I went from the living room into the kitchen this afternoon, and there’s my 8-year-old singing along with Lamb Lies Down on Broadway on her iPod. It doesn’t get any better than that.
For some time her favorite song has been White Mountain, more or less the title cut from Genesis’s second album, Trespass, about the king of the wolves and usurper. She’s been getting into a lot of the Gabriel-era stuff lately, though. I knew that, given her parents, she’d have good taste in music, but I wasn’t expecting anything this good, this young.
Good for you. The 4 year old my wife babysits is fond of singing Led Zepplin’s Immigant. He got this from his Father. My wife thought this would be a child who would need to know when and how to say, “Laissez Les Bon Temps Roulez.” He still wants to know why.
When my oldest was in first grade, everyone in the class was asked to sing their favorite song. Mimi’s choice was the Talking Head’s “Psycho Killer.” Got a call from the school psychologist on that one… When Rachel was about the same age she insisted on listening to Kapelye’s “Future and Past” album about a dozen times a day. She could do a splendid rendition of “Gut Purim, Yidn.” One of my proudest moments was when she asked, “Why does all the stuff on the radio sound the same?”
My kids don’t do the music, sad to say. But when my son was six years old, we got a call from the school asking why he was drawing pictures of a purple triangle and telling people it was “a tentacle”. His favourite game was “Day of the Tentacle”.
Nailed that sucker, too. I don’t think the school ever really understood that one.
When I was in high school, a bunch of us were into Frank Zappa. I had a niece who was about 4 or 5 who was visiting. One of my aunts was talking to her about songs, and says “Do you know ‘The Muffin Man’?” And I’m wondering how my aunt knows the song and imagining my little niece saying “The Muffin Man is seated at the table in the laboratory of the Utility Muffin Research Kitchen. . .”
Funny you should mention that. It’s not “Supper’s Ready”, but she’s now sitting next to me singing along with Steeleye Span’s “Montrose.” It’s not only 15 minutes worth of mostly vocals, we’ve been on the net looking up Montrose, the battles, and the civil wars.
