A Lady of Breeding and Refinement

I have always been fascinated by the way my daughter's mind works.  She is now eight years old, which means that my wife and I are now facing the fact that we must give over some of the influence that we have enjoyed these past years to the outside forces of teachers, school friends, television, and of course the internet.  This is not something that we will relinquish without a fight, although we recognize and take some pride in that fact that the choices she now makes reflect the quality of our parenting over the years.  And she has not let us down.

My wife and I are both trained musicians, but our tastes in music differ greatly.  We manage to agree on a few artists, enough so that we can listen to the radio together without any major meltdowns.  We also strive to influence our daughter's tastes in music.

 

We have tried to influence her tastes before.  As a baby and toddler, we did not dress her in pink.  My wife is a somewhat reformed tomboy herself and wanted to pass that on to our little girl.  However, when she was old enough to communicate her own choices on clothing and decorations we found ourselves inundated with goods and clothing in every shade of pink imaginable.  Her room right now is enough to strike a unicorn blind.  When asked about her choice in hues, she gave an answer as profound as it is innocent: "Pink makes me happy."  And as her father, that's enough for me.

Which brings me to the point of this post.

I like recurring themes in blogs.  A friend of mine over at the professional appreciator frequently posts his "Top 10 Songs of the Moment" which I often use as a compass for groups I should listen to.  His taste in music is pretty similar to mine.  So I'm stealing his idea and making it my own.  Since this is a blog about parenting and family, the music selections will be my Princess's, not mine.

My iPod contains some 7000+ songs at the moment, so what Princess and I decided to do was listen to music together, and she would have veto power over any song she didn't like.  So we put on some headphones together, hit "shuffle all songs" and started listening. Here are the first ten songs she liked, and my comments.

Princess's Top 10 of the Moment 1/24/10

Artist | Title | Album

#1 Moxy Früvous | River Valley | Bargainville

I was introduced this this little known Canadian group during a high-school trip to North Dakota.  I like their harmonies and their humor.  For those who don't know their style, think of early work by Barenaked Ladies.

#2 Budapest Symphony Orchestra | Ride of the Valkyries | Watchmen Soundtrack

I was kind of proud that she picked one of my few orchestral pieces.  She told me that she recognized it from a video game she has.

#3 Lauryn Hill | Tell Him |  The Mis-Education of Lauryn Hill

I got this CD in college from one of those "Buy 12 for $1" record company deals.  I forgot to send this one back in time.  

#4  Kidz Bop Kids | Girlfriend | Kidz Bop 12

With a spot of particularly effective manipulation my Princess coerced me into obtaining the Kidz Bop musical anthology.  For those who are unfamiliar with Avril Levigne's Girlfriend it contains such poetic lines as, She's like, so "whatever".

#5 Pulp | Cocaine Socialism | This is Hardcore (Deluxe Edition bonus disc)

Pulp is a really excellent brit-pop band who hit their stride in the 90's but went on hiatus in 2003.  I was very pleasantly surprised by my Princess's inclusion of this song.

 #6 Taylor Swift | Forever and Always | Fearless

Don't judge me.

#7 Big & Rich | Filthy Rich | Comin' To Your City

My wife is more of a country music fan than I am, but I like some of their stuff too.  Though Horse of a Different Color was by far their best album.

#8 The Dixie Chicks | Godspeed | Home

One of the sweetest lullabies ever written.  I can't help it, I'm kind of a big old softie where this song is concerned. 

#9 Elton John | Your Song | The Very Best of Elton John

This is just a pleasant song.  I defy you to argue that point.

#10 Elton John | Rocket Man | The Very Best of Elton John

I only have this one EJ album, so I was somewhat surprised to hear two songs from it.

So all in all I think Princess did pretty well for her first time out.  She isn't much of a hard rocker, but then anybody who knows her wouldn't be surprised by that fact.  Luckily, I don't have any Jonas Brothers music on my iPod, otherwise that would have definitely dominated this list.  And for the record, during the process of picking out the 10 songs for this list, 114 songs were vetoed.

This was a lot of fun, so you'll probably see another top 10 list from the Princess soon.