Counting- III

This week I'm ahead of the game time-wise (yay!), and I'd like to share my favorite number song for children with you. It's called "Bye-m, Bye." I learned about it from a compilation called "American Folk Songs for Children," by Ruth Crawford Seeger.

As a music composition student at Oberlin Conservatory, being a "woman" composer was still a "thing." While I surely hope it isn't a "thing" anymore, I bring it up now because Ruth Crawford Seeger was a visionary composer- not just as a woman but in general. I learned about her there, and I admired her. You see, the question was, "Why are there so few women composers (that we know about)?" An answer was, (I kid you not) "Men have more time to focus on music because childcare is less of a concern/expectation for them."

Missing from that conversation was the importance of music for a young child's development, and the role woman have played as innovators and conveyors of that music over time. I think Ruth Crawford Seeger recognized this, and although the way to be "established" as a composer at the time was to produce avant-garde orchestral music (which she also did), she produced her truly one of a kind collections of folk songs for children anyway- all the while raising her own family and most definitely singing the songs from her books to her own children (one of whom was Pete Seeger).

If you are reading this article, you are probably someone who might sing for children- whether as a parent, grandparent, caretaker or teacher. If you are someone who does this, you might know what it feels like when you find a song that just "works." It feels great to sing- it "speaks to you." "Bye-m, Bye" is one of those songs for me, and while I sing it differently than the recording below (as appropriate to the folk tradition), when I sing it, I know I pass that feeling on to young children, comfortably nestling those numbers into their minds and fingers. (One of these days I'll record my version)!

Play the video below to hear what the song sounds like, and stay tuned next week for more number song fun!

Learn more about Ruth Crawford Seeger!