It's late, and thanks to a monsoon thunderstorm wreaking havoc with the internet connection, it's later than I wanted this to be, so I'll be brief...
First, I have two posts coming up early this week that I'm very excited about. One involves virtually no work on my part (no, that's not why I'm excited about it) and is a sequel of sorts to a prior post. The other involves quite a bit of work on my part and, well, I don't want to spoil it. Just don't miss it.
Second, I wanted to make sure I highlighted some stuff around the web I've been meaning to link to...
1. Reader Gwyneth has started a Kids in Atlanta website highlighting kids-related musical events in Atlanta. It's very thorough, and I think it's a great example of what people can do to make it easy for the public to find out about kids' musicians.
2. Reader Suzanne (I thiiiiink) Gwyneth also is now operating a "Live365" radio station entitled "Gooney Bird Radio" , playing some artists familiar to this website, along with the occasional foreign language and poetry.
3. Thanks to The Lovely Mrs. Davis, who mentioned this site to Christopher Noxon, author of Rejuvenile and its associated blog, and thanks to Noxon for noticing. (Go back to the old site, and you can find the reviews for Gwendolyn and the Good Time Gang and Captain Bogg and Salty, both of which draw mention in Noxon's book. They'll get posted here soon, too. Really.) You can read Mrs. Davis' review of the book here.
And finally, thanks to both Charity and the JAMband and Joe McDermott, who both linked here recently. McDermott, incidentally, just won the Children's section of the John Lennon Songwriting Contest for "Great Big World" (no, not the Hoodwinked version) and will have a new album coming out soon.
OK, and really finally, Milkshake and Rebecca Frezza videos for PBS Kids here.
There. That oughta hold ya. Come back soon, though, I promise it'll be worth it.
A Tale of Two Cities
Last weekend, New York was, er, deluged with rain, putting Brady Rymer's Jamboree with his band, Elizabeth Mitchell, and Hayes Greenfield at risk. Luckily, it sounds like it was one fabulous time.
Meanwhile, Charity and the JAMband played at the Getty Center in front of about 800 people, Charity reports. Apparently it was sunny, though that's par for the course in L.A....
Major Population Centers Have All The Luck...
This weekend...
New York? Brady Rymer's Family Jamboree on Sunday, with Brady Rymer, Elizabeth Mitchell, and Hayes Greenfield, on Long Island.
Los Angeles? Getty Concerts for Kids on Saturday and Sunday, with Charity and the JAMband, at the incredibly lovely Getty Center.
Chicago? Jammin' at the Zoo tonight, with Tally Hall, the Bad Examples, and They Might Be Giants at the very nice Lincoln Park Zoo. (Thanks, Clea, for the reminder!)
As for me, I'm doing our family's workday for the coop preschool. Wheelbarrows and shovels, whee!
Interview: Charity Kahn (Charity and the JAMband)
Our kids are a huge part of everything we do with the band. We took all the JAMband kids on tour (9 total) with us down to LA and they were exposed to all the pieces of what it means to have a band. There’s a Behind the Music series waiting to happen here. I’ll say no more.Charity Kahn, founder and leader of the Bay Area-based funk/soul/whatever kids' group Charity and the JAMband, is a mother, musician, and mathematician. Or, at least, she has a mathematics degree. Charity took the time recently to answer a few questions of mine with her typical enthusiasm. Read on to find out about obsession with a certain '80s hair-metal band, her band's newest song, and the relationship of math to her music. What music did you listen to growing up? My folks are classically trained, and ran a piano studio forever. They also directed choirs, musicals, taught music in schools, and my dad’s been a church organist since he was 13. So the early years were filled with classical and sacred music and opera, a little jazz, show tunes, and my mom’s favorite, Johnny Mathis. And, of course, Free to Be, You and Me, John Denver and the Muppets, and all of Hap Palmer’s stuff. Next came the Carpenters, Chicago, the Jackson 5, Manhattan Transfer, until I finally discovered classic rock’n’roll. Led Zeppelin took me over for a few years (hasn’t let go, actually). And living in a small Midwestern town water skiing on summer lakes and partying in the woods and cornfields, I also had a Def Leppard obsession (still do, actually). The Grateful Dead came into the picture some time during teen-age hood. I was also performing a lot of classical, jazz, and swing music at the time (vocal and ensemble), so I loved listening to that stuff, too. Was kids' music something you went into deliberately, or was it something you sort of stumbled into? ("Stumbled into" not meant pejoratively...)
