Listen To The Children

Speaking of percussion, this primary song lends itself quite well to the use of many different percussion instruments, though not right away.

Written to be used as the second song of the musical revue, A World Of Music, Listen to the Children can also be performed separately or in some other context.

An important thing to note about this song is that it is very simple and can easily be used with your youngest singers. It is also a call and response song, which means that one group of your singers sings a line and another group answers it exactly. Call and response songs are fun for little children to sing and they most often do so with enthusiasm.

The first time through the song, all of the children sing in unison to the rhythm section accompaniment, adding claps on the repeat, if desired. The call and response doesn't begin until measure 17, and when it does, it uses the nonsense syllable na. Be sure to let your singers use a slightly nasal sound for less self-consciousness.

Also at this point, the non-singers can pantomime listening to the singing group by cupping their hands to their ears. This simple movement is echoed by the other group when it is not singing and vice versa throughout the na na section. The call and response then continues at the D.S. to the end.

This song is a light rock song with a strong eighth note pulse. There are two electric basses playing the pulse in octaves on the P/A recording along with an electric guitar and slightly processed drums. There is no piano, but we did use some fun synthesizer sounds, which you will easily be able to distinguish in the mix.

At measure 17, we added some neat ethnic percussion instruments, one at a time, every four bars. The first instrument is the cuica, or lion's roar, which is quite distinctive and will be easily picked out. Then we added a talking drum, some basket shakers and pueli sticks, which are similar to bamboo, from Hawaii. There is also a ribbon crasher and satellite drum adding metallic sounds to the overall blend.

The P/A recording provides an excellent example of the simplicity of this song. Be sure to use a stereo set-up that will easily demonstrate the left/right movement of sound during the call and response sections.