i’m partial, as i’ve said, to tons of music by tons of people. i have even made a playlist of nonkid songs that my kids love (it’s on a service called rhapsody, but it should give you some free plays if you’re interested in hearing it.) but what do you do when your kid is clamoring for some kid-friendly music made specifically for kids?

in other words, how do you fight off barney?

increasingly, real live grownup musicians are gearing music toward kids. they might be giants, dan zanes (formerly of the del-fu-e-gos, as juliana hatfield once sang), mark mothersbaugh (formerly of devo), the list goes on and on. it’s not even bad, mostly. and because i like to hifive indy folks, i’ll give a big shout out to my childhood friend yosi, whose indie kids rock blog hasn’t been updated in awhile but who has some fun content on, well, doy, independent folks who make rock for kids.

trout fishing in america is pretty hysterical. there. i said it.

i keep hoping that i can find some jazz that my kids would like. anyone got any suggestions there?

i must say, music in kids cartoons is becoming increasingly sophisticated. i once swore, for example, that a special episode of blues clues sounded like a takeoff of the who’s tommy. and the international super spy show of the backyardigans was a smart takeoff on mid-1960s spy movies, down to the music. and, guilty pleasure alert:

i still adore my old disney favorite songs. when you wish upon a star will always be one of my favorite songs. ever.

so go ahead and call me a wuss or a traitor. i care not. but music for kids is improving. and i think it’s because we parents finally said no to complete pap, like they’ve had for years.

truth be told, it still won’t keep me from playing regular music for my kids. i still think that’s the best. music. ever. and i know that my kids will rebel one day. they’ll love crappy top 40, or the current crappy hip hop that doesn’t usually hold a candle to old skool, or — horrors — they’ll fall in love with modern country.

that, and they’ll announce that they’re conservative republicans. eek.

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band is not my favorite Beatles album. (yes, yes, yes. no one needs to be lectured about this groundbreaking, innovative, astounding album, least of all me. i didn’t say i didn’t like it. i just said it wasn’t my favorite.) but for kids, this colorful and bright album is chockablock full of sounds and sonic styles. i remember putting on headphones and being simply awed by every tiny bit of audio joy on this pup — and i wasn’t even on anything.

you’ve got straightforward rock and roll. you’ve got groovy psychedelics. you’ve got a mystical indian offering (which, admittedly, i skipped each and every time i played the album when i was young. i loathed that stuff back then.) you’ve got orchestral moments. in short, the only things missing from here are jazz and countrified offerings. and who cares whether lucy in the sky with diamonds is about acid or not: it’s a wonderful song to sing with kids, as is with a little help from my friends. ringo’s delivery of the latter charms me to this very day.

this is a great chance to teach kids about different styles AND different instruments. listen for the harpsichord (fixing a hole), the harmonium (for the benefit of mr. kite), the sitar (within you, without you), the sax (good morning, good morning).  the swirling sound at the end of for the benefit of mr kite is an audiophile’s delight. and of course, all the animal sounds in good morning, good morning will delight any preschooler. it’s all there and more.

the sleeve art is legendary — you really need to see the album size to appreciate it (sigh, i mourn the days of albums, if only because CDs have completely marginalized album cover art.) and if you’re really, really lucky to own a non-US album version (or possess it on rarities), you might even have the end bit that is inaudible to humans but which has been annoying dogs now for 40 years.

you have my father to thank for this one.

when i was a little girl, i loved to march around the living room to prokofiev’s march from the love for three oranges. the version we had was by an orchestra; my father has always loved symphonic music. in fact, i still remember when i was my father’s “date” to see the garden state philharmonic play. i couldn’t have been more than 6, and i felt so grown-up and thrilled to be seeing a real-live show. i couldn’t tell you what they played; but i just remember revelling in all the sound. (a far cry from when i was 9 and my parents took me to see the bolshoi ballet perform swan lake at the garden state arts center. i went home and promptly threw up. stomach upset or not a tchaikovsky fan? you make the call.)

but back to our friend prokofiev, a man who started out as a child prodigy, much like i did. (ha ha, just seeing whether anyone was still with me.) seriously, though, the kid wrote his first opera at age nine (so you moms out there who think your child is gifted need to seriously reassess whether junior is simply really good in math. or science. or reading. or in not picking his nose and eating it.) he ended up as an obnoxious and disliked enfant terrible in school (moms with supposedly gifted kids also take note: this could be your kid if you overinflate his/her ego.) fortunately, for him, his talent was real, so it didn’t matter whether he was maladjusted. all geniuses end up pretty screwed up.

it’s the price we pay 😉

anyway, you can read his thrilling history in many places, chockablock with crazy datapoints including the fact that he ended up dying the same day as stalin (which made his burial somewhat problematic.) but i’ll focus on the march. the opera itself is a nutty bit of Commedia Dell’Arte, fluffy stuff that matters little. but the march and the music? i think prokofiev figured that one out, as he threw together a suite for orchestras to play — no tenors needed, thankyouverymuch.

so put it on, and tell your child to imagine what’s happening in the music. march along with your kid. and hell, afterwards, break out some oranges.

many in my kids’ generation have no earthly idea that there’s a second half to the film the sound of music. there are no nazis, no escaping austria, no emigrating to america. all they know is that there is this crazy nanny, played by julie andrews, who runs around singing and making the kids wear curtains. and then, mom or dad pauses the DVD, just before the creepiness sets in.

in fact, there are drag versions of TSOM, there are participatory versions a la rocky horror picture show, the muppets have done it, gwen stefani has sampled it, i suspect someone somewhere has put on an all-dog version. no matter. it’s the music that really makes this a great pick for kids. and besides, there are a zillion cultural references inside this gem. don’t keep the joy of running onto a great, green mountain meadow to yourself.

so save yourself the angst. skip the DVD and go borrow the soundtrack — julie andrews is still my fave as maria, though others have done well with the part — and start singing doe a deer, my favorite things, hell, my kids love my version of the lonely goatherd.

better they should hear that last one from you and not from gwen stefani.

people love motown, and i do, too. but there is nothing, and i mean nothing, better, to get yo’ ass out of yo’ comfy chair and dance than music from stax’s classic era. of course, i am wildly partial to this song — probably my theme song in life. but there are a bajillion more where that came from.

one thing i always loved about vintage stax is the fact that you have people — black people, white people — people from all walks of life who worked together to produce an amazing sound. at a time when civil rights was a dicey concept, you had a bunch of people who said no to racism and yes to music. integrated bands in a time when it was sometimes dangerous to even contemplate that idea. and that, my friends, is one of the greatest powers of music — it lets us rise above all our pettiness and brings us to another place.

it’s a wonderful teachable lesson for children. but even when you get past that– it’s got an amazing groove. you can dance to it. you will.

green onions. try a little tenderness (cos young girls do get woolly.) hold on’ i’m comin’. candy. respect yourself. you can even listen to the blues brothers to get a feel for the perhaps the biggest stax fans ever, john belushi and dan akroyd. and listen to duck dunn and steve cropper and the memphis horns. i can’t even begin to list all the songs i love that came out of that place.

so, in sum: fantastic music. great teachable lesson about why racism is a stupid idea. throw a dance party in your living room.