LIAM MALOY PHD

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This blog supplements the book by looking at the music on records, radio shows, television and films that have been made for children or become associated with children over the years.

 

The book and blog examine not only the music, but the social, historical and industrial discourses that affect how the music for children is made and distributed. The chapters are case studies that highlight the dominant and competing discourses in which the songs and music were forged, assumptions and unspoken ideologies by those 'hidden adults' that communicate how institutions and society conceived of the child in those places at those times.

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The chapters are about what adults communicate often unconsciously and unwittingly to child through music.

They include:

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• the problems and unexpected consequences of writing songs to meet a self-created curriculum (Sesame Street).

• how the BBC's paternalistic and ideological notions of the child and the family  informed their radio programming during the corporation's first 60 years (Children's Hour, Children's Choice, Junior Choice).

• how Woody Guthrie's 400+ songs for children perfectly mirrored the progressive, modernist and socialist ideals of post-war New Deal New York.

• how music for children can address profound and complex themes (Bagpuss) .

• how music in 'family' television subverts narratives of childhood innocence through sex, violence, puppets and humour (The Muppet Show).

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Spinning the Child is a major rewrite of my PhD which I completed at the University of Liverpool. The additional three years of primary research included a three-week visit to the Woody Guthrie Archives in Tulsa, OK, USA, the content analysis of the songs on the 85 albums on Sesame Street Records, and many interviews with current musicians, song writers, radio producers and managers involved in the creation of music for children.
 

 I continue to write, record and perform music for children and families with my band Johnny and the Raindrops.

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I spent nearly two decades as a Higher Education music lecturer before working on a major arts education research project. I am now a Senior Lecturer in Education at the University of Derby, UK.

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Previously, I had a major label record deal with BritPop band Soda in the 1990s, was in other bands, and worked as the music coach on the Joy Division biopic Control.  

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My aim here is to stimulate conversation and discussion about music made for children. Please get in touch with questions and requests.

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'Stay awake and keep dreaming.

Hope is the fuel that keep the fire burning' 

('A Song Full of Hope' by Johnny & the Raindrops)