator goes out by running on a treadmill. Needless to say, this doesn’t work very well… on its own, but when combined with a few solar panels and windmills (don’t ask where he got those) it can, in fact, power The Shock’s massive pile of amps.
• Happier Home Movie: “Super Sounds” begins (ignoring the Cold Open) with the Jazzberries watching a home movie of a young Ella and Herbie◊ playing “Sounds Like Ella” (a “game” where Ella would play something, and Herbie would press his “replay recording” button to play it back to her). The present-day Herbie then complains about how that game was “so basic” (which, to be fair, it kind of was for him), setting up his current attitudes as the source of the episode’s main conflict.
• Harmless Electrocution: In “The Forever Song”, RC is struck by lightning due to the bad-luck curse of the titular song. He comes out fine, if a bit singed.
• High-Class Glass: The “sophisticated” violin◊ seen in Billie’s Imagine Spot in “Tempo Trouble” has a monocle.
• The Heart: Ella is the heart of the Jazzberries, at least according to her bio on the show’s (now-defunct, so the link is to a Web Archive snapshot) official website.
• Heli-Critter: The Alien Castanets can somehow fly by looking upwards, opening their mouths 180 degrees and spinning◊.
• Hyperspace Holmes Hat: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, Ella produces not only a deerstalker hat but an entire Sherlock Holmes outfit to give to RC when he decides to lead the investigation into the titular phantom.
• Identical Twin Mistake: At the beginning of “A Bonnie Tale”, Buddy mistakes Bonita for her twin brother Woody (who the Jazzberries had been expecting, but who had to send Bonita in his stead due to being sick).
• Idiosyncratic Wipes: The show uses these to transition too and from its live-action segments- there are two “standard” wipes (stage curtains closing and then opening, and a roll of tickets falling across the screen and then being torn away to reveal a new scene) used in most episodes, but each episode may or may not receive its own specific, story-relevant wipes- examples include a poster of Elmore falling across the screen in “Solo On The Slide”, Xavier’s keys falling in “Melody Makers”, giant castanets chomping away at the scene◊ in “Music Is Universal”, and the lawnmower that Buddy used in the Cold Open of “Disappearing Act” rolling across the screen.
• I Know Kung-Faux: At one point in “Building To A Bang”, Buddy claims to know “drum-fu”. In demonstrating this, he karate-chops the air a few times and then falls on his head.
• I'm Not Here to Make Friends: Princess Persephone, the titular annoyance of “A Royal Pain”, has this attitude.
  Persephone: I’m just here to sing. I don’t intend to become friends with you people.
• Impact Silhouette: Any situation where Ella is moving faster than walking pace has a good chance of resulting in an Ella-shaped hole in at least one wall.
• Improv: Musical improvisation is the musical topic of the day in “A Bonnie Tale”; the main conflict of that episode stems from classically-trained clarinet Bonita’s refusal to improvise, and her insistence that the Jazzberries notate everything they play.
• Inconsistent Spelling: Two characters have their names spelled differently between the show’s closing credits and various supplemental materials- Sid/Cyd the cymbals and Hershel/Herschel the handsaw.
• Incredibly Lame Fun: Buddy’s eternal enthusiasm occasionally bubbles over on things that no reasonable person would be enthusiastic about. Take this scene from “Solo On The Slide”.
  Buddy: Do you guys know how many planes have flown over the House Of Jam this morning?
  (beat)
  Buddy: 38!
• In-Series Nickname: Kaz’s name is short for “Thermopylae Kazookius”.
• Invisible Anatomy: The Jazzberries lack ears. Hearing without them is by no means a new thing for cartoon Animate Inanimate Objects, but in “The Jazzberry Express” Ella (and later Krupa) can somehow wear earplugs.
• Iris Out: The transition from the end of the theme song to the beginning of the episode proper is done like this.
• Ironic Name: Kaz’s real first name is Thermopylae, which is exactly as sophisticated and dignified as she isn’t.
• It's Always Spring: Every single episode of the show seems to take place during springtime. Yes, somehow even including the Halloween Episode.
• I've Heard of That — What Is It?: Buddy invokes this trope nearly word-for word in “Helping Hands”, when Betty shows him her piano roll.
  Buddy: Of course! What is it?
• Jaw Drop: Ella’s jaw literally hits the floor◊ in “A Royal Pain” after Princess Perspehone suggests that she (Ella) can’t handle harmony.
