Children’s Songs to Save Your Music Loving Soul

Okay, so you had a kid. This does not mean you have to listen to recordings of kids singing the “Itsy Bitsy Spider” all day. Some children’s music can be unbearably annoying. I am here to save you from endless repetition of the same four songs you can remember from your own childhood. Take a half hour to hop onto YouTube, Amazon, or I Tunes, and listen to a few of these:

Songs for dancing:

• “I really love to dance” by Laurie Berkner
• “Shake my sillies out” by Raffi (The version by Andy Mason is also jammin’.)
• “Robot Parade” by They Might Be Giants
• “Drive my car” by Laurie Berkner
• “We’re going on a bear hunt” by Michael Rosen
•  Try some old and new pop songs that are kid friendly like
  • “Day-O” by Harry Belafonte
  • “I’m a Believer” by The Monkees
  • “That’s what I like about you” by The Romantics
  • “Lollipop” by The Chordettes
  • “Firework” by Katy Perry
    
  • “Shut Up and Dance” by Walk the Moon (maybe a bit inappropriate if your child knows what shut up means, but we love it)
  • “The Best Day of my Life” by American Authors

Songs for sleeping:

• “Moon, moon, moon” by Laurie Berkner
• “The more we get together” by Raffi
• “You are my sunshine” by Jimmie Davis and Charles Mitchell, I like the Elizabeth Mitchell version
  
• “Lavender’s Blue (Dilly Dilly)” traditional, and it is in the new Disney Cinderella
• “All the pretty horses” traditional, I like the version by Charlotte Church
• “Hushabye Mountain” by Bobbie Gentry (or Dick Van Dyke in the movie Chitty Chitty Bang Bang)
• “Rainbow Round Me” by Ruth Pelham

Songs for being silly:

• “Apples and Bananas” by Raffi
• “Pig on her head” by Laurie Berkner
• “What kind of cat are you?” by Billy Jonas
• “Aikendrum” traditional Scottish song, but there is a version by Raffi
• “Five little hot dogs” several versions
• “The Old Gray Cat” traditional, just discovered I have been singing it wrong as I learned it to be an old black cat
• “Crazy ABC’s” by the Barenaked Ladies (Yes, they have a couple of children’s albums and the songs are hilarious)

I hope you find some new favorites from this list! Please tell me some of your favorite children’s songs!