... or, in more search-friendly terms, writing about music -- ie, blogs -- by kids musicians. I know that
Warren covered this last week, but I've had this on my to-do list for awhile, so I'm going to press forward with a highlighting of another wave of kids musicians turning their thoughts to the blogosphere. Some have a lot to do with the kids music genre, some very little. But I'm guessing at least one of 'em will be of interest to most of you and/or your RSS reader...
-- Ann Torralba, best known as
Little Miss Ann, is trying her hand writing about kids music at
littleshouldersmusic, focusing in particular about music in the Chicago area where Ann lives.
--
Bill Harley has long been one of the most talented wordsmiths in the kids music field, so I'm glad to see that he's started a
blog. He tells his stories very well, and anyone interested about the arts and school culture generally will find this of value.
-- Robert Burke Warren had a long career making music for adults before starting to make music for kids as
Uncle Rock. Now he's got a
blog in which he's every bit as thoughtful on paper as he is in person.
-- Debbie Cavalier records music for kids under the moniker
Debbie and Friends but her day job (OK, other day job) is Dean of Continuing Education at Berklee College, so, uh, yeah, she knows something about music education. She has not one, but two blogs. One, on
Music, Education and Technology, is geared more toward Berklee's students, but occasionally deals with stuff of interest to a broader audience, while the other,
Kid's Music Matters, is a pretty good example of an artist blog, mixing self-promotional stuff with more behind-the-scenes stuff.
I didn't get to this earlier, but Little Miss Ann's Land of Nod Nodcast Podcast is a fun little listen, featuring some of Ann's best songs from her albums Clap For Love and Music For Tots. Besides some trivia regarding Ann's hometown, Chicago, I also found out that offering cupcakes and fruit tarts as prizes in trivia contests seems to work very well. A tip for aspiring kids musicians out there...
With experience singing in Old Town School of Folk Music Wiggleworms classes, Chicago-based Ann Torralba would seem a logical choice for recording a CD targeted at the preschool set. And sure enough her debut kids' CD as "Little Miss Ann," Music For Tots, is geared for exactly those kids. A folk-poppy blend of traditional kids' songs, covers, and originals, the 22-minute disk is notable for its arrangements, which take out-of-the-ordinary approaches to familiar songs. Sometimes these arrangements sound great, such as on "You Are My Sunshine," which is given a different melody and jazzy percussion background, or "Pirate Ship," which employs a tin whistle to fun effect. Other tracks' arrangements aren't as endearing (the rhythm on the Pete Seeger-inspired "Edamame" was just, well, too angular, for example), but Torralba gets points for at least trying something different. (And I particularly enjoyed the Torralba originals.)
The disk is appropriate for kids ages 1 through 5. You can hear samples of all the tracks (and purchase the CD) 