• Kazoos Mean Silliness:
  • One participant in the Terrible Interviewees Montage in “Join The Jam” is a kazoo.
  • “The ABCs Of Music” introduces Kaz the kazoo, a perpetually distracted Motor Mouth Cheerful Child whose personality fits her instrument perfectly.
• Language Barrier: In “Music Is Universal”, the Jazzberries have to deal with a pair of alien castanets who speak only in clicking noises, although the way they react after hearing the Jazzberries talk implies that the barrier only goes one-way- that is, the aliens can understand English but are physically incapable of making the sounds required to speak it.
• Leitmotif: Leitmotifs (simply referred to as “themes”) are the musical topic of “Disappearing Act”. Tesla introduces the Jazzberries to his theme at the beginning, and by the end the Jazzberries have all decided to give themselves their own leitmotifs (which are never heard again once the episode ends).
• Lions and Tigers and Humans... Oh, My!: The show plays host to a truly bizarre example- any named, important, individual character will be a sentient musical instrument or occasionally another kind of object, but the Jazzberries’ audience consists of human silhouettes (who are always silhouettes, despite the lighting), and there are other indications that humans exist in the show’s world such as Louis’s Bandleader Of The Year trophy being shaped like a human conductor.
• A Lizard Named "Liz": A fair few guest instruments have names like this. Specifically, there’s Susis the sousaphone, Mike the microphone, Annie the fan, Cyd the cymbals, Monica the harmonica, Kaz the kazoo, and Juan the one-man band.
• Loads and Loads of Loading: When Billie tries to visit her fansite in “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, all she gets for minutes on end is a screen with an hourglass on it.
• Looped Lyrics: The Forever Song, seen in the episode of the same name, is an eternally-repeating song a la “The Song That Never Ends”. This is the entirety of the loop (at least, before the Jazzberries manage to write it an ending):
  That old Forever Song
  It just goes on and on
  It lasts all night and day
  You can’t help but sing away
  To the Forever Song
  It goes forever long
  And you can’t do anything
  Until someone else sings
• Losing Horns: In “Join The Jam”, a wah-wah-wahhh sound plays whenever Louis gives an auditionee the thumbs-down (which happens a lot). Befitting him, the notes are played on a trumpet rather than a French horn.
• Luck-Based Search Technique: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, Buddy manages to activate a Trap Door he didn’t even know was there by putting his hand on a random brick in the wall. Although this could be a subversion, as the reason he put his hand on said brick was because he was trying to show the other Jazzberries where the eponymous phantom had gone through the wall, and it’s possible, albeit not confirmed, that the ghost was trying to show them how to activate it.
• Magicians Are Wizards: Tesla The Theremin, full stop. He can conjure just about anything out of thin air (granted, this is in a show where characters make liberal use of Hammerspace), appear and disappear in a puff of smoke whenever he doesn’t feel like walking, and even makes the Jazzberries levitate and start “swimming” through the air during that episode’s stage performance.
• Man-Made House Flood: Krupa manages to fill the entire House Of Jam with water in “Calling All Jazzberries” when he accidentally connects the pipes for the intercom system he’d been installing to some water pipes.
• Masquerade Ball: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, the Jazzberries rehearse for one but must contend with the legend of a ghost who supposedly shows up to haunt any masquerades thrown in the House Of Jam. The ghost is real, and he’s actually a nice guy who is able to perform with the Jazzberries in the ball.
• Matryoshka Object: One of the presents Louis gets in “Tuning In” is a crate from the “Bandleader Of The Year Association” full of smaller crates. The smallest, which is about palm-sized, contains a trophy that could not possibly have been able to fit inside it if not for the show’s liberal application of Hammerspace.
• Mellow Fellow: In “Tuning In”, the Jazzberries hire a “relaxation expert” named Lebowski who definitely fits. (In a truly golden missed pun opportunity, he’s a ukulele and not a cello.) Under Lebowski’s tutelage, Louis also briefly becomes one himself, although this lasts all of five minutes before something (Lebowski being absurdly out of tune) stresses him out enough that he returns to his normal persona.
• Mirror Monster: It’s a downplayed aspect of his character, but in “Phantom of the Jam” the titular ghost manifests to the Jazzberries by first appearing inside a mirror.
