American Folk, Game and Activity Songs for Children

Album Review

This hour-long CD combines the entirety of two children's-oriented Seeger LPs, 1953's American Folk Songs for Children and 1962's American Game and Activity Songs for Children, onto one disc. The eleven songs on American Folk Songs for Children were specifically selected from an identically titled book anthology of folk songs for children collected by Seeger's stepmother, Ruth Crawford Seeger. Pete Seeger renders them plainly and simply, singing and playing and banjo, on a program designed especially (but not solely) for children between three and seven years of age. "Jim Crack Corn," "Frog Went A-Courting," and "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain" are some of the better-known tunes on the record, but not all of them are as overly familiar. American Game and Activity Songs for Children focuses especially on songs associated with activities and dancing, sometimes sung a cappella, sometimes sung with accompaniment from Seeger's banjo. "Skip to My Lou," "Ring Around the Rosy," "Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush," and "Yankee Doodle" are some of the more well-known songs here — at this point, they're probably more over-familiar than they were when the album was first released — but there are less overdone ones here too, including the spiritual "Liza Jane."