Justin Roberts and Newfangled Technology
Justin Roberts might not be very adept at performing magic or telling jokes, but he is one heckuva songwriter. Thanks to the Land of Nod, you can hear the proof.
In a 15-minute (or so) podcast, Roberts inaugurates the "Land of Nod Nodcast Podcast" by crafting one catchy theme ditty, playing some of his stuff from Meltdown!, Not Naptime, and Great Big Sun, and displaying a very self-deprecating attitude. He even has a demo version of "Our Imaginary Rhino" for our amusement. (And, hey, if kids' music albums eventually get the expanded/remastered treatment now given to every album more than 10 years old, why shouldn't the stellar Meltdown! be at the top of the list in 2016?)
Not content with audio-only content? Devon at Head, Shoulders, Knees... found YouTube footage of Justin Roberts' "Airplane of Food" video.
Buck Howdy more your style? Fran at the About Kids' Music site has got you covered.
And if you're still just happy reading... The Lovely Mrs. Davis has a guest post from Charity Kahn (from Charity and the JAMBand).
Go forth, enjoy, then sit back and enjoy the cool pleasures of dancing or singing with your kids on a summer day (or night).
Review: Rock Your Socks Off - Charity and the JAMband
There must be a scientific study out there verifying what a lot of parents already know through personal experience -- your child's endurance when it comes to dancing outpaces yours. Sure, you go to the gym three times a week, but your kid, he's Lance Armstrong with the stereo on.
If this sounds at all familiar to you, then the third release from the Bay Area-based Charity and the JAMband, Rock Your Socks Off (2006), will come as a welcome relief to your legs, because it's filled with enough boogie-friendly music to tucker out even the most energetic of kids.
The album is filled with kid-friendly and self-empowering themes mixed with a (I wouldn't say it if weren't true) jam-band attitude and style. On the album's best songs, singer-songwriter Charity Kahn encourages kids to move to the music with a soulful voice and wordplay both direct and abstract. On the infectious "Happy Fluffy," lyrics such as "You're gonna jump around / Jump jump around / Jump around / Jump up and down" are matched to a bouncy melodic line that does its best to encourage actual jumping. Meanwhile, on the closest thing to an actual jam on the album, the leadoff track "Travellin'" includes a whole mess of bluesy nonsense wordplay ("car jam jeep jam double-decker bus jam / bug jam beetle jam chuckwagon van jam").
Musically, the 6-person JAMband itself has a great sound together, but with enough looseness to not feel too structured. Although it's mostly soulful and funky, the music takes some detours (the amusing "Towel Tango," for example). Some of the tracks are really motion oriented and may not sound all that appealing while stuck in traffic driving to soccer practice (I'm thinking here of "We Need Mud" and "Cake"). And two tracks just before the end ("Wish" and "Peace Dream") bring the dance party to an abrupt halt. After more than 30 minutes of dancing and movement, it's probably necessary, but these two tracks are really slow and lyrically serious and feel out-of-step with the rest of the album.
Lyrically, the album is probably most appropriate for kids age 4 through 8, although any kid stable enough to boogie will probably enjoy the rhythms and music here. You can listen to samples of the album at the CDBaby website for the album as well as watch a video for "Cake" at the Indie Food Channel.
The Grateful Dead and Phish have each gone their separate ways. But with Rock Your Socks Off, you could actually rediscover a little bit of the jam-band magic (even after you need to take a break collapsed on the living room floor from exhaustion). Recommended.
