Kids Summer

Summertime is kids' fun time, and nothing says fun like music. In fact, the Beach Boys say it three times in "Fun, Fun, Fun." While we're in triplet mode, Samuel E. Wright's "Hot, Hot, Hot," from The Little Mermaid II, is pure island energy. "Jammin'," on the other hand, is all about Bob Marley and Co. taking a moment to r-e-l-a-x. Allan Sherman outlines the many "joys" of summer camp in his immortal "Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah (a Letter From Camp)."

What's summer without a baseball game or seven? Dora the Explorer's "Baseball, Baseball, Fun In the Sun" celebrates America's favorite sport. For less sports-oriented, science-minded kids, They Might Be Giants explain the phenomenon of summer's heat in "Why Does the Sun Shine? (the Sun Is a Mass of Incandescent Gas)." And the Trashmen are delighting their fourth generation of kids with their surf classic, "Surfin' Bird."

Actor John Lithgow, as it turns out, has a very pleasant voice. Who knew? Clearly the people who recorded him doing Frank Loesser's classic "The Inchworm" did, and now we do too. "Skipping Stones," a distinctly summertime pleasure, is given its due by the angel-voiced Rebecca Frezza. And alt-babes Elizabeth Mitchell and Lisa Loeb capture the ethereal beauty of order Lepidoptera in "Butterfly."

Ah, to be a kid in summer again. No school. The Slip'n Slide on the front lawn, or maybe just the open fire hydrant down the block. Stickball, hide-and-seek, making lanyards in summer camp, catching tadpoles down by the creek, endless suffocating hours in the back of the station wagon to see relatives that are just going to embarrass you, getting threatened by the neighborhood bully, being eaten alive by mosquitoes, spending three days looking for your cat Dimples, who freaked out during the 4th of July fireworks and jumped out the window…Uh, let's start again — this time with music.