Toddler Favorites
Average Customer Review:
Audio CD (17 March, 1998)
list price: $6.98 -- our price: $6.98
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Reviews (50)

Cute cd for the $
Very cute. Our 15 month old loves it! Not the best singers in the world, but appealling to little ones. Easy on adult ears and tolerable unlike many other similar cd's Toddlers does not care about singers being in tune etc, its all about fun. Both my husband and I are probably the worst singers in the world, but our son loves our voices! Recommended!

Great for kids and easy on adult ears
My daughter loves this CD.I have heard it a million times and even though the tunes get stuck in your head the ladies voice is lower pitched and pretty tollerable.It is a good buy.

SO Great!
My 2-year old girl, 4-year old boy, all the 3-5 year-olds in my Kardio Kids class and ME absolutely LOVE this CD.It's fun, funky, silly and it gets us all moving and singing together.The overall favorite is "Monkeys on the Bed."It has a funny twist at the end!I noticed one reviewer complained about some of the singers being off-key.I also have 12 years of piano training (what are the chances?!) and I didn't notice that.All of the singing is appropriate for the songs.I haven't noticed any pitch problems, but they may be on purpose because a lot of the songs are Silly!I also may not have noticed because I'm generally singing off-key with my kids while listening.I don't believe we have the "curse"? of perfect pitch. ... Read more

Asin: B0000063EY
Sales Rank: 1691
Subjects:  1. Childrens    2. Pop   

Gift Of The Tortoise: A Musical Journey Through Southern Africa
Average Customer Review:
Audio CD (08 March, 1994)
list price: $12.98 -- our price: $11.99
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Editorial Review

The jewel in the crown in the Music for Little People catalog, Gift of the Tortoise is stunning in its beauty and uncompromising in its delivery of excellence. Expressed from the viewpoint of a very wise tortoise, the lush harmonies of Ladysmith Black Mambazo are supported by renowned guitarist Johnny Clegg and storyteller Gcina Mhlophe, creating a captivating blend of Zulu lore, South African history, and that country's brave optimism in the post-Apartheid era. As the drama unfolds, the listener is drawn into the spell cast by this marvelous group of players as they carry out the chant of ancestral names on "Two Shelleni," the folk legend of the "Boy Who Turned into a Cat," and the classic "Mbube (the Lion Sleeps Tonight)." --Paige La Grone ... Read more

Reviews (18)

wonderful for our 2-yr-old
This album is a great hit with our toddler.Many, many nights she requests to listen to this CD as she goes to sleep.The rhythms are wonderful for young ears, she loves to sing the choruses with the children on the recording............it tickles me to see my daughter respond so positively to lyrics in a language foreign to her.

Beautiful....and different
My 2 year old son LOVES music - all types.Laurie Berkner has been a fav for a while now.But this cd is DIFFERENT!!In a good way!!!!!It is simply beautiful and fun.

Excellent entertainment!
I bought this CD because it was geared toward children,but it had the beautiful acapella harmonies of Ladysimith Black Mombazo, which I enjoy.I found the stories to be enchanting, and my 2.5-year-old loves to sing and clap along to the songs.This is a wonderful CD to have in your own library as a break from nursery rhymes and traditional children's songs.It also makes an excellent gift for friends and family. ... Read more

Asin: B000002M6S
Subjects:  1. Africa    2. African Folk    3. Afro-Pop    4. Childrens    5. Mbaqanga    6. Mbube    7. Pop    8. South Africa    9. Stories    10. Worldbeat   

Lullabies of Latin America
Average Customer Review:
Audio CD (16 February, 1999)
list price: $12.98 -- our price: $12.98
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Editorial Review

Gifted with a gracefully pliant midrange soprano, stellar recording artist Maria Del Rey here turns her attention to lullabies and to an immersion of culture and language with Latin American poems adapted and translated for this purpose. Del Rey delivers the first half of Lullabies of Latin America in the gently fluid tones of Spanish, then follows up in the second half with a repeat of the same songs sung in English. Del Rey's cello, piano, and acoustic guitar figure prominently, and she is also accompanied by a talented group of musicians on percussion, strings, flute, and oboe, as well as on Peruvian harp, panpipes, and other traditional Latin American instrumentation. "Duerme Clave" and its English counterpart, "Sleep Rosie Flower," are particularly engaging, featuring soft piano and elegant lines of Spanish classical guitar. "San Augustine" and its correlation are gorgeously slumber-inducing duets. With their unhindered capacity for linguistics, wee ones will be sweetly singing along with both versions in no time. --Paige La Grone ... Read more

Reviews (11)

Great addition to materials for raising a bilingual child
This CD is excellent and I'm glad to have it in my collection. María del Rey has a beautiful voice and the men and children reciting poetry are refreshing.

I am an educator who plans to raise my children bilingually and I find this CD to be an excellent addition to my collection of music in Spanish. As a native speaker of English who has learned Spanish to near-native ability, I am happy to have as many resources in Spanish as possible and look forward to singing and sharing these songs/rhymes (esp. the Spanish versions) with my child. While my baby has not yet arrived (he's on the way!) and I can't say what will put him to sleep, I disagree with several that have said the poetry and speaking by children and a man are disrupting. While some are slightly more upbeat than María del Rey's songs, I still find them very soothing (hopefully my baby will too!). I also disagree with a reviewer who said these are not traditional. I know I've heard some of these before and another reviewer mentioned that she remembered some from childhood.

