Friday, November 24, 2006
Dan Zane
I think a whole post should be devoted solely to the world of Dan Zane. As I write this, one of his videos is playing on the Disney Channel. He turns "Ride, Sally, Ride" into a house party, as kids jump and stomp amidst an improvising group of loose jazz musicians - and hey, throw in a Jamaican-style dub rapper for good measure. In fact, Zane has made House Party a video unto itself.
But say you don't have a reliable broadband connection or a Flash player installed in your Web browser. No problem. Because here is the thing I really like about Zane's site. He not only provides the usual links to buying his merchandise, checking his tour dates or other commercially interested data, but he shares the music through Lyrics and Chords for all the songs he has recorded. That's eight albums full of folk classics, silly sing-alongs, train songs, and more, complete with lyrics, guitar chords and sound files, just in case you "misremember" the melodies. For a youth librarian armed with a guitar like yours truly, that's a great resource!*
As the photos gallery of Zane's site demonstrates, the world Zane has created through music and friends is both very personal and idiosyncratic, yet all-encompassing of various cultural and personal styles. For kids, it's accessibly silly, fun and creative. My first thought on seeing one of his Disney videos was, "Who's the wild haired dude with the banjo and checkerboard socks?" My second thought was, "Does he babysit?" Unlike so many commodity personas targeted at the youth demographic, Zane's kid-friendliness is not adult-hostile. He communicates a sense of innocence and playfulness without being cloying or condescending. He respects the intelligence of both child and adult. Personally, I would rather live in his world than the paranoid, violent one that surrounds us. Naive artistic utopias such as the one Zane offers are worth advocating, if only to offer children an alternative vision of human interaction based on the joy found in creating playfully with others.
*One caveat: Not all lyrics and chords are available due to copyright restrictions. But Zane advises a little searching of the Internet for less restrictive resources. I plan on blogging about such resources soon.
But say you don't have a reliable broadband connection or a Flash player installed in your Web browser. No problem. Because here is the thing I really like about Zane's site. He not only provides the usual links to buying his merchandise, checking his tour dates or other commercially interested data, but he shares the music through Lyrics and Chords for all the songs he has recorded. That's eight albums full of folk classics, silly sing-alongs, train songs, and more, complete with lyrics, guitar chords and sound files, just in case you "misremember" the melodies. For a youth librarian armed with a guitar like yours truly, that's a great resource!*
As the photos gallery of Zane's site demonstrates, the world Zane has created through music and friends is both very personal and idiosyncratic, yet all-encompassing of various cultural and personal styles. For kids, it's accessibly silly, fun and creative. My first thought on seeing one of his Disney videos was, "Who's the wild haired dude with the banjo and checkerboard socks?" My second thought was, "Does he babysit?" Unlike so many commodity personas targeted at the youth demographic, Zane's kid-friendliness is not adult-hostile. He communicates a sense of innocence and playfulness without being cloying or condescending. He respects the intelligence of both child and adult. Personally, I would rather live in his world than the paranoid, violent one that surrounds us. Naive artistic utopias such as the one Zane offers are worth advocating, if only to offer children an alternative vision of human interaction based on the joy found in creating playfully with others.
*One caveat: Not all lyrics and chords are available due to copyright restrictions. But Zane advises a little searching of the Internet for less restrictive resources. I plan on blogging about such resources soon.