• Mistaken for Flatulence: “Happy Birthday House!” contains a truly bizarre example- Buddy and later Louis notice a soft pinging sound (which turns out to be the muffled noise of pipes rattling in the basement) and ask Krupa about it. Judging by his reaction, they seem to be accusing him of whatever the drum equivalent of flatulence is.
• Mistaken for Special Guest: In “Music Is Universal” two alien castanets turn up at the House Of Jam looking for their disco-ball-shaped spaceship (It Makes Sense in Context) and are mistaken for Dean and Jerry, whom Mike had sent to the Jazzberries to perform with them that night. It’s not until the end of the episode (after the aliens have reclaimed their ship and flown off while the Jazzberries’ backs were turned) that the Jazzberries learn that the real Dean and Jerry A. couldn’t join the jam that day due to being sick, and B. were banjos, not castanets.
• Model Planning: In the Cold Open of “The ABCs Of Music”, Billie has a model of the “Billie School Of Music” which is made of can’t-call-em-LEGOs.
• Moonwalk Dance: Louis does one during “Say It In Song”, the retro-themed musical number of “Music Is Universal”.
• Motor Mouth: Kaz The Kazoo. Here’s a sample of her dialogue:
  Kaz: (in a single breath) Well, that was loud but not as loud as a jackhammer I bet because those are loud enough to make you go crazy my dad says even though I heard one once and I myself am still perfectly sane.
• Multiple Head Case: Nestor and Cesar◊ are a pair of bongo drums, with both drums having a face and a separate personality. (Nestor is the one on the left, and Cesar is the one on the right… probably). They each control one arm, and it’s not clear how control of their legs is divided.
• Mundane Object Amazement: The children in the live-action segments of “Phantom Of The Jam” are improbably impressed when Gene Hardy shows them a handsaw, and then improbably impressed again when he produces a violin bow.
• Murphy's Bed: Buddy and Krupa are shown in one episode to sleep in bunk hammocks. Buddy, when startled awake, falls out of his hammock and lands on Krupa, whose reaction indicates that this is far from the first time that’s happened.
• Musical World Hypotheses: All songs in the show (except for the opening and ending themes) are completely Diegetic, and the Jazzberries are regularly shown to practice them beforehand… except for “Together We Rock”, which begins diegetically with Billie, Buddy, and Krupa jamming together, but transitions into a full-on song which the Jazzberries could not possibly have prepared beforehand. (Why not? Well, the episode “Together We Rock” was in is a Whole Episode Flashback showing how the Jazzberries formed their band, and at that point the band hadn’t gotten together yet.)
• My God, You Are Serious!: In “The Jazzberry Express”, Billie suggests they move the House Of Jam away from the trolley stop in order to avoid having to deal with the cacophonous noise the trolley produces. Louis laughs… and then realizes she wasn’t joking.
• Mystery Episode: In “Disappearing Act”, the Jazzberries each find that they’ve lost something of theirs (Billie’s mirror, Ella’s gramophone, Krupa’s comics, and Buddy’s lawnmower), and suspicions immediately fall on their guest for that episode: Tesla, a magician whose specialty is making things disappear. It turns out that the actual culprit is RC, and all of the missing objects are things the other Jazzberries borrowed from him and never returned.

Tropes N to Z

• Nap-Inducing Speak: In “Super Sounds”, when invited to practice the Jazzberries’ latest song with them Herbie falls asleep from boredom. He “snores” by playing snoring noises on himself, so he could’ve been faking, but he reacts with genuine surprise (and a genuine “powering-on” noise) when awoken, so it’s equally possible that sleep-playing that is just how an anthropomorphic synthesizer would snore.
• Newhart Phonecall: Any time characters talk on the phone, this trope is played completely straight.
• New Job as the Plot Demands: Mike the microphone was a reporter for a radio station in his first few appearances. Then he was a radio DJ. Then he was the host of “Mike Tonight”, an apparently-very-famous TV show. Then in the very next episode he was back to being a DJ.
• New Neighbours as the Plot Demands: In “Calling All Jazzberries”, we’re introduced to Salinger, who despite being a big fan of the Jazzberries and living just across the street from them has somehow managed to never appear in the show before.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed:
  • The Shock’s design is obviously modeled on Slash, although his mannerisms make it clear that the writers weren’t familiar with how the actual Slash acts.
  • One episode featured a set of turntables referred to as “Mixmaster Flash”.
