Product reviews
Preschool Entertainment www.preschoolentertainment.com
June 19, 2006
A review of Music's Everywhere
Music's Everywhere is a DVD and music CD for ages 3 months to 3 years. Music's Everywhere takes
children through their days where they might experience music—in everyday objects and people.
"...[W]e'll join Christy and her music class as she takes us on a journey to learn how music really is everywhere around us. We'll also meet some interesting characters along the way, like a frog who loves to shake and a carpenter named Carl, who creates music using nothing more than his hammer and nails!"
As a point of disclosure, while Christy and I were friends during high school, we have lost touch for several years. I knew of her interest in music in high school, but the Boston-based Little Virtuoso has put together an impressive package for kids.
As many parents and experts know, music helps to introduce children to skills and help with development. As the Music's Everywhere insert on the packaging states: "Studies have shown that interacting with music during early childhood promotes the development of reasoning, verbal, motor and social skills. Plus, experiencing and making music early in life gives children a solid foundation for more in-depth musical studies as they grow."
Most parents would agree, having witnessed children light up and dance around to music. Music's Everywhere gives children the opportunity to dance around to all sorts of sounds and varying lengths of songs, from 1:04 to 3:32. My four- and two-year old prefer the CD to the DVD, even though the music is the same on both. They move to it in their car seats and they enjoy when I put it on in the house. They seem to prefer dancing on their own to seeing Christy's music class dancing and singing.
The video/DVD shows Christy with young students. They dance and sway to the music—Christy appears in the foreground, some of the action and objects or other videos appear in the background.
Some of the video elements work better than others. There are elements that seem unnatural, such as when Christy or the children are placed in the foreground and other activities occur in the background. Sometimes there are some choppy edits that add to the disjointed feeling of the video. One of the best sections was during the song "Has Anyone Here Seen Michael?," which lends itself to the live-action of the children and Christy playing hide and seek.
The DVD, which has some interactive parts, works well on a television, but I wasn't able to play it on my PC. The kids in the DVD seem a bit older than the suggested ages of 3 months to 3 years old, which might work for the interactivity of a child watching, but it might suggest something else to a younger child.
I appreciate the fact that both the CD and the DVD are packaged together—how often to you find a video that you like, with music, but you can only listen to the music if you watch the whole DVD? Little Virtuoso uses accessible musical instruments (sticks, shakers, etc.) this seems to make the music marketable to schools interested in musical appreciation, as well. The running time for the DVD/CD is about 28 minutes.
The music enjoys percussion and catchy tunes. One suggestion for the future packaging would be to list the songs. The names can be found on the DVD, but not the CD. The ten songs are: "Hello Song;" "Carpenter Carl" (encourages hammering); a Western-esque "Clap Your Hands" (tapping, clapping and other interactivity for the kids); "Frog Went a Shakin'" (shakers are featured here), "Has Anyone Here Seen Michael?," "Can You Spin Around With Me?," "Music's Everywhere," "TD's Jam" (a jazzy instrumental), "Lullaby," and "Good-by Song."
Music's Everywhere seems to encompass so much—where do you go from everywhere? Since Little Virtuoso's theme is "Opening little minds to music," keeping that in mind, there is a lot more to grow with. It will be super to follow what Little Virtuoso releases next.
