My wife is a teacher in the provincial Catholic board, and as one of her many self-imposed duties, has taken it upon herself over the decades to introduce her students–a kind of suburban inner-city demographic–to music they will almost assuredly not have heard before. This isn’t (just) to say “My dudes, have you heard the latest Metallica single? Kirk has this solo that he shreds” -kind of exposure so much as, “Hey, so there was this band called The Beatles… oh, and here’s some blues… and some Beach Boys… and some classical… and if you like Beyoncé, there were these singers named Ella Fitzgerald and Etta James and Aretha Franklin you need to hear…”
Just some broadening of musical horizons beyond the rap and hip-hop that tends to dominate their listening experiences. Stuff to show them that there were things that pre-dated Drake and Lil Nas X, and by the way, it’s not just okay or even good, but great stuff. (And it’s worked, by the way. Now when her students are working on something they need some quiet time for, they’ll ask her to play some Jack Johnson because they genuinely enjoy it.)
So when she was gearing up her kids for Valentine’s Day, she asked me to kindly throw together a 4th/5th grade, Catholic school-appropriate Valentine’s playlist on my train commute to work.
It started off as pretty easy, particularly diving into the doo-wop era of singing about being in love and falling in love and missing your true love. It got harder as I was seeking more modern stuff, with our cultural shift to singing more openly about sex rather than love–and there were a couple that I’d thought were fine but then on checking the lyrics I realized wouldn’t cut it for this specific project (Marry Me, Archie by Alvvays, for instance, is great but finishes with “Too late to go out, too young to stay in/They’re talking about us living in sin”, so not great for the Catholic crew; and while Macy Gray’s song The Heart is nothing short of excellent, it’s a undeniable deep downer about having lost a love, which wasn’t the vibe I think nine- and ten-year olds want to hear just yet)–but I was still able to cobble together a playlist of over 50 songs.
And so, I present to you, for your Valentines listening pleasure that you can safely share with your kiddos, Jackie’s Valentunes.
Hope you enjoy it.