Need help SUGGESTING MUSIC TO kids

[rumfoord]

Lol, I could also imagine a really great series of lessons just analyzing threads like this one where people are suggesting things but you're also teaching them which fandoms to watch out for.

• Radiohead is the literal best, kids, but watch out for radiohead fans. If you get in a radiohead fight, just say you prefer Yo La Tengo and change the subject.

• You about to hit an age where you're likely to have really REALLY impactful and meaningful connections to the music you listen to. If it happens with some guy that plays guitar and surfs, or skates, or smokes weed, or does cocaine; and names his guitar, or covers it with tape, or writes songs that jerks listen to...just keep an open mind so you don't get stuck on anything terrible. You don't want to make it to 30 (or maybe even 19) without questioning if there's more to life than your favorite band at 13.

• Learn how to pronounce "David Bowie".

• Turning your amps up loud and spacing out, shredding out, or glitching out is AWESOME. Just be careful about grownups that tell you about the wisdom they found in music. If they're not also listening to you about whatever wisdom you found in music, then they can not be trusted---pop your bubble gum in their face and make music that annoys them.

[Larry Mal]

At the end of the day, though, you can't tell someone how to undertake their musical journey or where it's best they go with it. The best you can do is to want them to get walking in the first place, they'll take it from there.

If you can get kids to know that music is important, then you have done all you need to do. It doesn't matter if they learn that music is important from Radiohead, Yo La Tengo or Imagine Dragons, just that they understand that music is the best thing that human beings do and that they can be as much a part of this thing that makes humans human if they want to.

[DesmondWafers]

I think it's always a good idea to involve the kids when teaching. Maybe have them choose an artist that they like and then have them (or you, as long as they choose the original bands) plot out some of their influences? Very rarely do people jump from point A to Z with music, you need to have some sort of connection from A to B and slowly work your way down. I don't think that it is a good idea to impose your own taste, but showing them how to discover and appreciate new music would go a long way to broadening their own taste.

[s_mcsleazy]

oh shit, i cant believe i nearly forgot 2 bands that really helped me feel important when i was 15.

the replacements and the wipers.

[howdo3313]

I haven't taught n a lotta years...and at that it was private lessons, not a class or anything.
I wanna say Beatles, Beatles, Beatles...at least for the current trend pop kids.
The ones who are into "heavier pop", look at later Beatles like Helter Skelter, Hey Bulldog, All Too Much.
The ones who are into the lighter pop can look at earlier stuff. Moptop Beatles.

Good singers...deadly players. And encompassing many genres within their little pop bubble.

My wee girl is in her teens and digs Imagine Dragons, and Twenty One Pilots. She really digs Green Day too.
Once she found I Want to Hold Your Hand...and I showed her the Hard Days Night movie, she was in:)

[Larry Mal]

You might also challenge them to find the musicians who influenced the bands they listen to... like, where did Imagine Dragons come from? Who do they look up to, who inspired them to play?

It's a safe way for kids to bring in songs to share other than music they like, which they might be shy to do.

[scottT]

I've got no specific recommendations, but just wanted to say I think you are on the right track with the "historical/contextual" approach like you and some others have mentioned. The students are young though, so I don't know how far you can go with that. Watching those videos it's probable there is a lot more going on as far as the image of these groups which goes beyond music.

I would think what you would want to do is widen their horizons a bit by bringing in some not so popular choices they are overlooking and including what came before. It's sort of like what a lot of people figure out on their own, for example Reggae fans starting out with UB40 and Police just like in the '60s Yardbirds or Cream fans backtracked into Muddy Waters and Albert King. I'd just be afraid that one of your eight year olds are going want to grow dreadlocks or go home and ask, 'mommy, what's a spliff?".

But anyway you could show them where TOP got that beat from, and in the case of ID, I don't know. There is electronica in there (drum machine) and it is pretty beat oriented, and takes from hip-hop. Frankly the singers moves mimics hip hop and rap artists as well. They are probably too young to go too far into that, but eventually it's important that they know that just about all of it came from black people, bringing in a wider world view along with the recognition of the contribution of those cultures.

[budda12ax7]

This is a hard one.....start with a bit of first gen hip hop. Focus on the where the beats come from. As far as lyrics and message content the stuff the kids listen to is not for playing in a classroom. Have the kids make their own raps over a beat...you can include writing, editing, collaboration, critical thinking. One topic kids love is "if they could change the school" type of thing. Kids write lyrics, you approve them. They perform, you film it with an ipad....this stuff is lesson gold. ALSO....choose some content from what they are learning in class.


Budda

[budda12ax7]

Warning: you can't get kids that age to think the older music is cool. The worst thing is a teacher tying to be "cool" with the kids....worst thing.

[shadowplay]

You're probably on a hiding to nothing if you've only got lesson time to work with, it's taken years of playing Coil to babies to brainwash my lot.

I'm in my 50's and I can well recall well meaning self styled 'cool' adults trying to get me into dad music like the Beatles way back in the 70's and to be honest someone hitting a tween with some Radiohead is likely to engender the same response...GTF! However...if you light a fire in just one or two kids all the indifference could be worth it and even then you might somehow make a difference to some kids years after they dismissed your Music to Watch Dads By suggestions.

I didn't like him much at the time but my music teacher at school was a fairly well known Scottish folkie and broadcaster called Peter Mallan but in retrospect he let me use the music room record player at lunch time and in a roundabout way helped connect some music I liked back then like Eyeless in Gaza with folk and led to me buying up lots of folk records to try in the early 80's. He also introduced me to Child Ballads and Rouds and the lyrics really stayed with me. He was pretty/very shortbready but he directly pointed me at Dick Gaughan because he also did Jock O'Halzeldean and his antipathy to folk revival music like Pentagle or anything post psychedelic actually drove me towards them down the line, so even negatives can be positive.

