I get daily journals from Viv’s school which come via email and include stories about the day along with pictures or PowerPoints. Today’s talked about how recently the children fell in love with a tape book from the library of Stevie Wonder music. They were drawn to the fast paced beat, variety of musical sounds, and learning the words! The teachers invited everyone else to revisit this music through a dance party.
Now that would explain the “hey - it’s Stevie Wonder” comment when I put on music over the weekend. It wasn’t him - it was Earth, Wind and Fire but I was impressed she associated a similar genre of music. Of course that being said we do play a lot of Stevie Wonder (big fan of
Sir Duke!) at home along with most everything Motown ever put out.
Viv loves to dance either by herself or asks to be picked up and twirled about. We’ve got a lot of the songs from movie soundtracks on our iPad, she navigates to the music she likes by choosing the album cover and then jumps about. Bear Necessities is a favorite although it sounds like she sings it as “Bear Ma-Sesames”. John and I have some pretty electric music taste so she rocks out to Katy Perry, Eliza Doolittle and Pink too.
Both of us talk about how our parents music shaped a lot of our early childhood
memories. I remember my mom winning a radio contest and getting a copy of the Muppet Movie soundtrack or dancing around the living room to The Captain and Tennille songs. John talks about listening to classic music and loves to play "Porcupine Pie" *very loudly* while singing some days. We laugh about one of our first dates when we were riding in the Miata with the top down belting out 80's tunes for most of the afternoon. Music holds a lot of memories. Can still name off my first tape, 8-track, album, cassette and CD purchase. Can you?
On the subject of music and memories. I’m looking forward to a music-related movie coming out soon called
The Music Never Stopped it’s a sentimental but deeply felt true story about the healing power of music by a neurologist. Using songs from the '60s by Bob Dylan, the Beatles and the Grateful Dead to bridge the generation gap between a father and son and an emotional look at the power of music therapy to trigger memories lost after brain surgery.
One of my fondest music memories, is dancing around your house in W. Springfield belting out Dolly Pardon’s 9-5. We would all march up and over the couch (until we heard your dad’s car pull in the driveway of course *S*). I smile every time I hear that song!!
Ha! I think I can still remember most of the words to that songs too. Actually you talking about that reminded me of another fond memory, I’ll have to post that too now.