• No Name Given: The electric fan from “Billie’s Biggest Fan” and the herald trumpet from “A Royal Pain” are never named, and the show’s credits only refer to them as “Electric Fan” and “Herald” respectively.
• Non-Standard Character Design: Mike the microphone lacks the stick-figure arms and legs that most of the show’s other Animate Inanimate Objects have, instead hopping around on his base and using his cord (which is of indefinite length and always appears to be plugged in to something just offscreen) to hold objects.
• Noodle Incident: Buddy has been responsible for at least two.
  • In the Cold Open of “Super Sounds”, when something (which turns out to be Herbie experimenting with his sound) is seemingly roaring and making a huge racket downstairs:
  Louis: Buddy! I’ve told you this before! No lions in the House Of Jam!
  • He hasn’t been allowed into the Jazzberries’ record library since “The Incident”, the mere mention of which causes him to hide his face and shudder. Apparently, he managed to create so many bits of broken record that the other Jazzberries are still finding them to this day, and scattered them so thoroughly around the House Of Jam that, somehow, a piece got in to the Hammerspace where he and Krupa keep their drumsticks.
• Old Shame: As a kid, RC participated in the music video to the “Silly Time Song” while wearing clown getup. RC is deeply embarrassed by this and spends the better part of an episode trying to prevent the other Jazzberries from finding out about it.
• One-Man Band: Juan from “Genre-Busters” is a living version of one, a conglomeration of several instruments consisting of a cymbal, bass drum, xylophone, snare… well, it’s easier if you just look at him◊.
• One-Shot Character: Every episode (except for two) features a unique Guest Instrument (that’s official terminology used in the show’s supplementary materials, by the way) who shows up at the House Of Jam, participates in that episode’s plot, and then vanishes never to be seen again. Some episodes also have secondary one-shot characters such as Electric Fan from “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, Louis’s mother from “Genre-Busters”, and Queen Marie and the Herald from “A Royal Pain”.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: The Shock, who was featured in “Jazzberries Unplugged”. Despite what Cowboy BeBop at His Computer might tell you, his real name is not Lars.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: In “Move To The Beat”, Ella is somehow able to hide in an alley by pretending to be a dumpster. All that she has going for the disguise is being large and boxy, but somehow this fools the other Jazzberries enough that one of them even throws a tin can in her.
• Paranormal Episode: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, the Jazzberries hear spooky moaning of unidentifiable origin and come to believe that the House Of Jam is haunted. Believe it or not, they’re right.
• The Perfectionist:
  • Billie, to go with her diva-style personality, although unlike most divas she’s willing to work towards perfection herself instead of making other people do it for her.
  • Louis also has perfectionistic tendencies. “Genre-Busters” reveals he gets this from his mother, a nitpicky music teacher.
• Perpetual Frowner: Krupa. Hilariously, Buddy was once able to flawlessly impersonate him by forcing himself to affect the same grumpy expression.
• Perpetual Smiler: Buddy. His smiling vs. Krupa’s glum look actually serves as their Identical Twin ID Tag.
• Polar Opposite Twins:
  • The Drum Brothers, Buddy and Krupa, are about as different as night and day- fairly literally. Buddy is cheerful and sunny, while Krupa is gloomy (and snarky).
  • There’s Bonita and Woody from “A Bonnie Tale”. Bonita is stuffy, uptight, and dislikes improvisation, and while Woody is never actually seen, from the way the Jazzberries talk about him he’s cool, fun to hang around with, and has a tendency to make up stories about his supposed adventures (which Bonita hates).
• Power Outage Plot: In “Jazzberries Unplugged”, Billie’s massive light show manages to blow out the House Of Jam’s generator. They manage to get it back up and running partway through the episode… only for it to be blown out again by The Shock’s massive collection of amps. Fortunately, they do find a solution that allows them to perform their show that night.
• Preschool Show: This is what the show’s official material lists the show’s demographic as, although in practice it’s more like “preschool and elementary school”.
• The Prima Donna:
  • Billie is a downplayed example, as while she does have a large ego and is the Jazzberry who cares the most about fame and stardom, she still gets along well with her bandmates, and while she does want everything to be absolutely perfect she’s willing to put in the effort to make them perfect herself, rather than demanding other people do it for her. Her standards of perfection are also applied as much to herself as to the world around her.
