Artist: Liz, Holly & the Jolly Lollies
Album: Wishin' Volume 1
Age Range: 2 through 5
Description: Based in the Charlotte area, Liz Seegers and Holly Lorette are early childhood music teachers, so it's little surprise that their debut EP stays safely in that preschool age range. Songs about transportation ("I Wish I Were an Airplane"), feeling OK when things go bad ("We All Have Bad Days"), a "Freeze!" song ("Wiggle Freeze") -- these are familiar topics for albums for this age range.
But there's something about this album that elevates it above a lot of the music I hear for this age range. Maybe it's the slightly handmade sound, so it's not overproduced. Maybe it's Seegers' and Lorette's voices, which are sweet but slightly nasally and sound lovely in harmony. Maybe it's the fact that they offer up "Storm," which is more tone poem than song. Maybe -- probably -- it's all three of those things. Whatever, it just works.
You can listen to clips and one full song from the 16-minute album (hey, I said it was an EP!) here. The duo is currently raising money via Kickstarter for Volume 2. Based on the evidence from Volume 1, I'm looking forward to hearing more. Recommended.
Note: I received a copy of the album for possible review.
