Review: My Neighborhood - Johnny Bregar

In every reviewer's career, there are the artists you find, follow devotedly, and wonder why the rest of the world isn't quite as enamored as you.

Exhibit A, for me, I think, is Seattle's Johnny Bregar.  I thought his first three albums Stomp Yer Feet!, Hootenanny, and Dragonfly were on par with any recent three-album set from just about any artist you'd care to name.  While they were received positively, with radio airplay and cuts on a couple of Putumayo Kids albums, he hadn't received the attention that his peers (Justin Roberts, TMBG, Elizabeth Mitchell, a few others) had.

And then, 3 1/2 years of silence.  Much of that silence is because Bregar has been struggling to find his singing voice (literally).  And while that condition isn't fully resolved, Bregar has finally released his fourth album for kids, My Neighborhood.  For fans of the first three albums, it is good to hear Bregar's voice once more.

While I don't think Bregar's included too many more guest artists than on Dragonfly, he brought enough guests to his Bainbridge Island studio to make his rootsy Americana with a hint of bluegrass seem like a small party.  There's a mellow, soulful vibe to the album's best tracks, even a bit of wistfulness at points.  The title track recounts a stroll through the narrator's neighborhood, evocative of Mr. Rogers if he'd had a chance to listen to some Jack Johnson.  The next track "Weekend" evokes the best of the Counting Crows sonically in service of praising the fun of Saturdays and Sundays.

While Bregar still invites some younger kids to sing along (as on the uber-confident rocker "Yes I Can"), he's mostly moved on from the preschool songs he originally made his name on.  (I will admit to being tickled pink that Bregar, who I once called "the next Raffi," includes a simple, sing-along version of the Raffi classic, "You'll Sing a Song".)  Bregar's playing (and that of his guests) is unfussy, but there are some nifty instrumental turns.  I will admit to skipping forward past "Pancho," but the vast majority of the songs stand up to repeated spins.

The songs here are most appropriate for kids ages 4 through 9.  You can listen to selected tracks by going here and clicking on the "Listen Now" button.

I've laid it out as best I can without coming over to your house or minivan and commandeering the CD player or iPod and making you and your kids listen.  My Neighborhood is what we expect good kids music to be these days -- musically rich, thematically diverse, and (for older kids, anyway) lyrically sophisticated.  Please please please try it.  Highly recommended.

Review: A Little Love - Renee & Jeremy

Cover albums are, depending on one's perspective, the last refuge of scoundrels or a songwriter's tribute to classic songs.

Of course, that's an adult's perspective.  Such debates are nowhere to be found in kids' music, mostly because preschoolers don't truck in adults' notions of hipness and because the history of the genre has been one of handing down songs from generation to generation.  There's a reason why kids have been singing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" for hundreds of years in dozens of languages -- it's because it's a damn good song.

And lullaby albums are especially susceptible to the cover treatment.  It's hard work crafting loving songs that are memorable (but not too memorable, because, hey, the kids are supposed to go to sleep).

One of the bands that have worked the lullaby seam quite well in recent years are the LA duo Renee & Jeremy.  Many of their chilled-out songs (especially on their debut It's a Big World) are mellow, modern gems of love.  So it was with a little trepidation I gave their new album A Little Love -- a collection of ten covers given a mostly down-tempo burnish -- a spin.  "They write a good song," I thought, "why would they want to record others'?"

Whatever their motivation, the resulting album highlights Renee & Jeremy's number one weapon in making parents weak at the knees and kids very relaxed -- their voices.  Jeremy Toback and Renee Stahl are the best vocal duo in kids' music, bar none, and it's the interplay and harmonies between them that turn what could otherwise be a collection of "why bother?" covers of overly familiar tunes into something much bigger.  "Daydream Believer," "Shiny Happy People," "Love" -- all songs I never needed to hear other than by their original artists, but which R&J give a sufficiently mellow spin and artfully draw out the lullaby-ish nature of the song to prove me wrong.  And in some cases, like their take on Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Give It Away" and Coldplay's "Yellow," they provide an entirely different perspective from the original, breathing new life into those songs.  Some of that is due to the arrangements, but much of the credit must go to duo's voices, which seem perfectly matched.

It's mostly a lullaby album (ages 0 through 5), but besides the parents, the 25-minute album will probably translate well to the toddlers' older siblings as a mellow-afternoon spin.  (You can listen to 90-second samples via the widget below.)

I expected to like A Little Love, but was surprised how much I ended up enjoying it.  It has nothing to do with the fact that they're covering songs of my musical childhood and everything to do with the fact that they're turning those songs into music of our collective childhood.  That, and the fact that I'm pretty sure I would buy an album of the duo singing anything, including the happy hour menu at TGI Friday's.  I actually have a lot of love for A Little Love.  Definitely recommended.

Itty-Bitty Review: Songs for Little Bean - Kori Pop

Lullaby albums aren't a dime a dozen, but hear enough of them, and their value does diminish rapidly.

And I've heard enough of them.

