Music For or About Children and Childhood

[Florestan]

Aside from the big names and their warhorses, what other works of this kind are worth checking out? Do you have any favorites (big names and their warhorses included, this time)?

[North Star]

Obviously among my favourites: Ravel's Ma mère l'Oye and L'enfant et les sortilèges. Schumann's Kinderszenen too. And Berlioz's L'enfance du Christ  0:)

[Sergeant Rock]

Elgar Wand of Youth, Dream Children and Nursery Suite.

[asin] B000OMCIVI[/asin]

[mc ukrneal]

Aside from the big names and their warhorses, what other works of this kind are worth checking out? Do you have any favorites (big names and their warhorses included, this time)?

Assuming you mean the Prokofiev and Saint-Saens here (and not replicating what's already been said):
Tchaikovsky: Album pour enfants
Chaminade: Album pour enfants
Debussy: Children's Corner
Bizet: Jeux d'enfants

This album would be an ideal starting point for this sort of thing:
[asin]B00001X59W[/asin]

[bwv 1080]

Ligeti - Lontano (the opening and closing of "a window on long submerged dream worlds of childhood")
Stockhausen - Gesang der Jungling


But Kinderszenen is the first and greatest

[Karl Henning]

Dallapiccola, Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera

http://www.youtube.com/v/Kb6PxV6f4C4

[Florestan]

Thank you all for the recs, will check them asap.

By big names I meant Schumann, Faure, Ravel, Prokofiev, Saint-Saens, maybe even Bizet and Tchaikovsky.

Heitor Villa-Lobos has two nice piano suites titled A prole do bebe (The baby's family).

There's also Mendelssohn's  Kinderstücke op. 72, Deodat de Severac's En vacances (premier recueil) and Le soldat de plomb --- I highly recommend them.

My all time favorites are Kinderszenen, Album fur de Jugend, Dolly, Jeux d'enfants (Bizet) and the above mentioned En vacances

[Florestan]

Dallapiccola, Quaderno Musicale di Annalibera

http://www.youtube.com/v/Kb6PxV6f4C4

This is nice. It reminds me of Mompou's Musica callada.

[Karl Henning]

Bartók, A Gyermekeknek, of course.

[Florestan]

Bartók, A Gyermekeknek, of course.

That should indeed be a beauty. Must check my Kocsis set soon. 

[Spineur]

got this one recently.  Very nice


and if you havent seen suzie tempelton anime on peter and the wolf, you must remedy this subito presto


[asin]B002BSP7HA[/asin]

[Florestan]

got this one recently.  Very nice

Wishlisted.

and if you havent seen suzie tempelton anime on peter and the wolf, you must remedy this subito presto


[asin]B002BSP7HA[/asin]

Wow! Looks like something my 4-year son who is quite fond of anime might be interested in! Thanks a lot for that!

[Cato]

Is there an age "window" ?

My 6th Graders have heard Mozart's Waisenhausmesse (composed when he was 11 or 12) and excerpts from his opera Apollo et Hyacinthus.

How about the Franz Von Suppe' overtures, which appeared in a good number of classic cartoons?

You could of course visit the Looney Tunes, Tom and Jerry, and Walter Lantz cartoons of the 1930's, 1940's and early 1950's for all kinds of Classical Kids stuff!

But if you just want them to hear the music, people have put together medleys on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/v/GrjxtNYhTCc


https://www.youtube.com/v/R7gNNA-GdsA

And of course...Bugs Bunny as Leopold!!!

https://archive.org/details/LongHairedHare

[Florestan]

My 6th Graders have heard Mozart's Waisenhausmesse (composed when he was 11 or 12) and excerpts from his opera Apollo et Hyacinthus.

This is music by, not for or about, a child. 

How about the Franz Von Suppe' overtures, which appeared in a good number of classic cartoons?

Were they written expressly for, or about, children? 

[Cato]

Were they written expressly for, or about, children? 

Well, as far as I know, the answer is yes for the Mozart works (the opera was for a school play, and the Mass was for the orphans and their new chapel, and apparently the music was sung at the premiere by a choir of orphans conducted by the 12-year old composer) and "sort of yes"  for the latter, as a number of von Suppe overtures have found their way into children's cartoons. 0:)

Check out John Zorn's Cat o' Nine Tails, influenced by cartoon music:

https://www.youtube.com/v/rLp_1xh34X0

[bwv 1080]

a little darker, Dutilleux's Shadows of Time was written in memory of Anne Frank and other children lost in the Holocaust

[North Star]

a little darker, Dutilleux's Shadows of Time was written in memory of Anne Frank and other children lost in the Holocaust

Oh, that reminds me of Hans Krása's Brundibár - children's opera performed by the children in Theresienstadt.

[DaveF]

Britten - lots of Britten (all of Britten?)

[Spineur]

Britten - lots of Britten (all of Britten?)

The golden vanity is really a piece for children.  It is included in this CD which has Dutilleux carnet de bord also an easy choral work for children.  Thee Daniel-Lesur on this disk is an adaptation of folk songs.

[bwv 1080]

Britten - lots of Britten (all of Britten?)

The Michael Jackson of classical music