Review: More Singable Songs - Raffi

It is waaaay too easy to dismiss Raffi as the purveyor of bad children's music based purely on reputation.

That is, if you've never actually heard his early work. His first album, Singable Songs For The Very Young, is a landmark of the children's genre, a genre that arguably didn't exist in any meaningful way until Raffi came along. And his second album, More Singable Songs, while not earning any awards for album-title creativity, is no less vital.

The album title doesn't promise much variation from the first album, and the music bears that out, but in a good way. Raffi blends traditional kids' favorites ("Comin' Down the Chimney," "Six Little Ducks") with folk standards ("Workin' On the Railroad," "New River Train") and originals ("Shake My Sillies Out," "If I Had a Dinosaur"). There are very few "messages" in the songs, and even those are slid in ("Oh Me Oh My," which at the very end becomes as articulate an argument for self-sufficient singing as anything Dan Zanes has recorded). The instrumentation is generally simple, but bringing in, when the need arises, a tuba, say, or pedal steel guitar played by Daniel Lanois (or "Dan," as he was known in his pre-U2 and Emmylou Harris days).

The comments from my review of the first album apply here, too -- best for kids aged 2-6 and too short at less than 30 minutes. (I keep thinking that Rounder could make a lot of money by combining these two CDs into one CD and adding some bonus tracks for the completists. If there are Raffi completists, the notion of which strikes me as very odd.) This is another children's music classic. Available at the usual suspects online and off-.

Review: Jivin' in the Jungle - Barking Gorillas

Jivin' in the Jungle is the first CD from Barking Gorillas, a two-person band from New York. It's filled with upbeat and musically diverse songs targeted at toddlers and preschoolers -- songs about riding on the train ("Riding on the Train"), fire trucks ("The Fire Truck Song") and playing all day ("Play All Day," natch).

There are parts of the CD I was less than fully enamored of -- "Spinning" uses some sort of toy piano that sets me on edge, as does "Poopie Pants." And maybe this is a personal thing, but on some songs, the lead singer's voice annoyed me.

But there are also some very worthwhile songs on the album. For example, my personal favorite, "The Park," sounds like the result of the Dead Milkmen recording a kids' song, and I mean that as a compliment -- it has a very punky energy and is lots of fun. "The Fire Truck Song" doesn't do much more than sing about fire trucks, but does that very well. And the two slow songs placed in the middle and end of the CD, are sweet, speaking more to the parents than the kids. (And, for whatever, on those slow songs, I really liked the singer's voice.)

A lot of the songs -- even the ones I didn't particularly enjoy on CD -- I can envision being lots of fun in concert with lots of kids around. In the car with just you and your wee one(s), your mileage may vary. Still, this is a promising debut album, and I look forward to hearing their next go-round. (Just lose the toy piano, please.) The album is available from CD Baby.

Review: Songs to Grow on For Mother and Child - Woody Guthrie

The folksinger Woody Guthrie was a prolific songwriter. Best known as the composer of "This Land is Your Land," Guthrie wrote and wrote and wrote. (Billy Bragg and Wilco combined to make two enjoyable Mermaid Avenue CDs in which they took songs from his large store of unreleased lyrics and added new melodies.) In addition to writing many songs with a more political bent, he also released a couple kids’ albums in the mid-1950s. Both these albums have been released on CD by Smithsonian Folkways records.

Guthrie’s Songs to Grown on For Mother and Child is one of those CDs. It can be a fun CD for singing along with your child(ren). The titles (“Rattle My Rattle,” “I Want My Milk,” “I’ll Write and I’ll Draw”) are pretty indicative of the CD's topical concerns. (No, I could find no references to the labor movement.) The CD says the target audience is kids age 4-6, but I think kids as young as 1 or 2 would enjoy some of the songs.

A warning, though, the production is pretty simple, with many tracks only having Guthrie’s vocals accompanied by a guitar or a shaker. (There's a reason why I prefer Elizabeth Mitchell's or Wilco's versions of Guthrie's songs -- better vocals and/or better melodies.) If you like your productions polished or you dislike folksinging, this isn’t the CD for you. Over time, the CD has received less attention in our household for those reasons. But if you are more interested in folksinging, you may just find this to your taste.

