Tag Archives: music for kids

Arts & Entertainment, Music, Theatre

The Not-Its are the Hot It Kindiependent Band

James Callan has written with The SunBreak crew for approximately a billion years. We proudly present his latest dispatch from the parental front.

Before I actually had a kid, “kids’ music” to me meant Raffi. And I didn’t really know what Raffi sounded like, but I knew what I thought he sounded like: a slightly hipper Barney.

The thing about Raffi: So ’90s! Kids’ music has come a long way, baby. It’s not necessarily better (please Raffi don’t hurt me), but now, kids in tow, I’ve figured out that there’s a big, vibrant kids’ music scene out there. My choices go beyond Raffi, vintage Sesame Street albums, or the growing list in my own iTunes collection of vetted non-potty-mouth songs. In short: There’s good music out there for kids.

Seattle’s a vital center–which makes sense once you figure out that all those young people who were making music here in the ’90s are still here and still making music and have very possibly had kids themselves. We’re home to the Kindiependent scene, independent bands who play kids’ music, and a focused collective that’s been
generous with local concerts.

Their latest toddlapalooza is Big Top Rock, a genius collaboration with Teatro Zinzanni that combines ever-hip circus fun with kick-bottom kids’ bands. This weekend marks the third and final concert, featuring The Board of Education opening for The Not-Its.

Kindiependent bills The Not-Its* as “your child’s first rock band,” and it’s a great description. They’re the loudest, hardest rocking band in the Kindiependent collective. If their pink and black and white color scheme didn’t call the White Stripes to mind, their really noisy sound might do it anyway. They’re the Rolling Stones compared to the Beatles that are Recess Monkey or Caspar Babypants. (I’d pander to my generation and make a Nirvana vs. Pearl Jam comparison, but that has overtones of authenticity vs. sellout that don’t belong in the Kindiependent sandbox.)

The Not-Its are so noisy, in fact, that I wondered if my delicate flower of a daughter would enjoy them. Would they be, heaven forbid, too darn loud for kids today?

Turns out that, as usual, I’m useless at predicting my daughter’s tastes. She loved them. (Turns out kids like noise.) We’ve seen them in concert twice, and she’s super excited about going again on Saturday.

The rock attitude, in fact, dovetails nicely for kids’ music. Rock ‘n’ roll long ago shed most of its rebel cachet–5-year-olds sing along with Ramones songs. But the Not-Its reframe that attitude to capture very youthful aggression. Case in point: Their song “Time Out to Rock” is from the defiant perspective of a kid who’s fed up with being told to “use your words” or that “it’s bedtime, honey.” She puts all of us who won’t play with her into time out–time out to rock.

Time in for the Not-Its, though. Grab a kid (get parental approval) and head down to Teatro Zinzanni this Saturday to catch the full show, circus, and bands. Maybe you want to buy tickets ahead of time, though.

*I wondered why they used the hyphen until I tried to parse their URL without it, then realized it was a great call.

Arts & Entertainment, Music

What’s Better Than Seven Cellos? Eight Cellos

If you’ve never before heard a host of cellos playing together, you’d be astonished at the thrill of the sound, so rich and reverberant, so exciting. Such was my first reaction to the sound of six cellos playing a movement from a Vivaldi concerto for two cellos with four others taking the roles of violins, viola, and accompanying cello.  Downstairs at Town Hall on Friday night, it was the opening work on a program for eight cellos and one soprano presented by Simple Measures.

This lively organization, the brainchild of cellist Rajan Krishnaswami and now in its seventh year, aims to make classical music accessible, unalarming, and fun for all sorts of people including children, whether they know much about the genre or not. He gathers small groups of excellent musicians, performs with them wearing casual dress in unusual music venues like Mt. Baker Community Club or Q Café, and talks with the audience, not lecturing but having a discussion about the music. Usually the first half is short pieces or single movements which may relate to each other, and the second half is a full-length work.

Friday’s cello grouping is uncommon. It may have been that which drew the biggest audience Simple Measures has ever had, judging by the show of hands of cello-lovers in the hall, or maybe the centrality and space of the venue and ease of parking, or maybe because of the program’s big draw, the Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 of Brazilian composer Villa-Lobos. Composed for eight cellos and a soprano, we rarely get a chance to hear this extraordinary work live, particularly with, as here, accomplished professional musicians and an equally accomplished singer.
It was the culminating highlight of a fun concert. The programming had been put together with a deft hand, and the musical points were mentioned lightly in introductions as chairs were rearranged.

The first half included a Gigue from one of the Bach Cello Suites, paired with a Toccata from a George Crumb sonata for solo cello, showing the three-century differences but also Crumb’s debt to Bach, plus a lively movement from a sonata for two cellos by the 18th century-cello virtuoso Boccherini, a delightful Bacchanalia supposedly by Chopin and arranged for three cellos, and a mystery work which was instantly recognizable to the audience who loved it, Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven,” despite an overlong and somewhat dull performance.

The most arresting works came as the concert continued, with Golijov’s Lua Descolorida for soprano and string quartet played as written by four cellos, a fine arrangement of Faure’s Pavane for four instruments by cellist Chuck Jacot, and Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras No. 1, composed for a cello orchestra and here played with eight, preceding the final tour de force.

The Pavane made an excellent choice for arrangement, with cello sonorities blooming in this stately work, and Villa-Lobos created in his first Bachianas Brasileiras a work poetical, declamatory and fast. Best of all were the two works with soprano Terri Richter, a past Seattle Opera Young Artist whose voice has developed to a warm purity perfect for this kind of music.

The Golijov, described enigmatically by the composer as “a slow motion ride on a cosmic horse” opens with long melismatic phrases in the voice, with the vocal line then remaining separate from a slow, gently moving, harmonic accompaniment. It’s one of those works where exact pitch sense is crucial, and Richter achieved it effortlessly, her whole range to the highest notes easy and clear and almost without vibrato as is needed here.

Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5 is deservedly famous for the beautiful antigenicantilena with which it starts over soft, plucked strings, and then for the fast rhythmic second half with its imitations of bird song, if you listen carefully.

It was a treat to hear this live in a well rehearsed, satisfying performance with the right type of voice. Kudos go not only to Richter, a perfect choice for this, but to the eight cellists: Krishnaswami himself, Theresa Benshoof, Roberta Hansen Downey, Virginia Dziekonski, Eric Gaenslen, Chuck Jacot, Page Smith, and Brian Wharton. By the looks of it, they were enjoying themselves as much as the audience.