SDML Children's Music - Children's Songs: Book One {hands of heaven...}

"Children's Songs" is an on-going collection of songs I will write & record for children...and for the child in every adult. They will feature both familiar ideas as well as bold new concepts. "Book One" is complete and "Book Two" is in pre-production.

Below are the songs in both OGG VORBIS format and MP3 format, and condensed liner notes. While the files use a low-quality setting (to speed downloads) in both formats, it should be noted that OGG is superior to MP3. However, you'll need WinAmp, SnackAmp, or a pro editor to listen to OGG. There is a link to WinAmp at the bottom of the page.

You might also wish to visit Skinny Devil Radio to listen to all of "Childen's Songs" on the Skinny Devil Flash Players.

If you want the songs to burn to disc, download the ZIP file below (coming soon). Feel free to copy & burn as many discs as you like for non-commercial applications (for the casual listener, that means don't sell them). For individuals or businesses who might like these for a specific commercial application, write for permission.

Though this collection is being released free of charge, so if you want to support this work (and future works), please feel free to leave a tip via the Pay-Pal link at the bottom. This collection, like others available on this site, is part of a continuing experiment in the voluntary payment system.

Children's Songs: Book One
The first volume of Children's Songs is actually a collection of songs written over roughly a 5 or 6 year period for a variety of projects I did for various people, but songs that fit the general theme for the collections. I don't have a very good way to explain what makes a track suitable for the children's volumes, but I know them when I hear them (hahaha!!!). Close your eyes when you listen to these and see if you are transported back to childhood; or, if you're a child, listen with your eyes wide open!

1) "The Kid Show"
Written in the mid-1990s for a children's elementary school talent show. Like much of this collection, I didn't polish up the mistakes. It's interesting that in the middle of the song where the fiddle gets carried away the parents lose the beat while the kids keep dancing in time. MP3

2) "Enchanted Encounters"
Written in the late 1990s for my friend Tammy Cooper, proprietor of Ye Old Magick Shoppe (part of the larger "Enchanted Encounters" site). It uses the tone-painting method, basic canon form, and has some cool harmonic play. MP3

3) "Ria (for musicbox)"
Also using the tone-painting method, this was written in 1999 for the woman who is now my wife. It is a hyperkinetic fugue that lasts less than 100 seconds and pulls a harmonic slight of hand (is it a modulation or is it polytonal?). A little magic for your ears! MP3

5) "Ria (for piano)"
Written a year after the first "Ria" compositions in strict canon form. I'm always amazed at how limits can provide freedoms where you least expect them. MP3

6) "Eastwind"
The "Wind" series comes in 4 parts, and was written (along with "Enchanted Encounters") for my friend Tammy Cooper. I tried to capture the eastern essence as I felt it at that moment. MP3

7) "Northwind"
Stylistically, it is a harsh departure from "Eastwind", utilizing electronic instruments (my Kurzweil K-2000's warped synth sounds) and a looping wind sample. Cold magic to warm the heart, and the first of these trax to feature a vocal (performed beautifully by Ria). MP3

8) "Southwind"
Another stylistic switch, from both "East" and "North"...this one with warm island magic and vocals by Blue, plus Nik & Damien McLean, and Liz & Christopher Smith. MP3

9) "Westwind"
A final stylistic shuffle of these four trax ("East", "North", "South", and "West") and we hear a track I wrote as a dedication to the Windham Hill artists of the 1980s and early 1990s. I'm sure I took a theme or two from someone like Michael Hedges or Shadowfax, but I don't remember now...it was just in my memory. MP3

10) "The Garden (part 1)"
An experiment in metal percussion, this track was written in the mid-1990s and donated to my friend Jami Desrosiers and her wonderful family. MP3

11) "The Garden (part 2)"
The experiment continues in a more other-worldly direction using several melodic & sonic themes from part one in a new bed of sound. MP3

12) "The Garden (part 3)"
The final segment of this trilogy, part three returns to the quickening pace of part one while reviving the angel voices of part two. MP3

13) "The Rose"
The final cut and the only track to feature the vocal as the primary element, Blue performed this around 1998 or 1999. It is an old Gaelic piece that I've heard with a variety of lyrics. The lyrics performed here are akin to those typically found in school books...at least schools in the southern part of the U.S. MP3

I hope you enjoy these songs. They were a joy to write, perform, record, and master...and I'm even more excited about the volume I'm now working on, which will feature certain classic forms with bold new harmonic concepts (symmetrical harmonies, bi-tonal experiments, and the like) as well as more expanded rhythmic concepts (polymeters, metric modulations, and such). I suspect that though adults may struggle with some of what will be presented, the children will simply dance and play...which should be a lesson to us all.

--David M. McLean

November 10, 2003 - 11pm

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