Best Kids Music 2011: Top 25 Albums
The high point in my list of the best kids music of 2011 is this, my list of my favorite kids music albums of the year.
By "year," again, I mean albums with Nov. 1, 2010 through Oct. 31, 2011 release dates available to the general public. That means albums like Laura Veirs' Tumble Bee, with a Nov. 8, 2011 release date, have to wait another 12 months before appearing in this list. (I would be shocked -- albeit incredibly delighted -- if there were 25 albums better than that particular one in the next year.)
I do use the word "favorite" advisedly. I receive something approaching 300 family music albums every year. I review maybe 20% of those. Last year I picked out 20 albums, and cutting off this list this year at 20 just seemed cruel. But, as it turns out, increasing the number on the list to 25 didn't make things any easier. Albums from folks like Laura Doherty, Chip Taylor, Todd McHatton, and ScribbleMonster -- albums I genuinely liked -- didn't make the list. That's what happens when albums in the top 10% of everything I heard this year can't fit into the number of slots available; I had probably about 40 albums I was seriously considering for this list. So the difference between what goes in this list and what stays off is as much about personal preferences as it is about "objective" quality. (That's why I came up with the idea for Fids and Kamily, thinking that the personal preferences of many folks would be a much better approximation of "best.")
In any case, here are those 25 albums, ranked from most favorite to a little less most favorite, that I (and we) most appreciated this year. (As always, the top 10 reflects my Fids and Kamily ballot.)
1. Caspar Babypants
Sing Along!
[Review]
"I really, really like Sing Along! -- the Caspar Babypants disks have been favorites at our house for a long time, and I see no reason why this new album won't join its predecessors in heavy rotation. If he can keep it up, Chris Ballew might just create a body of work for preschoolers to rival Raffi's."
It is not terribly surprising that I would lead off this list -- the "most goofy" -- with an album from 
Nothing like news of a 
In addition to the EP, Zanes is also putting on a 
I've already reviewed 
I 
When I first heard about 
It's been a couple weeks now, but I didn't want to forget to mention the show 
While I say there isn't much that Zanes can do to surprise me in concert, his long-standing tradition of bringing in local talent to perform with him at his shows, is still one of them. As it turns out, I saw a neighbor there who mentioned that the daughter of one her friends would be performing with Zanes. Sure enough, six songs in, a young girl strode out onstage and played "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" with the band.
The 
I know that people sometimes criticize the Grammys for being not quite attuned to the "real world," especially in the genre categories, but most readers of this site would probably look at this year's 
One of the goals I have for the year is try to expand the reach of family music (at least my sliver of it) into the broader world. I know that everyone is trying to do the same, but I really believe that we can let our freak flags fly a little bit louder, right?
Oh, that Smithsonian Folkways label. Folk music from around the world, but they've totally gone 21st century. Yep, that's right, they have a 
Excellent, even. That's a festival lineup for you: 
No, not the entire album, 
OK, I'm overstating it, but there's no question that 
I've had a 
I 
Earlier this week I noted that the 
However you feel about 
If you've been reading your 
Photo credit: faithdesired
I admit it. I'm old. Not, like, Social Security old, but old enough that if I use the phrase "OMG" I mean it ironically. I am old enough, however, to have a kid who, though she isn't quite out of the "kids music" phase yet, will start listening to music I haven't introduced her to.
Imagine if Kanye West decided his next album would be a bluegrass album. Or if Metallica felt they had a polka album in them. How would their fans react? How would the bluegrass or polka purists react? Most importantly, would the music be any good?
I feel compelled to jot down a few words about the 
With 
Two is better than one. Or, in this particular case, fifty-one is better than two.
Compilations are notoriously hard things to compile. Any fool can put together a CD of good or popular songs, but their appeal as a single entity often fades after time. (Really, who listens to those Now! CDs, like, six months later?) The key is finding some loosely unifying theme or spirit to guide the collection.
You might think 
The books themselves are OK -- Saaf's drawings are fun and filled with fun details, but he's illustrating the title tracks' song lyrics which don't, in and of themselves, have much of a plot. They're nice to look at, but not the most compelling books by themselves. The books also have notes, chords, lyrics, and liner notes for each of the songs on the EP, to help the readers who want to play the songs on their own.
I begin here by noting my tremendous affinity for Chicago's 
There are two basic approaches to putting together a genre-specific compilation of music, approaches which for brevity's and wit's sake, I call 
