Songs for Thanksgiving (Updated)

About five years ago, I compiled a list of songs for Thanksgiving that brought together a bunch of kids music themed for Thanksgiving either overtly or somewhat more subtly (i.e., songs about gratitude).

It's time for an update.  I've included some stream/video links, along with a Spotify playlist for those songs on the service.

And if I've missed one, please let me know in the comments or via e-mail and we'll add it in.

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Laurie Berkner - "(I'm Gonna Eat on) Thanksgiving Day" (as close to a kindie Thanksgiving Day anthem as we have)

John McCutcheon - "Thanksgiving Day"

Charity and the JAMband - "Thank You" (close enough, right?, and you can still download it for free or pay what you like)

Cathy Fink & Marcy Marxer - "Thank You" (this one's much more Thanksgiving-related)

Brian Vogan and his Good Buddies - "Last Thanksgiving"

Todd McHatton - "Happy Vegan Thanksgiving Song" (listen here)

Bill Harley - "Enough is a Feast" [parents: see note below]

Bill Harley - "Thanksgiving Prayer"

Kindiependent - "Kids' Table"

Jim "Mr. Stinky Feet" Cosgrove - "Gobble Across the USA"

The Harmonica Pocket - "Give Thanks"

Dre Towey - "Turkey Bop"

Joanie Leeds and the Nightlights - "The Tofurkey Song"

Spencer the Gardener - "The Gobble Song"

Kurt Gallagher - "Tommy Turkey" (watch here)

Shine and the Moonbeams - "Soul Food Holiday"

Renee and Friends - "Gather Round"

Aaron Nigel Smith and the One World Chorus feat. Dan Zanes - "Grateful"

Mista Cookie Jar - "Gratitude" [stream]

José-Luis Orozco - "Thanksgiving"

Rocknoceros - "This Thanksgiving"

Justin Roberts - "How Lucky We Are"

Gustafer Yellowgold - "Pumpkin Pied"

Miss Nina - "Grateful" [YouTube]

Video: "These Things Go Together" - Katie Ha Ha Ha

As we approach the end of 2016, it's tempting to look ahead to 2017 and try to discover what new music awaits us, but, hey, there's still new music left in this year!  Don't write it off yet.

These Things Go Together album cover

One new album that gets its release this weekend with a 2016 date stamp is These Things Go Together, the debut kids album from Katie Mullins.  Mullins is a Brooklyn-based singer-songwriter who's got a couple albums for adults under her belt, but even though she's been making music with kids as "Miss Katie" for more than 8 years, These Things is her first full-length under the project name Katie Ha Ha Ha.

The album is simple in lot of places -- Mullins' vocals, a guitar on many tracks-- but seeing as she worked with kindie uber-producer Dean Jones, there are a few flourishes [waves hello to the toy piano and kalimba] that elevate the collection of pre-K originals and classics above your standard vocals-and-guitar recording.  It's not necessarily reminiscent of Raffi, but it's definitely Raffi-adjacent.

While the title track is one of those vocals-and-guitar tracks and a bit of percussion thrown in, it's energetic -- a bit punk, even -- and features lyrics that will most certainly amuse your novelty-primed preschooler.  And it's got a video that features dancing, rocks, and an ill-fated cake.  The video below is worth a spin, as is the album when it gets a full release.

Katie Ha Ha Ha - "These Things Go Together" [Vimeo]

Video: "Grumpopotamus (and the Crankosaurus Rex)" - Sugar Free Allstars

No tiny dinosaurs here.

The latest (and greatest? yes, greatest) video from Oklahoma's Sugar Free Allstars goes life-size in its song about crankypants of all ages.  The video for "Grumpopotamus (and the Crankosaurus Rex)" from their most recent self-titled album features the title characters, who seem like they should be mascots for a minor-league baseball team somewhere, (gently) expressing displeasure and general raucousness to the tune with a killer singalong chorus.

Crankosaurus Rex's arms seem to be slightly longer than his (or her) older brother Tyrannosaurus, for what it's worth, dinosaur experts.

Sugar Free Allstars - "Grumpopotamus (and the Crankosaurus Rex)" [YouTube] (h/t: Geekdad)

Kids' Songs About Emotions

While I generally shy away from songs and kids music that explicitly teach subjects in a didactic way, that doesn't mean that a) non-didactic songs don't teach the listener, and b) you can't create a very catchy song that also happens to be educational.

There are lots of songs that take history as their subject, and there are any number of math, non-English language, science, and standard school or preschool life skill subjects in song.  Emotional literacy, however, is a trickier subject, as the songwriter isn't so much covering facts as she or he is trying to write a song explaining the very emotions songs usually generate.  It's a meta idea... for 4- or 7-year-olds.

Back in 2008, I said that there really hadn't been much if any non-didactic kids music about emotions written, and that there was a niche waiting to be filled.  Luckily, I think that niche has been filled, at least a little bit -- there are now a number of tracks that I think could serve as tuneful introductions for a young audience to what emotions are.