That said, my favorite lullaby CD is "Latin Lullaby" which has 17 songs (1 in Portuguese, 3 instrumentals and the rest in Spanish). Songs by "El Cri-Cri" and "De Colores" by José Luis Orozco are also in my collection (not lullabies, though.)

Wow what a voice!
I am a grandmother who has given Maria Del Rey CDs to everyone in my family and to friends who haveyoung children.It a gift that I love to give.Maria has an amazing and tender voice.I can feel her heart in every note.She is rare gem to have that kind of talent and share it with our children.

Maria Del Rey's Lullabies are great for nap times
As an Educator and mother, I highly reccomend Lullabies of Latin America.In my family we have a long tradition of
handing down music, books and stories.Maria has totally captured the beauty and warmth that I remember my mother and my abuela singing to me as a child.These are the classics, these beautiful lullabies brought such tender emotion in me when
I first heard them.When I taught preschool for a few years
the children always loved Maria's voice. The whole atmosphere was so peaceful in class during our nap times.When you work in the trenches with children everyday you need materials that work and I trust Maria Del Rey's work, she is just wonderful. ... Read more

Asin: B00000HZF7
Subjects:  1. Childrens    2. Lullabies    3. Pop   

Uni Verse Of Song: French
Average Customer Review:
Audio CD (01 February, 2000)
list price: $9.98 -- our price: $9.98
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Editorial Review

French is probably the only language in the world that can make the most trivial idea sound grandiloquent. Imagine what it can do when the poetic Romance language is set to children's songs. It entertains and educates, bien sûr (of course)! UniVerse ofSong: French is the fun and informative follow-up to UniVerse of Song: Spanish, and seems an ideal tool for starting second-language learning with elementary phrases and basic songs. Jean Rene and his versatile backing combo help make a handful of bilingual kids into lively teachers. It doesn't matter if your native tongue is English or French--the record playfully teaches kids both languages by using common French and English nursery songs such as "Frère Jacques," "Alouette," the ever-delightful "Sur le Pont d'Avignon," "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," "Wheels on the Bus," "London Bridge," and others. Along the way, listeners can also pick up useful expressions in French that sound, well, almost diplomatic. Now, bring on the Chinese and Russian versions of UniVerse of Song, and soon we can send kids to the UN Security Council. --Martin Keller ... Read more

Reviews (8)

Great CD - my kids loved it
The kids loved it.However, Global Village Kids has a French Nursery rhyme CD that I found that lists the lyrics seperately, now I can tell my two year old what the words mean, and they pick it up faster.

awesome
voices are great -music is great -kids love it --i even like it !!some great singers children and adults alike-also very educational while not seeming to be "lessons"-its fun and sounds great

FANTASTIC!
I am amazed at just how much both my 2-1/2 year old girl and 9-1/2 month old son LOVE this CD!These are easily the best and most amusing renditions of Wheels on the Bus and Old MacDonald I've ever heard (Wheels on the Bus gets my little one laughing and waving his arms).And my girl has not only learned French words from the tape, she now asks me "What is the French word for ()?" as we go about our day.This is FUN music! ... Read more

Asin: B000046PX8
Subjects:  1. Childrens    2. Pop   

A Child's Celebration of Folk Music
Average Customer Review:
Audio CD (23 April, 1996)
list price: $14.98 -- our price: $13.99
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Editorial Review

Children of all ages will delight in the simple melodies featured in A Child's Collection of Folk Music. These story-songs are repetitive and eminently singable. Material ranges from traditional twangy banjo numbers like "She'll Be Comin' Round the Mountain" from Folk granddaddy Pete Seeger to the soulful song-in-the-round "Run Molly Run" by contemporary gospel group Sweet Honey in the Rock. Moms and dads will have the opportunity to share some of their favorite folk artists with the next generation: Michelle Shocked, who does a lovely traditional Irish-minstral-type ballad; Taj Mahal, who performs a bluesy "Little Brown Dog"; and Woody Guthrie on "Riding in My Car (Car Song)." And for all the Deadhead mommies, there's Jerry Garcia and David Grisman performing "There Ain't No Bugs on Me." Kids will particularly enjoy the Cajun boogie of Buckwheat Zydeco and the trip-over-the-tongue island music of Cedella Marley Booker. --Paige La Grone ... Read more

Reviews (9)

you'll love it too
My 3 y.o. loved it.The music is upbeat and fun, and you'll crack your kid up when you sing your own version of Ridin' in My Car.And Their Ain't No Bugs on Me is a great song.I don't know about your kid, but mine can handle a lyric like "How in the hell can the old folks tell ..." especially when sung so cheerfully and, um, innocuously.Mostly, it's a cd that you yourself will enjoy listening to ... even (believe it or not) the supplied version of Skip to My Lou.

A Child's Celebration of Folk Music/Various Artists
Loved it except for the "Ain't no bugs on me" song. It uses the phrase "how in the (hell) can the old folks tell" In my opinion, that is not appropriate for young children.

Concerned mother actually listened to lyrics
Most of the songs are enjoyable and of the caliber I expected after reading the reviews posted.However, on Garcia's version of "Ain't No Flies On Me", there is a mild obscenity, which is fine for an adult compilation, but unacceptable for a compilation directed to children.As the rules for this forum prohibit obscenities, I cannot be more explicit about the exact lyrics.I am extremely disappointed in the editors and will be returning my CD. ... Read more

Asin: B000002M7Z
Subjects:  1. Childrens    2. Folk & Traditional    3. Pop    4. Traditional Folk