  • Bonita from “A Bonnie Tale” is a classically trained clarinet who hates anything she considers “frivolous” (such as her brother Woody’s tendency of making up extremely improbable stories of adventures he supposedly had) and looks down on the Jazzberries for performing without sheet music. Fortunately, by the end of the episode Buddy has convinced her to lighten up.
  • Princess Persephone from “A Royal Pain” really lives up to the episode’s title. Within minutes of her introduction, she manages to soundly out-diva Billie by taking over the latter’s room (which is apparently the only dressing room in the House Of Jam that’s “fit for a princess”), and then she starts banning the Jazzberries one-by-one from their performance that night. She does see the error of her ways once she bans every Jazzberry and is faced with the prospect of performing completely alone, however.
• Pun-Based Creature: The episode “Billie’s Biggest Fan” reveals that at least some of the Jazzberries fans are… literal fans. Specifically, there’s Annie the handfan and also a nameless electric fan who appears at the end.
• The Queen Will Be Watching: In “A Royal Pain”, the Jazzberries have to perform with Princess Persephone for a show that will be attended by her mother, Queen Marie. Unfortunately, Persephone is quite the Royal Brat (see below).
• Right Out of My Clothes: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, upon being informed that the House Of Jam is haunted the Jazzberries run out of the place so fast they leave parts of their costumes lying on the ground where they were standing.
• Rooftop Concert: The Jazzberries hold one in “Calling All Jazzberries”, as a way to still do that night’s performance despite having accidentally flooded the House Of Jam.
• Royal Brat: Princess Persephone from “A Royal Pain” really fits the episode’s title with her It's All About Me demeanor and general unpleasantness. Fortunately, by the end of the episode the Jazzberries have managed to get her to see the error of her ways.
• Rubber-Hose Limbs: Characters’ arms and legs consist of simple black lines which gently curve rather than bend at joints. Buddy even manages to loop his arms around each other multiple times for a gag in “Tempo Trouble”.
• Running Gag: While there weren’t any permanent running jokes, there were a few jokes that were used multiple times over the course of a single episode.
  • In “Billie’s Biggest Fan”, characters would overstretch the cords on phones (yes, the phones in the show still have cords) and then be violently yanked backwards when the somehow-elastic connection had had enough.
  • Buddy spent most of “Super Sounds” trying to offer Herbie and the rest of the Jazzberries hot cocoa, regardless of the situation. He did a similar thing in “A Royal Pain” with a gigantic bowl of barbeque sauce.
• Sampling: This is the musical topic of “Mixmaster Flash” (despite the episode wanting to pretend the topic is “texture“, whatever that means). In the episode, Flash The Turntables, searching for new samples, uses a record containing RC’s Old Shame, and RC tries to hide all information about the record’s origins while the other Jazzberries are desperate to know more about it.
• Sarcasm-Blind: Any and all snark just flies over Buddy’s head. For instance, take this exchange between him and Krupa in “Helping Hands” (for context, Ella had just gotten frustrated with the Keymaster 3000 and thrown it down a flight of stairs).
  Krupa: No, after crashing down the stairs like that I’m sure they’ll be in perfect working order.
  Buddy: Phew! That’s a relief.
• Saw a Woman in Half: One of Tesla’s magic tricks in “Disappearing Act” is to fake-saw Louis in half.
• Scatting: The theme song has some “Skiddly-bop”s and “Diddly-bop”s mixed in with the real lyrics. Also, Ella has a tendency to exclaim “Skiddly-bop!” when excited, although not enough for it to qualify as a proper catchphrase.
• Scooby-Dooby Doors: A non-chase scene variation occurs in “Move To The Beat”, as RC and Billie are looking for Ella- they go in and out of various rooms in a downright non-euclidean fashion.
• Self-Demonstrating Song: In an odd variation, “Can’t Pin Me Down” isn’t self-referential if you look at the lyrics in isolation, but the words to it end up perfectly encapsulating Juan’s inability to decide what genre to play the song in.
  You can’t pin me down
  No, you can’t pin me down
  When you think you’ve figured out
  Just what I’m all about
  I change my tune
• Sherlock Homage: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, RC is given a Sherlock Holmes outfit by the other Jazzberries after he decides to track down the ghost supposedly haunting the House Of Jam. He also ends up wearing this costume to the Masquerade Ball.
• Shout-Out: Cesar and Nestor’s names are a clear reference to The Mambo Kings.
