Marion Savage Rosette was a pianist, teacher, and composer of children’s music. Rosette was born in Baltimore in 1900, her father being a successful surgeon at Johns Hopkins. She was involved in music from an early age and earned her Artist’s Diploma in piano from the Peabody Conservatory in 1923. After graduating, she moved to New York with her husband, George Rosette. There the couple teamed up to open a record company where Marion Savage Rosette wrote and recorded hundreds of children’s songs.

She is most known for the compositions that were featured on the popular children’s television show Captain Kangaroo. These songs included “Katie the Kangaroo,” “City Mouse and Country Mouse.” and “The Monkey Who Wanted to Fly.” Many of her songs have also appeared in school books, radio programs, television, and several other record labels.

Rosette frequently performed as a soloist with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and worked often as an accompanist for many dancers, singers. and instrumentalists.

In 1984 Peabody Institute Director Robert Pierce presented Rosette with the first Director’s Recognition Award for her significant contributions to the world of children’s music. Johns Hopkins University now offers merit scholarships to piano students under the Marion Savage Rosette Piano Scholarship. Rosette passed away in 1991 of brain cancer.