Tag Archives: Jeff Giles

Book/CD Review: “Sunday in Kyoto”

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51NR43fS3yL._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]You may never have heard of Gilles Vigneault, but he’s a cultural icon in Canada, particularly in Quebec, where his music so popular that one of his songs has replaced “Happy Birthday” as the birthday party anthem of choice. One of Vigneault’s fans is Roland Stringer, founder of publishing company The Secret Mountain; he’s referred to Vigneault as “French Canada’s Pete Seeger,” and now, he’s giving Vigneault a chance to raise his profile with American listeners — and readers — with Secret Mountain’s latest beautifully packaged book/CD combo, Sunday in Kyoto.

A collection of 14 Vigneault songs performed by Canadian singers including Patrick Watson, Thomas Hellman, Coral Egan, and Vigneault’s daughter Jessica, Kyoto highlights Gilles’ gentle whimsy; the title track, for instance, is about a Cajun musician who lives in Kyoto with his Japanese wife, where they lead jam sessions and perform for Buddhist monks (“Let me tell you about Yoshi / Fingers dancing on the harp / Has a pond of swimming carp / Just don’t say the word ‘sushi'”). Other songs continue in the same vein, from the sprightly “When the Danse Began” to the mock-operatic “Four Eggs” and effortlessly catchy “The Great Big Kite.” The arrangements are clean and jazzy, with charmingly silly vocal contributions from the singers, and the lyrics manage to be appropriate and educational while also avoiding your typical well-worn kids’ music subjects (one notable exception is “One, Two, Three, ABCD,” which will use copious amounts of Jew’s harp and lyrics about bovine peeing and farting to squeeze gales of laughter out of your children). Continue reading →

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CD Review: Peter Himmelman, “My Trampoline”

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51EienGk3NL._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]Before They Might Be Giants turned crossing over to kid’s music into a viable business model, Peter Himmelman was doing it — and unlike the whimsical TMBG, Himmelman never seemed like a natural fit for a younger demographic. This isn’t to say Himmelman’s “adult” CDs are inappropriate for younger ears, but they aren’t exactly whimsical, either; in fact, they’re often harrowing self-examinations prompted by grown-up stuff like death, heartbreak, or — in the case of 1992’s absolutely devastating “Untitled” — a long ride with an anti-Semitic cab driver.

So yes, Peter Himmelman may not have been the artist most likely to start a second career as a performer of children’s songs, but here’s the thing: as anyone who’s followed his artistic path is aware, he’s comfortable writing in pretty much any genre (including scoring for TV, which he’s done quite a bit in the last 10 years), and no matter what he does, he always writes honestly, which is the key ingredient in this stuff. That honesty, coupled with Himmelman’s keen eye for beauty and deep insight, is what makes his kids’ CDs so special — a collection now expanded to include his latest effort, My Trampoline. Here, for example, is how he describes his inspiration for the My Trampoline track “Ten Billion Blades of Grass”: Continue reading →

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DVD Review: “Pooh’s Heffalump Halloween Movie”

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51gZMX4mKoL._SCLZZZZZZZ_[1]It’s a stitched-together reissue, and Pooh purists who reject any non-Milne-created character will scoff at it, but Pooh’s Heffalump Halloween Movie should give the junior Hundred Acre Wood lovers in your household plenty of October fun — and since it comes bundled with new extra content and a stuffed animal, you get a little extra bang for your buck, too.

Heffalump was originally released in 2005, but it’s a little more complicated than that: basically, the movie’s story forms a loose bookend around Boo to You Too! Winnie the Pooh, a 1996 television special that’s stuffed in the middle (and actually makes up more than half of the whole program). How does that work? Well, Heffalump revolves around a Halloween celebration that’s ruined when Pooh eats all the candy, and in order to save the holiday, everyone has to run around in the woods to find a wish-granting Gobloon. Lumpy, the Heffalump that will give Milne loyalists conniptions, is afraid to go Gobloon-hunting, so his best friend Roo relays the story of a fateful Halloween for Piglet — a flashback that plunks Boo to You right down in the middle of the movie. Make sense?

If you’ve never seen Boo to You, it won’t matter much; aside from some slightly flaky animation and some transfer artifacts, there isn’t much of a difference between that and the newer content that frames Pooh’s Heffalump Halloween Movie, and in any case, the whole thing delivers all the sweet, modestly paced adventure we look for in our Pooh movies. My daughter (who’s almost four) and son (who’s almost two) enjoyed it, even if they weren’t held rapt by it, and I’m sure we’ll revisit Heffalump again before Halloween.

The extra content includes a variety of games, including DVD and DVD-ROM material, and a “party planner” that gives you printable bingo cards, invitations, recipes, and more for your holiday shindig.

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The set also includes a Winnie the Pooh stuffed doll (fittingly for the Halloween theme, he’s wearing a Tigger costume).

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