• Shout-Out Theme Naming: The Jazzberries are all named after famous jazz musicians- specifically, Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, Billie Holiday, Ella Fitzgerald, Gene Krupa, and Buddy Rich. Billie’s father Elmore is also named after Elmore James, “King of the Slide Guitar”, and Ella’s cousin Herbie is named after Herbie Hancock.
• Shown Their Work:
  • In “Super Sounds”, most of what the Jazzberries do to try and find new sounds (at least until the cartoonish antics take over) are actual musical techniques- Billie plugs herself in to a distortion pedal, Louis tries using various objects as mutes, RC bows himself col legno, and Buddy and Krupa try using drum brushes.
  • Mike being able to play Lebowski’s tune back to him in “Tuning In” isn’t an Ass Pull- microphones and speakers are both electroacoustic transducers (to put it simply, in microphones sound in the air makes a thin membrane vibrate, and the vibrations are converted into a signal in a wire; in speakers, a signal in a wire makes a thin membrane vibrate, and the vibrations are transferred into the air as sound), so it’s actually possible to use a microphone as a speaker (though you shouldn’t expect good sound quality from it).
• Show Within a Show:
  • In “Mixmaster Flash”, the Jazzberries watch “The Oldies Video Show”, which appears to be something like MTV... or at least like MTV when it actually played music.
  • In “Building To A Bang”, Krupa is invited to join “Mike Tonight”, Mike’s TV show. Not much about it is shown except for the fact that it’s popular, it’s probably a talk show, and Mike needs someone to do drumrolls before he drops the punchline to his jokes.
• Sick Episode: While the main focus of the episode is on something else, Billie having a cold is a subplot in “Building To A Bang”.
• Single-Minded Twins: Cesar and Nestor, the Bongo Twins. They’re also in a weird gray space between Conjoined Twins and a Multiple Head Case, so it’s not even clear why they had to be more than one character.
• Sleep Aesop: In “Give It A Rest”, Louis stays up all night in order to finish every chore on his to-do list, and spends the following day exhausted… and still refusing to rest. The Jazzberries finally manage to get him to sleep just before their performance of the day, although he wakes up soon enough to be able to participate in the second half. (Incidentally, the musical topic of “Give It A Rest” was… rests.)
• Slippery Skid: At one point in “Melody Makers”, Louis somehow slips and slides on dust as if it were marbles.
• Sneeze of Doom: In “Building To A Bang” Billie (who was sick that episode) unleashes a sneeze so forceful it sends Ella flying through a wall.
• Solid Clouds: During the song number of “Calling All Jazzberries”, the Jazzberries (who due to having accidentally flooded the House Of Jam are giving a rooftop performance) are somehow able to stand on a small cloud that inexplicably appeared, and even ride it to (almost) the next rooftop over.
• Song of Many Emotions: “This Is How I Feel”, from “Phantom Of The Jam”. It’s (well, it and the live action segments) pretty much the only manifestation of the fact that that episode’s “educational“ topic is supposed to be “expressing emotions through music”.
• Southern Gentleman: Willis The Fiddle from “Tempo Trouble”.
• Squashed Flat: In “Jazzberries Unplugged”, Buddy and Krupa are squashed after one of The Shock’s many, many gigantic amps falls on them. The Shock then scrapes them up, folds them into a paper airplane, and throws them (they were standing on the House Of Jam’s roof at the time; and hey, it does get them to the first floor faster than taking the stairs.) As to be expected from cartoon physics, they’re back to full three-dimensionality the next time we see them.
• Special Guest:
  • Each episode has a guest musician star in several live-action segments, although most of the guest musicians were… less than famous.
  • In-universe, nearly every episode has the Jazzberries invite a guest instrument to perform with them that night. “Join The Jam” reveals that this tradition was Ella’s idea.
• Special Thanks: Each episode’s credits thank the school that episode’s live-action segments were hosted in.
• Species Surname: The show’s naming conventions provide an odd variation on this- rather than having proper last names, everyone seems to be named “[Name] The [Object they are]”, with the last part actually being considered part of their official name.
• Spell My Name with a "The":
  • Every character seems to have “The” as their middle name (see Species Surname above).
  • For a more traditional example, take The Shock. And his Third-Person Person tendencies make sure everyone around him knows this. (Though he’s never actually referred to this way, this means his full name would be The Shock The Double-Necked Guitar.)
• Staircase Tumble: In “Mixmaster Flash”, RC rushes down the stairs to attempt to beat the other Jazzberries to the front door and ends up tumbling all the way there.