I've provided a list below, but if you've got more to add, list them in the comments!  (Note that the list generally tries to limit itself to songs about emotion, rather than including songs that deal with emotion in passing.  Such a list would be much, much longer.)

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“It’s Alright to Cry” - Rosie Grier (among many others) [stream]

"Cry Cry Cry” - Ziggy Marley (feat. Jack Johnson & Paula Fuga) [stream]

“Joy Comes Back” - Alastair Moock [stream]

“Furry Happy Monsters” - R.E.M. [video]

“Sad” - Big Block Singsong [video]

“Brave” - Big Block Singsong [video]

“Happy” - Big Block Singsong [video]

"Mad" - Big Block Singsong [video]

“Mama Is Sad” - Justin Roberts [stream]

“Happy Sad Silly Mad” - Jeremy Plays Guitar [video]

“Sad Robot” - The Jellydots [stream]

“Are You Happy?” - Alison Faith Levy [stream]

“If You’re Happy and You Know It..." - Raffi (and many many others) [stream]

"In All of the World" - Papa Crow [stream]

"Alright, Okay, Just Fine" - Gwendolyn and the Good Time Gang [Spotify]

"Feel What U Feel" - Lisa Loeb feat. Craig Robinson [Amazon]

"Feelings Change" - The Pop Ups [stream]

StevenSteven: Finally and Foreverywhere

StevenSteven Foreverywhere album cover

It started nearly a decade ago, when former Blue's Clues star Steve Burns and current Flaming Lips instrumentalist Steven Drozd stormed Jack's Big Music Show with "I Hog (the Ground)," which forever and for all time will be the best song for Groundhog Day.

Then, a couple years or so later, news surfaced that Burns and Drozd hadn't stopped singing about groundhogs but had, in fact, recorded an entire album together. They named their band Steve 'n' Steven.  (Yes, that post links to a Myspace page, which is an indication of just how far back this goes.)

And then: silence.

You can read this 2014 post about the first time the album was streamed, and you can hear the frustration in my text -- about time! -- and palpable excitement.  (Especially since that was in the wake of a video that has become over time one of my all-time favorites -- "A Fact Is a Gift That You Give Your Brain.")

And then (again): silence (again).

Steve Burns and Steven Drozd

Until the end of this September, when a brand new StevenSteven website and Twitter account popped up, with a psychedelic new video for "The Unicorn and Princess Rainbow" playing on the site.

Well, even Chinese Democracy finally got a release date, and the long-awaited StevenSteven (spelling updated slightly) album -- now titled Foreverywhere -- has an official release date: February 2017.

The band cites "Black Sabbath, Cephalopods, Grover, [and] Toy Commercials from the 1970s" among many other people and entities as influences and inspirations.  It'll definitely be one of those kids music albums that lots of folks both inside and outside the kids music world will be talking about next year.

As for me, I might be willing to be like the Unicorn in the 3 song "mini-EP" of sorts scattered as an arc throughout the entire album, waiting until the edge for forever to have the album released into the world.  (I have been like that, in kindie terms, at least.)  But I'm glad I've only got another 3 months or so.

Still from "The Unicorn and Princess Rainbow" video

Announcing the Best Kids Music of the Decade

I've spent a long time thinking about kids music and trying to elevate the genre's visibility, both generally and as well for the very, very best of it.  One of the efforts I'm most proud of relative to that latter category is the Fids and Kamily Music Awards, which compiles top 10 lists from a lot of people who spend a lot of time listening to a lot of kids music.  The 2016 awards will be announced later this week, but this summer I realized that this would be the 10-year anniversary of starting the awards in 2006.

With that in mind, we put out a call to Fids & Kamily judges past and present and asked them to give us their list of the best kids music of the past decade.  To help them a bit, we limited the choices to the 122 ranked winners over the first ten years of the awards, and told them to give us their 20 choices, ranked in the same general way they rank their top 10 lists for the regular awards.

The result is a list of the top 20 kids music albums of the past decade, with another 20 albums awarded honorable mention.  The top five?

1.  The Okee Dokee Brothers - Can You Canoe? (2012)
2.  Molly Ledford and Billy Kelly - Trees (2015)
3.  Dan Zanes and Friends - Catch That Train! (2006)
4.  Justin Roberts - Jungle Gym (2010)
5.  Justin Roberts - Pop Fly (2008)

That is an excellent, excellent list, in my opinion, a great start to any kids music library (be that an actual library, or a family's iPhone playlist.  I encourage you to see the rest of the list of the best kids and family music of the past decade.  I'll have some thoughts on the results at some point soon, but for the moment, thanks to all the judges, artists, readers, and Bill Childs of Spare the Rock Spoil the Child, a Fids & Kamily co-founder who continues to work on this with me today.

Logo credit: 2006-2015 Fids and Kamily Awards logo courtesy Jeff Bogle / Out With The Kids