Leave Your Sleep

Once upon a time, I thoroughly enjoyed listening to music. I listened to it as often as I could. I loved discovering great new songs by artists I knew and I loved discovering artists I hadn't heard of.

Then I had children.

Suddenly, the Wiggles sounded good to me. Imagination Movers rocked. And LIVE music -- forget it. How could I see a show that started at 10pm? That is when I am going to bed. It was a sad, sad situation.

To further complicate things, my children are really into music.....and they have very definitive opinions about the kind of music they like. These days, they ONLY want to hear female singers. Hey - at least we have moved beyond the Wiggles, right?

Recently I discovered Natalie Merchant's new cd, Leave Your Sleep. You can hear it playing in the background of the video. The girls LOVE it. They spent an hour choreographing dances to the cd on Friday.

The cd has so many different styles of music; from folk music to Irish/celtic to reggae. There are some musician who contributed who you will recognize (Medeski, Martin and Wood) and others you might not (Katell Keineg).

The lyrics are actually poems -- ee cummings, some nursery rhymes, etc. The song in the video is ee cummings.

I love it and the girls love it and thank goodness it isn't Imagination Movers!

You can listen to the song here. Check it out it will be worth you while.

P.S. Now watch the video again and check out Sweet Latham watching the girls dance.

MAGGIE AND MILLY AND MOLLY AND MAY

E. E. Cummings (1894 – 1962)

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles, and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles: and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)
it's always ourselves we find in the sea