Review: Singable Songs for the Very Young - Raffi

The Elvis of children's music would have to be Raffi. His own "Behind the Music" episode wouldn't be nearly as interesting as, say, Motley Crue's. But the category of "children’s music" didn’t exist in record stores before Raffi -- and this CD -- came along.

Singable Songs for the Very Young was recorded nearly 30 years ago. But it still sounds fresh today. Now, if you’re allergic to folk music, you may not like these CDs. The instrumentation is often simple -- a guitar, perhaps, or Raffi singing with no accompaniment at all. But sometimes there’s a full band playing, such as on "Willoughby Wallaby Woo" or "Old MacDonald Had A Band." The CD sounds great, and that may be due to the work of Daniel Lanois, who recorded the album. Lanois went on to do much more famous work creating a great sonic palette for U2's classic '80s era albums and, in the '90s, Emmylou Harris and Bob Dylan, among others. (So look at it this way -- even if you dislike Raffi, without him, maybe there's no "Where the Streets Have No Name," unless, of course, you also dislike U2, in which case I can't do anything for you.)

For the most part, Raffi sticks to classics and traditional songs. Raffi's own songs are split between "non-message" songs (e.g., "Going to the Zoo") and "message" songs ("I Wonder If I'm Growing"). With the exception of the "message" songs, kids 2 years old (or younger) through 5 years will enjoy the CD; some of the "message" songs are probably more appropriate for 3 year olds. If there's any drawback to the CD, it's that it's less than 30 minutes long. Then again, a little Raffi can go a long way.

One thing that is striking to me about Raffi's earliest albums is the utter lack of reference to the adult world. If you listen to children's artists recording today such as Ralph's World or Justin Roberts or Laurie Berkner (all very good), they will incorporate references to adult television shows or humorous lines targeted at the adults. No such thing in Raffi's work. It is all aimed at the kids' level. Not that it is ever condescending (the great error in bad kids' recordings). But Raffi is clearly not singing for the kids' parents.

I think there's a tendency to dismiss Raffi as an "annoying" children's artist. It's possible that his later work is the source of this frustration. But his earliest work, especially Singable Songs for the Very Young, are CDs your children will love and you will like a lot more than you expected. Highly recommended.

Review: Listen Learn and Grow Lullabies - Various Artists

With these Zooglobble reviews, I've focused on, for lack of a better word, "daytime" CDs. They're generally peppy, or a little bit folky, and definitely candidates for, well, the car. You know, you listen to the CD at home. You listen to it on the airplane. You listen to it in the car. If a CD can stand up to that repeated (ab)use, then there is definite merit to the album.

I've not talked about "lullaby" CDs because, by definition, neither parents nor kids should be actively listening to a lot of these CDs. The parents should be out of the room and the kids, well, they should be sleeping. They're probably not, of course, but it's nice to pretend, no? Whatever the case, kids are definitely not begging to "play that song again!" when referring to Brahms' "Lullaby."

But good music is good music, no matter when it's played. And my wife and I heard quite a few of these CDs when (she) nursed or (I) gave a bottle to our daughter.

The first thing you should know about lullabies on CD is that there are many CDs that have "lullaby" or "sleepytime" in the title that have no business being used during nap time or nighttime. Next to the "Mozart effect," it's probably the most-overused phrase in kids' music. (Next thing you know, they'll be advertising how these CDs have Bluetooth technology.) Just because the CD has music by Mozart doesn’t necessarily mean that it'll be calming and soothing during naps or feedings.

Naxos is a "budget classical" label and has a CD entitled Listen Learn and Grow Lullabies. The CD advertises that "each selection [on the CD] has been specifically chosen for its soothing and tranquil qualities," and while that sounds like a bit of marketing hoo-hah, this is a pretty "soothing and tranquil" CD. Because these are pulled from Naxos' other recordings, they avoid the saccharine nature of a lot of kids' CDs. You'll recognize the first couple selections ("Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" and the aforementioned "Lullaby") by name and some others by melody, but others will likely be completely new to you. They are, however, almost uniformly pleasing to the ear.

While marketed as a "lullaby" CD, nothing except the cultural knowledge of the first couple songs requires pigeonholing this CD as just for kids. Naxos' huge catalog means that it'll be hit or miss as to whether you can find it in your local music store; they're certainly available online.

If I had to pick just one lullaby CD that I would actually use for a child, Listen Learn and Grow Lullabies would be the one.