• Starfish Language: The Alien Castanets seen in “Music Is Universal” speak a language composed entirely of clicking sounds.
• "Staying Alive" Dance Pose: Ella does one at the start of “Say It In Song”, the disco-themed song number of “Music Is Universal”.
• Stealth Insult: Krupa unleashes one on Buddy in “Tempo Trouble”, after the former loses a bet with the latter over which of them can go the longest moving and talking in slow-motion (It Makes Sense in Context… sorta).
  Krupa: Buddy, I have no problem admitting that you are the slowest Jazzberry.
• Superstition Episode: “The Forever Song” revolves around the titular endlessly-looping song, which supposedly brings bad luck (read: Amusing Injuries) to anyone who tries to stop singing it without having someone else pick up where they left off.
• Super-Strength: Somehow, in “The Jazzberry Express”, Ella is strong enough to (slowly) drag a trolley forward along its track, while the trolley’s motor is trying to push it in reverse. The closest thing this gets to an explanation is a Voodoo Shark throwaway comment implying it’s because she’s a Determinator, which was not part of her personality at all until that episode.
• The Stinger: After the credits of every episode is a scene where one of the Jazzberries (which one it is depends on the episode) asks the viewer to check out the show’s (now-defunct) official website.
• Tandem Parasite: In the Cold Open of “The Voice Of Change”, it’s shown that Buddy has bought a titanic seven-seater tandem bike (he thought it might be useful in a show) that he and Krupa are trying to bring in to the House Of Jam’s garage. Or rather, Krupa is, while Buddy sits on the last seat of the bike and talks.
• The Teaser: Every episode starts with one. They’re usually plot relevant, but some (like the one from “Phantom Of The Jam”, where the Jazzberries try on costumes that don’t end up being the ones they wear to the masquerade ball) are clearly Padding.
• Telescoping Robot: The Keymaster 3000 consists of a pair of mechanical arms that pop out of a tiny pouch when activated. Just looking at it,◊ it is abundantly clear that the arms should not be able to fold up inside the pouch.
• Terrible Interviewees Montage: At one point in “Join The Jam”, we’re treated to a montage of auditions for the Jazzberries that mostly consists of instruments that would be wildly out of place in a jazz-rock band- everything from a calliope◊ to a kazoo◊ to a classical cello◊ an alphorn◊. However, to highlight Louis’s perfectionism, mixed in are several instruments that actually have decent performances (a keytar◊, a clarinet◊, and Xavier the xylophone) which he still rejects.
• Tertiary Sexual Characteristics: Without exception, every single female character in the show has visible eyelashes. In fact, this is the only way to tell that one character (one of the Alien Castanets) is female.
• Thanking the Viewer: The song that plays over the credits, “We Wanna Thank You”, is naturally all about doing this. Here’s a sample of the lyrics:
  We wanna thank you (Thank you!)
  For joinin’ the jam!
  We wanna thank you (Thank you!)
  For hangin’ out ‘till the end!
• Theme Song Reveal: “Disappearing Act” has an extremely odd metatextual version- the Jazzberries hear Tesla’s In-Universe Leitmotif shortly after each of them notices they’re missing something, which causes them to suspect him as the one behind the disappearances. However, eagle-eyed (owl-eared?) viewers may notice that the instrument playing the theme in those cases isn’t a theremin, but rather a double bass, cluing them in that RC is the true culprit.
• Theremin: Tesla The Theremin, the guest instrument of “Disappearing Act”. Oddly, his character (he’s a stage magician) was based on the theremin’s ability to sound “magical” rather than spooky.
• Third-Person Person: The Shock always refers to The Shock in the third person, as The Shock is a parody of… Slash, who doesn’t actually do this. The Shock is confused by this, or The Shock would be if The Shock knew The Shock was supposed to be a Slash parody. Or who Slash was.
• This Is a Song: The lyrics of the Forever Song (featured in the episode of the same name) are entirely about the Forever Song and its lack of an ending.
  That old Forever Song
  It just goes on and on
  It lasts all night and day
  You can’t help but sing away
  To the Forever Song
  It goes forever long
  And you can’t do anything
  Until someone else sings
  (Loop back to the beginning)
• This Is My Side: Buddy and Krupa’s room is occasionally shown to have a dashed line drawn through the middle, presumably separating each Drum Brother’s side. However, this is regularly contradicted by other episodes (such as one where Buddy and Krupa were shown to sleep in a bunk bed-hammock setup, or “Jazzberries Unplugged” where their room was shown with a completely different layout).