He was also invoved in teaching me the Gay Gordons, the Dashing White Sergeant and The Circassian Circle (not an entry from the Hauntological music thread), which has been more use than I'd care to admit.

I very occasionally get talked into an extremely halfarsed and embarassing talk/presentation about folk with my sister's classes and now as then the kids (well roughly the third of the class that aren't falling asleep) like the bloodthirsty and intensely narrative nature of the songs, which they declare as 'very Game of Thrones'. It's fucking terrifying and I'd not fancy getting the young ones into anything even remotely my style without years of sublimimal training. I talk about how many of the stories are found in cultures all over the world and we try and come up with reasons why, be they travellers, certain universal fears and experiences and also how tales change through retelling.

I often have to work with young folk in their 20's and I'm often quite astonished at their musical conservatism, I used to try and Henry Higgins them but these days I just try and stay away from their music which seems more news and social media led than release led. To be honest I want to feel as bitter and alienated as old man Shadowplay did when he finally just told me to take the family music centre to my room and never play any record I bought near the parental unit ever again, the day I came home with United by Throbbing Gristle in 1978. Up to that point I played everything I bought to them to a 'very nice dear' (translated as 'we hate this') but after TG there were no family listening parties.

One thing I notice is when someone dies I suddenly hear their music in the design offices, so if the likes of Macca were to die in the near future you might be quids in and I might have to find a quiet island for six months or forever...

Btw Imagine Dragons should be arrested under the trades descriptions act for being nothing like you'd imagine anything dragons would be connected with...unless we are talking Puff The Magic Dragons bedwetting instagram obsessed cousin.

wolf alice
https://youtu.be/WqxE-zppu30?list=RD-5Ae-LhMIG0

I think I'd have to come in and speak to any teacher that tried it on with Wolf A Lice and any child of mine.

D

[Jaguar018]

I have a six year old a three year old.

They like things with distinctive sounds whether they are the instruments or the lyrics. Kraftwerk was a hit. Mary Robbins has some good ones. Also, if the song has an interesting title that can have some appeal, like songs by the Cavern of Anti-Matter.

It usually takes a while for songs to sink in.

Make it for THEM. I let my son (the six year old) choose 'his mix.' He gets to be the DJ, not me. He does this with my wife's songs too. If they make the choices then it's not about some older person ramming their shitty old person tastes down their throats. I don't particularly like much of what my wife has in her set list, but so what? If my kid likes it, then I will deal. The songs that you liked as a teenager are irrelevant. They don't care that Prince and David Bowie are dead, that Chris Martin is a twat, or whatever the fuck Thom Yorke is doing these days.

Play some Be-bop, classical, Texas Swing, folk, blues, vintage hip hop, new hip hop, trip hop, reggae, RAWK, disco, techo, etc. . There are so many interesting directions that a curious person can go. Some kids will dive in and others will not. There are reasons that certain bands sold millions and millions of records, and it has to do with the universal appeal that some of these groups tapped into. We can moan about the Beatles and Michael Jackson, but there is something to those songs. You can be with it-- or against it-- but everyone should at least learn about it and go from there.

The history of music and all the different directions it went can be utterly captivating if you do a good job teaching it.

[shadowplay]

I have a six year old a three year old.

My youngest likes to repeat songs several times in a row, at the moment it's a bit of Marie Davidson which unfortunately has the 'S' word in it which has led to me getting parents chewing my ear in the past. All my kids have done this but she's the one with maximum, maximum repeat and a cry of AGAIN and sometimes she'll play something 20 times in a row and have me BEGGING for something else.

I've always enouraged all my kids to find their own stuff, indulged their buying to point and allowed unfettered access to the record collection as soon as I they learn how to use it correctly. Worked fine for me since I get to say that buying records is a 'family thing'.

Young kids can really surprise you, with our eldest I took her to record shops in her baby papoose and later on when she was walking and talking she'd be telling adults what they should be buying (sometimes including me) and also just dancing without a care in the world in a world that often cares a little too much about what everyone else is thinking. I feel a bit confused and sad/happy sometimes when she tells me she's been an bought something on her own.

D

[Zork]

This might be a bit of a stretch but with a few years of experience working in education and as a father of three kids I see it this way: kids have a lot of complex and strong emotions they often can't really define, adress or sort out. So music with a strong focus on dramatic emotional expression without a clear meaning or message but a hint of rebellion works for them pretty well. It's actually the same reason a lot of kids these days still get into Nirvana early or Miley Cyrus or Billie Eilish or so. As they grow older, they understand their own emotions better and if they already are into any kind of music, they will most likely develop a more diverse and more refined taste in music.

But just like adults, kids look for meaning and identification in the music they like. You can try to inspire them to listen to other music by talking about lyrics, history, personal struggles of different artists but the key here is really meaning and identification that must be suitable to their age and personal development. For example, one of my younger kids is totally into Kraftwerk because he likes cars and robots and they sing about the Autobahn and well, robots. My oldest kid got into fridays for future and is now into political german rap and punk music because he identifies with the lyrics about social injustice.

You should, however, definitely play some Imagine Dragons with them. They are on the very beginning of their musical journey. Don't spoil it for them.

[PapaB]

Not sure if these suggestions have to follow the examples you listed, but here's my two cents: Bobby McFerrin "Don't Worry Be Happy."
Good luck with your lessons!

[Steadyriot.]

Always curious how these old threads get dredged up after 5 years of silence.

Also: where did some of the posters go after all these years?