Fids and Kamily Awards -- the Best Kids Music of the Year -- Announced for 2019

Last month, the 14th edition of the Fids and Kamily Music Awards were announced. The annual survey of kids music writers, programmers, librarians, and other enthusiasts from across the country produced a list of their favorite kids music albums of the year (late 2018 through most of 2019) — a dozen ranked winners plus another 13 honorable mentions, a full 25 honorees. The winner in this year’s awards was the excellent don’t-call-it-a-holiday-album Winterland by The Okee Dokee Brothers, but you should go check out the entire list of recognized albums.

For what it’s worth, here’s my own personal ballot for this year’s F&K Awards. They’re not ranked because I gave them all equal weight in my ballot for this year’s awards. So, in alphabetical order by band:

Alegria - Sonia de los Santos

Finding Friends Far From Home - Oran Etkin

I’m from the Sun - Gustafer Yellowgold

Baby on the Subway - Camille Harris

Shake It and Break It - Randy Kaplan

Growing Up - Josh Lovelace

Buenos Diaz - The Lucky Band

Winterland - The Okee Dokee Brothers

A Cheerful Little Earful - Diana Panton

Backstroke Raptor - Story Pirates

This year’s process was bittersweet for me as F&K co-founder Bill Childs and I decided that this year’s awards would be the last. We wrote up our thoughts in this post, but the TL;DR is basically that kids and families aren’t listening to albums as much as they’re listening to streams these days, and there aren’t nearly as many people writing about albums, either. (It’s been awhile since this here website has tackled an album review, to provide a very pertinent example.) Bill and I have been clear that there will be no more Fids & Kamily Awards (though the website will live on for many years), but we are both hopeful that there will be something that replaces F&K in some way — we are both ready to participate in whatever might take its place.

I look at my list above and while I think it’s a solid list of ten excellent albums, I also see how I could’ve listed different albums who brought joy in other ways. And so I always enjoyed F&K because while it was based on people’s personal lists of favorites — personal lists that certainly were affected by each judge’s personal experience and tastes — by combining those lists, I thought it more closely arrived at something like a consensus. I don’t know if the idea of consensus is worth pursuing anymore, but for more than a decade, I hope the awards shined more light than there otherwise would be on albums popular and insufficiently noticed.

Listen To This: "I'm an Optimist" - Dog on Fleas (World Premiere!)

Album cover for Dog on Fleas’ “I’m an Optimist”

One way I think about the New York band Dog on Fleas is as kindie comfort food with a twist — japaleno mac ‘n’ cheese, perhaps, or an orange chicken burrito. Kindie music uberproducer Dean Jones and bandmates John Hughes and Chris Cullo produce music that families want to settle down with all comfy-like but with a musical (or lyrical) perspective that’s ever-so-slightly askew from the standard.

Dog on Fleas have a brand new album titled I’m an Optimist coming out on November 8th. (That’s the cover art to the side, done by Cindy Hoose in collaboration with Jacinta Bunnell and Michael Wilcock.) A dozen tracks of Fleas goodness/weirdness. (Check out the video for “Doppelgänger” for an excellent example of “goodness/weirdness,” more so on the lyrical side of the equation.)

I am super-happy, then, to offer you the world-premiere stream of the title track, “I’m an Optimist.” The song is about leaning towards thinking about positive things, but if you think it’s going to be a sappy message song, you’d be wrong. The music takes the lead, a horn-filled R&B track that is really hard not to smile and bop along with. Let’s just say that when the (light) message kicks in, the brain is in a very receptive mode to hear that message. The family’ll enjoy this one.

Dog on Fleas - “I’m an Optimist” [Soundcloud]

Listen To This: "Can't Wait" - Gustafer Yellowgold (World Premiere!)

Gustafer Yellowgold - The Minnesota Chronicles album cover

Let’s hear it for new music from Gustafer Yellowgold! Yes, it’s true, Morgan Taylor and one of kids music’s most indelible characters, Gustafer Yellowgold, is back with more audio earworms for your family’s listening pleasure with tomorrow’s release of The Minnesota Chronicles. It’s the second audiobook Taylor’s created for Audible — this story features Gustafer on earth trying to cure his “ultra-rare case of Ice-Cream-Cone-Heart,” but the heart of Gustafer for me, anyway, will always be the songs, as Taylor is particularly skillful at providing brief character sketches and occasionally surreal images wrapped in melodies inspired by the Beatles and ‘70s AM rock radio.

The first track is “Can’t Wait" has a particularly Beatles-y sound to my ears, and will sound familiar to longtime Gustafer fans and instantly appealing to those who haven’t discovered him yet. I’m pleased as punch to premiere the track here.

If you want to learn more about the audiobook, take a look at this YouTube teaser. (An artist originally known for his animated music videos creates audiobooks, which is then promoted via YouTube… we live in weird times.) And luckily, even if you “Can’t Wait” to hear the whole thing — you don’t really need to — the audiobook is out tomorrow.

Who knew that a visit to Minnesota would be even stranger than life on the Sun? Our tale begins where I'm from the Sun: The Gustafer Yellowgold Story leaves off. Emboldened from a putterbike race victory against his arch-nemesis, young sunling Gustafer Yellowgold heads to Earth to cure his ultra-rare case of Ice-Cream-Cone-Heart.