So I'm willing to admit that the novelty (meaning new-ness, not jokey) of Songs for Little Bean, the first kids album from Canadian artist Kori Pop, is part of the reason for its appeal.

But get past the sounds of Pop's ethereal voice multi-tracked and used as much as instruments and percussion, and the album still stands as a gentle mix of classic kids' songs, originals, and well-chosen covers.  Originally recorded as a gift for Pop's newborn godchild, it starts out with "Chim Chim Cheree" from Mary Poppins, a version which is even more wistful than the original. "Twinkle Little Star" extends that small classic into a two-minute version into a Andrews-Sisters-meets-naptime gem.  It's not entirely a lullaby album -- the final two songs, "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and the original "A is for Alphabet" could easily be on a non-lullaby album, but throughout the 25-minute run-time of the disk there's a feeling of calm.  You can stream samples and a few whole songs using the widget below; the only comparable album I can think of is the Innocence Mission's classic lullaby album Now the Day Is Over.

As with any (good) lullaby album, the primary age range of 0 through 4 years for Songs for Little Bean implies that adults won't enjoy it at all, which definitely isn't the case.  Kids could easily get used to falling to sleep it and parents will appreciate the times they get to rock or nurse their kids to this.  Hoping that Kori Pop is asked to be a godparent again in hopes that she records another album as a gift is wrong, I realize that.  But it would be nice to hear a sequel to this.  Definitely recommended.

Itty-Bitty Review: "World of Wonder" - Alison Faith Levy

San Francisco's Sippy Cups were one of the first new (21st-century) acts to attract a lot of attention in the wake of the kids music explosion of circa 2006.  They had a big, '60s-inspired sound and look (though they weren't limited by that era), and despite their large size, toured quite a bit.  The band is on hiatus - maybe permanently - but some of the members of the band are making music for kids again.

One of those members, Alison Faith Levy, has a new album, World of Wonder, which will please fans of the Sippies and their psychedelic sounds.  It's targeted more at the preschool demographic that the band had somewhat moved past by the time they went on hiatus, but the sounds are classic Sippy Cup.  The Wall-of-Sound production on "Itsy Bitsy Spider" drew the attention of Greil Marcus, but will still draw in the youngster set.  "Like a Spinning Top" is an energetic movement song that will sound just fine even if you're buckled into a car seat.  And I must admit to adoring the goofy "Baby Anteater" almost as much the song's narrator adores its subject.

Levy's powerful voice and Allen Clapp's production give the "big" songs the oomph they need while giving each song their own personality.  While the sounds and some of the songs (like the title track) may target older kids, the album's greatest appeal is to kids ages 2 through 6.  You can listen to some tracks here.

With World of Wonder, Alison Faith Levy gives her Sippy Cups fans -- and new ones -- a solid collection of songs that will definitely please preschoolers without being too cutesy for those preschoolers' older siblings.  I miss the Sippy Cups, but this will do quite nicely.  Recommended.

Review: WeBop: A Family Jazz Party! - Jazz at Lincoln Center (feat. Matt Wilson)

There was a point 4 or 5 years ago when I thought jazz would be the area of the next great kids music explosion. This most American of musical art forms had not been sufficiently explored by musicians focusing on families, and it seemed ripe for artists to fill the space.  And, yes, there were a number of good, even great, jazz albums for families.

And then, silence.

OK, that's an exaggeration.  Coal Train Railroad and Oran Etkin have both released albums that families with any jazz tendencies (and even those who don't) should check out.  But I expected more musicians to try their hand at this.  After all, jazz is -- or can be -- the most playful of musical forms, and what audience is -- or can be -- more playful than a bunch of under-10s?

Well, with the addition of the folks from WeBop, Jazz at Lincoln Center's (JALC's) early-childhood jazz education program, I'm hopeful that perhaps we're on the cusp of another kinder-jazz renaissance.  Their first album for families, WeBop: A Family Jazz Party!, is my favorite jazz-for-kids album since at least Putumayo's Jazz Playground disk from a couple years ago, and definitely my favorite non-compilation since the great Medeski, Martin & Wood album Let's Go Everywhere.

Some of my enthusiasm for this particular disk is rooted in my own personal jazz tastes, which are heavily weighted toward the classic jazz of pre-Bitches Brew Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Dizzy Gillespie.  (This isn't particularly surprising, I suppose, given the interests of JALC's Artistic Director Wynton Marsalis.)  And one of this album's greatest strengths is its celebration of that heritage.  Unlike a lot of the "introducing jazz to the kids" disks, which take traditional kids' standards (e.g., "Old MacDonald" or "Itsy Bitsy Spider") and put them in a jazz arrangement, many songs on this album take jazz standards and add (or tweak) a few kid-friendly lyrics.  Not every standard is modified -- the Duke Ellington classic "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)" speaks just fine to kids as-is -- but some of the adaptations are inspired (I particularly loved the re-purposing of Coltrane's "Syeeda's Song Flute" into "Syeeda's ABC," an alphabet song, natch).  And kudos for figuring out how to work free jazz pioneer Ornette Coleman into a kids' track ("Free Jazz Adventure").

