You don't often get a second chance to make a first impression, the cliche goes, and that's especially true in children's music. A cheesy song is enough to make the parent quickly hit the eject button lest the children get too attached to music that drives the parent absolutely nuts; a poor album cover will doom the CD before it even reaches the player. So it was with Uncle Rock's 2nd CD, Plays Well With Others (2006), released a couple weeks ago. Uncle Rock? Just the name made me a little dubious. The logo? Designed by a child (the artist's son, as it turns out). And the opening song? Starts with the shouted phrase "Are you ready?" I was thisclose to hitting eject and never looking at the CD again, let alone listening to it.
And then within the space of about one minute, I was interested. The opening track, a general dancing around song, has a nice groove and includes the lyric "I'm gonna shake my head like the head of a mop." OK, you've got me back -- I'll stick around. Uncle Rock, as it turns out, is New York State-based Robert Burke Warren, who's played with both Wanda Jackson and RuPaul, among others. (I feel fairly certain that puts him in fairly small company.) Joined by a bunch of musicians on various tracks, he brings a loose roots-rock attitude to the CD, giving it a nice, organic feel. (The production is a lot better than the 4-track home recordings on his debut album.) The best cuts are those that are more fully realized instrumentally and lyrically. "Picnic in the Graveyard," for example, is a great kids' song about... er... death. Well, not exactly, but it's about Dia de los Muertos, a day of celebration where people have a picnic in the graveyard. "We're gonna sit in the grass / With people from the past / And we will not be afraid," goes the lyrics. It's got a great chorus backed by a horn section. The amusing "Gettin' Big Blues" is a bluesy number about how difficult it can be for kids to grow older ("I once had a T-shirt / the coolest thing around / but since I can't get it over my head / It's gonna be a hand-me-down" ... "I once had attention / I was an only child / But now there's a baby in the house / So I'm going wild... Pick me up / 'Cause I don't wanna walk") It works for both kids and their parents. The kids on the album generally add, instead of detract, from the mix.
Some songs ("Playin' Possum, "Shoe Bandit," "I'm a Pirate") don't work as well for me, they seem a little cheesy. But I give Warren credit for trying different things. He turns in a nice medley of "Magic Carpet Ride/Hey Bo Diddley/Magic Bus." And while the album's best cuts are the midtempo rockers, the closing ballad "Connected" is a sweet song.
The CD is most appropriate for kids age 3 through 8. You can hear clips of a few songs at Uncle Rock's MySpace page, though only one song, "Sugar Talkin'," is off the new CD. (Robert, update that page, pronto!) You can also hear samples at the album's CDBaby page.
Warren has made big strides in this, his second album. Teaches me to judge a book by its cover. He's got a little bit of Ralph's World and a lot more of Brady Rymer in him. Plays Well With Others is an album with some great cuts of kid-friendly roots-rock. Recommended.Review: Plays Well With Others - Uncle Rock
You don't often get a second chance to make a first impression, the cliche goes, and that's especially true in children's music. A cheesy song is enough to make the parent quickly hit the eject button lest the children get too attached to music that drives the parent absolutely nuts; a poor album cover will doom the CD before it even reaches the player. So it was with Uncle Rock's 2nd CD, Plays Well With Others (2006), released a couple weeks ago. Uncle Rock? Just the name made me a little dubious. The logo? Designed by a child (the artist's son, as it turns out). And the opening song? Starts with the shouted phrase "Are you ready?" I was thisclose to hitting eject and never looking at the CD again, let alone listening to it.