• Title Drop: Ella performs one in “A Royal Pain”.
  Ella: I’m sorry, Billie. I tried my best to make it work, but playing with royalty… it’s a royal pain.
• Title Theme Tune: The show’s theme tune subverts this, as while all of the words making up the title are included the full title is never said verbatim.
• Totally Radical: Ella’s cousin Herbie peppers his speech with odd vernacular that seems to resemble hippie slang mixed with a bit of Surfer Dude lingo, which for a show made in the 2000s is, as Herbie would say, “so bogus”. (Interestingly, he never actually says the word “radical”.)
• Translator Microbes: In “Music Is Universal”, Krupa gives Buddy the Talk Translator, a handheld device which can translate spoken language. Ironically for how such a device is usually used, the Talk Translator, being made on Earth, can’t translate the Alien Castanets’ speech (though this doesn’t stop Buddy from pointing it at them and hoping it’ll work this time.) At the end of the episode, the aliens upgrade it to be compatible with their speech, allowing them to give the “thank you” that starts the Every Episode Ending.
• Trap Door: In “Phantom Of The Jam”, the Jazzberries discover one (activated by pushing on an innocuous-looking brick in the basement wall) which leads to a secret subbasement.
• Trash of the Titans: Apparently Kaz’s room is like this. We never see it, but given how much chaos she creates over the course of a few hours in the House Of Jam it wouldn’t be that implausible.
  Kaz: (Seconds after suggesting that the Jazzberries make a junkyard set for their performance) My mom says my bedroom looks like a junkyard.
• Treadmill Trauma: At the end of “Jazzberries Unplugged”, Buddy is sent flying backwards by the treadmill he had been running on to generate extra power for The Shock’s massive collection of amps. (Which raises some Fridge Logic if you think about- the treadmill was being used to generate power, but in order to shoot Buddy backwards it would have to be drawing power from an outlet.)
• Twin Switch: “A Bonnie Tale” contains two instances of characters impersonating their twins, although they don’t exactly switch places with them. A proper switcheroo also occurs in the Couch Gag at the end.
  • Buddy impersonates Krupa so he can talk to Bonita (who has a maybe-a-crush on Krupa) and try to convince her to not be such a diva. Hilariously, the Drum Brothers are so identical Buddy can do this just by affecting Krupa’s eternally grumpy expression.
  • After Buddy successfully gets Bonita to lighten up (revealing his true identity in the process), she impersonates her twin brother Woody to prank the real Krupa.
  • And then, in the Couch Gag, Krupa-as-Buddy comments on the Jazzberries having just being thanked which prompts Buddy-as-Krupa to grouse about having to perform “the ‘Thank You’ song”.
• Two Girls to a Team: Billie and Ella are the only female members of the Jazzberries.
• Unfinished Business: Apparently this is what was keeping Herschel haunting the House Of Jam. We’re never explicitly told what exactly his business was, but he was finally able to pass on after performing in the Jazzberries’ masquerade ball, so presumably that was something he dreamed of but never got to do in life.
• Unnamed Parent: Louis’s mother is never named, and the credits only refer to her as “Mrs. Trumpet”. This is especially odd since when Billie’s father visited in an early episode, he did have a name. (Elmore, for the curious.)
• Visual Pun: In “Super Sounds”, Buddy and Krupa are attempting to find their “new sounds” by hitting themselves with what are essentially random objects. One of the things they try is a food item that is never referred to by name, but which is obviously a chicken drumstick.
• Wham Shot: In “The Voice Of Change”, the Jazzberries are being forced to move out of the House Of Jam by Angie (the building's owner). They assume she’s selling the building to some new occupants… until they walk out, arms laden with boxes of packed personal items, and see parked in front of the House a wrecking ball crane.
• Whole Episode Flashback: “Join The Jam” consists mostly of a flashback to how the Jazzberries met each other and decided to form a band, with a Framing Device of the Jazzberries considering breaking up due to Conflict Ball and RC trying to prevent them from doing so by reminding them of why they decided to play together in the first place.
• X-Ray Sparks: When RC is struck by lightning in “The Forever Song”, his skeleton is visible◊. This is despite him being an Animate Inanimate Object who logically shouldn’t have a skeleton.