Besides the traditionals and standards, there are also a handful of originals.  These songs tend to be a little more pedagogical in nature.  "Shakey Shake Shake," for example, encourages shaking of rhythm instruments and jumping around.  "Playin' Together," a song about, well, playing jazz (playing together, then taking solos) is buoyed by Adam Platt's nimble toy piano playing -- it's probably the first song featuring that instrument that I truly dig.  I don't think they're the equal of the standards, but that's kind of an unfair comparison.  As you'd expect considering the Lincoln Center parentage, the playing is top-notch, from drummer Matt Wilson, the album's music director, on down.  And the participation of kids on some of the tracks, such as on "What Kind of Food Do You Like To Eat?," their take on Dizzy Gillespie's "Salt Peanuts," just adds the right amount of childishness.

The 50-minute album is nominally targeted at kids ages 2 through 7, but its playfulness will appeal to jazz fans of all ages.  Listen to samples from the album and download a copy of their take on "When the Saints Go Marching In" at the album's page (you can also download an activity booklet).

I like WeBop: A Family Jazz Party a whole bunch.  It's joyful, playful, and full of life.  Even if you're not particularly into jazz -- maybe especially if you're not particularly into jazz -- it's an album your family should check out.  Let's hope this encourages some other jazz musicians to follow suit.  Highly recommended.

A Tasty Review: Four Kids Music Albums for Locavores

Delicious album coverYou don't need to have been locked up in a fast-food restaurant's storage closet for the past few years to know that eating food produced locally has become a Big Thing. Playing around in the dirt and growing fruits and vegetables with bright colors? No wonder that last year's Maria Sangiolo and Friends' album Planting Seeds was just the tip of the iceberg (not the lettuce) when it comes to the mico-genre of "Farmers Market Kindie." I'm not a huge fan of "lesson" music, but it's possible to strike a good balance between entertainment and education. Here are four recommended kids music albums whose musical benefits are as good as the lessons inside. (Note: several food metaphors follow. Tread cautiously.)

The first (and most diverse sonically) album is from Bay Area trio Orange Sherbet, who will release their first album in five years, Delicious, on May 15. The collection of mostly original tunes was inspired by band member Tamsen Fynn's experiences with the Local Foods Wheel, a tool for discovering local, seasonal food in the San Francisco Bay Area. The result of the album Fynn's made with bandmates Jill and Steve Pierce is a sound that's part playground chant, part lounge-jazz, and and a few other genres thrown in, too. (Yes, that is a Santana reference in the Latin guitar rock of "Rice & Beans.) And while sometimes albums that feature lots of different musical genres sound awkward in totality, the result here is much, much closer to the successful, eclectic mix of a Dan Zanes or Dog on Fleas album.  The album's most appropriate for kids ages 5 through 9; you can listen to 3 of the tracks here. (Sound intriguing? Check out the band's final Kickstarter campaign.) With Delicious it's likely you'll want seconds.

Groovin' in the Garden album coverNext on the grocery list is Groovin' in the Garden, from New York musician and storyteller Laurie McIntosh, aka Story Laurie. It's focuses much more on playing in the garden. So there are a fair number of traditional or well-known songs ("Shoofly Pie", "Five Little Monkeys", "Hokey Pokey") mixed into the originals from McIntosh. Her partner in crime for the album is New York state producer and musician Dean Jones from the aforementioned Dog on Fleas, who plays nineteen instruments, sings, and probably catered the recording sessions for all I know. It's a little more narrowly folk-focused than Delicious (and geared toward kids slightly younger, 3 through 7), but still features variety in its menu selections.

Grow album coverAndrew Queen represents Canada in this quartet of food-based albums with his latest album Grow. While the fine liner notes feature recipes and some songs -- "Macaroni and Cheese," the traditional "Fried Ham" -- fit very clearly into the food theme, others such as "The Witch's Brew" and "Worms" (no, it's not a paean to composting), seem to, er, strain the theme.  It shares the folk tradition with the other albums here, and musically, the use of instruments like fiddle, banjo, and a well-deployed tuba is reminiscent here.  (There's also a very communal sound to the vocals.)  Queen is more interested in telling stories in song than even Laurie, so if you're looking for something in that vein for kids ages 5 through 9 (and don't need a whole album of songs praising CSAs), this will fit the bill nicely.

Green & Growing album coverAnd for dessert, we have Shannon Wurst's Green & Growing. I've already praised the album packaging, but the songs inside are nice, too.  They are definitely on the preachier side of the food issue (with detours into energy-saving and recycling) -- so if you don't lessons mixed with your music, you're probably better off with the other albums (particularly the first two).  The object lessons aren't always dry, though -- the brief "Label Able Mable" is a tongue-twisting finger-picking ode while "Criss Cross Applesauce" is a soulful activity song.  (Plus, you have a dinosaur on "Recyclasaurus Rex Visit").  The album's best for kids ages 4 through 8, and you can listen to a few tracks here.  For a country-folk take on ecologically sound eating and living, Green & Growing will hit the sweet spot.