Listen To This: "Kutapira" - Oran Etkin (feat. Musekiwa Chingodza) (World Premiere!)

Album cover to Oran Etkin’s Finding Friends Far From Home: A Journey with Clara Net

The clarinetist Oran Etkin is well-traveled. Sure, he’s based in New York City, but his concert schedule takes him literally all over the world. He plays concerts for adults, while also making music for families, both through his early music education program Timbalooloo as well as through concerts in the U.S. and abroad.

His forthcoming album Finding Friends Far From Home: A Journey with Clara Net is the fruit of many of these travels, featuring collaborations with musicians from Zimbabwe, China, the Czech Republic, and Turkey. Sure, the structure of the album, in which Etkin’s friend “Clara Net” (go ahead — I think you can guess what instrument plays that role) meets children in the various countries, is intended to serve as an introduction to young listeners. But such an overlay means very little if the music itself isn’t fun and well-played.

Oran Etkin holding his clarinet. Photo by John Abbott

I guarantee that “Kutapira,” the track below, will get your day going right. It features Musekiwa Chingodza, a Zimbabwean Gwenyambira, or spiritual master of the mbira (thumb piano). Chingodza and Etkin (on the clarinet, of course) are joined by the girls choir of the Zimbabwe College of Music, Sam Mataure on drums, and Etkin’s bassist Marcos Varela.

What does “Kutapira” mean? Well, you can listen to this introductory track featuring Etkin and another mbira player, Irene Chingamba, who introduced Etkin to many of Zimbabwe’s mbira masters. But regardless of whether you listen to the intro track or not, I’m sure you'll agree that “Kutapira” is pretty sweet.

Finding Friends Far From Home: A Journey with Clara Net is out on August 30th, but is available on many digital streaming sites for “pre-order” today. (You can listen to “Kutapira” on Spotify right now.) Thanks to Etkin for letting me world-premiere the track!

Oran Etkin - “Kutapira” (feat. Musekiwa Chingodza) [Soundcloud]

Photo credit: John Abbott

Listen To This: "Halo-Halo" - Mista Cookie Jar feat. Little Miss Ann (World Premiere!)

Cover to “Halo-Halo” single by Mista Cookie Jar and Little Miss Ann

I am new to the world of Filipino ice cream, but I had some Magnolia guava ice cream a few months back and was so wowed that I threw in a gratuitous reference to halo-halo, a Filipino ice cream treat that’s like an ice cream sundae with ALL the toppings, into a post featuring a song by Mista Cookie Jar and Secret Agent 23 Skidoo.

Fast forward 6 months, Trader Joe’s briefly had some awesome ube ice cream in their stores, and so it feels appropriate that Mista Cookie Jar is back, teaming up with Little Miss Ann to give the world an entire song about halo-halo, the dessert treat commonly served with a scoop of ube ice cream on top.

A serving of halo-halo

Both artists have Filipino ancestry, and in talking about the song, they both mentioned excitement about being able to share the treat with their families as restaurants like Jollibee and more locally-based places make inroads into America.

Most tracks featuring Mista Cookie Jar don’t bother limiting themselves with one genre, and this track, written by both artists, has a gentle folk vibe with some hip-hop swirled into the mix. In its mellow, mixed-up way, it’s a little scoop of halo-halo for the ears. I’m super glad to be world-premiering the track here today. It’s available in all the places you get your digital music, including via the link below.

Little Miss Ann and Mista Cookie Jar - “Halo-Halo” [Bandcamp]

Video: "Under the Big Umbrella" - Brady Rymer and the Little Band That Could

Brady Rymer - Under the Big Umbrella cover art

We are in the midst of spring (or, if you’re in the desert Southwest, rapidly approaching summer), which means that it’s time for a sunnier attitude.

And as I think about kids’ musicians, Brady Rymer is right near the top of the list of those with sunnier attitudes. On May 17th, Rymer and his Little Band That Could release his tenth (!) studio album, Under the Big Umbrella.

Now, you might be thinking that I’ve failed in my narrative approach — “sunny” and “umbrella” being a more unusual pairing of words — but the album title track definitely takes more of a metaphorical than a meteorological view of the phrase. (If there were a camping-themed song here, it’d be titled “Big Tent" to be sure.) The whole album’s musical and lyrical approach will sound familiar to Rymer’s fans — roots-pop originals with an expansive sound and lyrics that welcome all. (These songs in particular were inspired by Rymer’s request for kids at a New Jersey elementary school for what was meaningful to them.) It’s a sunny set of tracks, hopeful in many ways.

We’re happy to be premiering the brand new video for “Under the Big Umbrella.” It’s a simple lyric video, but since it features the charming illustrations and hand-letterings of illustrator Emily Balsley, who did that cover art up there, that’s A-OK by me. (Go here for links to your favorite non-video way to listen to the track.)

Brady Rymer and the Little Band That Could - “Under the Big Umbrella” [YouTube]

Brady Rymer and the Little Band That Could - photo by Jayme Thornton

Photo credit: Jayme Thornton