And then within the space of about one minute, I was interested. The opening track, a general dancing around song, has a nice groove and includes the lyric "I'm gonna shake my head like the head of a mop." OK, you've got me back -- I'll stick around. Uncle Rock, as it turns out, is New York State-based Robert Burke Warren, who's played with both Wanda Jackson and RuPaul, among others. (I feel fairly certain that puts him in fairly small company.) Joined by a bunch of musicians on various tracks, he brings a loose roots-rock attitude to the CD, giving it a nice, organic feel. (The production is a lot better than the 4-track home recordings on his debut album.) The best cuts are those that are more fully realized instrumentally and lyrically. "Picnic in the Graveyard," for example, is a great kids' song about... er... death. Well, not exactly, but it's about Dia de los Muertos, a day of celebration where people have a picnic in the graveyard. "We're gonna sit in the grass / With people from the past / And we will not be afraid," goes the lyrics. It's got a great chorus backed by a horn section. The amusing "Gettin' Big Blues" is a bluesy number about how difficult it can be for kids to grow older ("I once had a T-shirt / the coolest thing around / but since I can't get it over my head / It's gonna be a hand-me-down" ... "I once had attention / I was an only child / But now there's a baby in the house / So I'm going wild... Pick me up / 'Cause I don't wanna walk") It works for both kids and their parents. The kids on the album generally add, instead of detract, from the mix.
Some songs ("Playin' Possum, "Shoe Bandit," "I'm a Pirate") don't work as well for me, they seem a little cheesy. But I give Warren credit for trying different things. He turns in a nice medley of "Magic Carpet Ride/Hey Bo Diddley/Magic Bus." And while the album's best cuts are the midtempo rockers, the closing ballad "Connected" is a sweet song.
The CD is most appropriate for kids age 3 through 8. You can hear clips of a few songs at Uncle Rock's MySpace page, though only one song, "Sugar Talkin'," is off the new CD. (Robert, update that page, pronto!) You can also hear samples at the album's CDBaby page.
Warren has made big strides in this, his second album. Teaches me to judge a book by its cover. He's got a little bit of Ralph's World and a lot more of Brady Rymer in him. Plays Well With Others is an album with some great cuts of kid-friendly roots-rock. Recommended.
Unfortunately for New York band 
We really have Meg Ryan and the diner scene to thank for this. Jazz musician and erstwhile Broadway star Harry Connick, Jr. got his big break when he was asked to record the soundtrack to the movie When Harry Met Sally. The soundtrack was good, but the massive success of the movie was what pushed Connick into the national consciousness. More than ten years later, Connick repaid the favor -- sort of -- with his 2001 album Songs I Heard, on which he reworked Broadway and film showtunes. It's not a traditional kids' album, but when said tunes come from beloved sources such as Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music, and Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, there's clearly a kids' music theme to the album. The best tracks are those where Connick lets loose his band and really swings. The opening cut, "Supercalifragilisticexpiadlidocious," is well, that word, on which Connick, Jr., backed by a New Orleans brass band, almost makes us forget Dick Van Dyke. (Connick's voice is smooth as always.) Other uptempo tracks such as "The Lonely Goatherd" and Dixieland stylings on "Spoonful of Sugar" also benefit from Connick's big band and his traditional jazz arrangements. They're definitely a new, jazzier version of the original, but they're not so different from the original that kids won't enjoy them. Less successful are the slower tracks -- I can't see kids recognizing "Maybe" (from the musical Annie) or enjoying the string-backed version here. On the whole, Songs I Heard is a playful album. It's probably too long with some songs too obscure for kids to enjoy the whole thing at one sitting but parents wanting to discover some new showtunes or hear new spins of classics may find this worthwhile and "have what she's having."
Why are there not more great jazz albums for kids? You have wonderful melodies infinitely adaptable to the improvisational technique that is one of jazz's trademarks, and yet the number of really good jazz albums geared for kids is small. Hayes Greenfield's 2002 release, Jazz-A-Ma-Tazz, is one of those few albums, great for introducing kids to jazz.
The vocals, unsurprisingly for an album of renditions of kids' songs, are front and center. Miles Griffith turns in a broad variety of vocal approaches and his often gravelly voice contrasts nicely with the sweet voices of Lisa Michel and Charenee Wade. Richie Havens also lends his resonant voice to two tracks, "Grandfather's Clock" and "Oh Susanna."
The album utilizes a broad range of jazz styles, from the gospel wrap-up to "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" to the scat stylings on "Skip To My Lou" to the more contemporary jazz sounds of "This Old Man." Greenfield has also indicated -- and here's where my surface-deep jazz knowledge recognizes the names but not the particular albums -- that on "Grandfather’s Clock" they employ Latin swing (like John Coltrane's arrangement of "A Night Has A Thousand Eyes"), on "Old MacDonald" they use Thelonious Monk’s harmonic progression from his tune "Bemsha Swing", and on "Animal Fair" they superimposed Coltrane's classic "Giant Steps" harmonic motion. (Note: I have "Giant Steps" and I didn't recognize it, which says everything about me and nothing about Greenfield's skill here.)
What makes this album such a great introduction is the combination of vocals that are both skillful as well as engaging for kids (some tracks feature kids, but only as accompaniment) with instrumentals that are so often missing on kids-focused jazz CDs. Most tracks feature an instrumental break, with Greenfield's saxophone work taking the lead on the solos. The rest of his band swing solidly, too, making the whole 47-minute disc a pleasure to listen to.
It's really hard to put an age range on this disk, because I think most of the album works for adults just as well as for kids (with the possible exception of some of the vocal tracks where Griffith's voice is perhaps too cartoony), but I'll shoot for ages 2 through 12. You can see video clips and learn more about the project at the 
With its stylized cover photo of San Francisco, little about the packaging of George Winston's 1996 album Linus & Lucy: The Music of Vince Guaraldi suggests "kids music." Indeed, we had this in our own family long before we had any idea what a Baby Bjorn was, let alone struggled to make those snaps, well, snap. But through his scores for 15 Peanuts television specials and one movie, Guaraldi's music may be more familiar to Americans old and (especially) young than that of just about any jazz composer. So it's with the nostalgic thoughts of repeated viewings A Charlie Brown Christmas that many adults may be tempted to get this album, both for themselves and for their kids. Winston, a pianist better known for his New Age(ish) soundscapes and lesser known for his affinity for Hawaiian slack key guitar, plays things pretty straight here. His renditions of two familiar cuts from the Christmas score, "Skating" and "Linus and Lucy," sound much like the original recordings, with only a little flourish at the end of "Linus and Lucy" to distinguish itself from the original. Guaraldi was often backed by his own Vince Guaraldi Trio, so Winston's solo piano does have to do a little bit more work than Guaraldi's original piano work did with other musicians. Other highlights include Winston's rendition of Guaraldi's hit "Cast Your Fate to the Wind" (again, not so different from the original) and the brief "Bon Voyage," but there really aren't bad tracks. One of the main reasons to get this album is the broad net Winston casts across Guaraldi's work, both Peanuts-related and not -- sadly, it might just be the best Greatest Hits album out there for Guaraldi. Whether or not the kids will be interested in this album is another question entirely; this is probably one of those CDs the parents will play much more for themselves than for their kids. Which isn't a bad thing, either.
With its Giselle Potter-illustrated cover, the inattentive adult might be fooled into thinking that this is another Ralph's World CD. Clearly, Verve put some thought into how to market this compilation. But with Lionel Hampton, Oscar Peterson, and Ella Fitzgerald (twice!) among those heard on the disk, somebody also put at least a little thought into the music itself. The 11-track, 28-minute album is a nicely sequenced mix of jazzy renditions of children's standards (Ella's versions of "Old McDonald" and "The Muffin Man"), silly novelties (Louis Prima's "Yes! We Have No Bananas"), and other kid-friendly songs. While the presence of Hampton, Peterson, and Fitzgerald are nice, for a person like myself whose jazz knowledge is about a quarter-mile wide and a foot deep, the Louis Jordan, Blossom Dearie, and Carmen McRae tracks are pleasant discoveries. (And while Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" doesn't really fit the swinging attitude of the rest of the tracks, it's a great cut, so we'll let it slide.) If I had any qualms with the disk it would be: a) I wish a disk entitled "Jazz for Kids" would have more than one semi-instrumental track (Peterson's boppy "Mumbles"), and b) I wish the disk's liner notes would've been seriously upgraded, giving more than just each track's title, artist, and release date. But as a whole, this is a pleasant collection of vocal jazz tracks from the mid-20th century and should please even those proclaiming to be allergic to jazz. Recommended.
