Welcome to the world of MY MOOZIK – a musical venture for kids designed to bridge the gap between nursery rhymes and inappropriate pop music. My Moozik has been created by LOTTIE FAULKNER, the sister and manager of double-platinum artist NEWTON FAULKNER, who wrote the album with his older brother TOBY FAULKNER and close friend JIMMY SIMS.
In many ways, it makes sense that the Faulkner team have gone in this direction; their father Keith is a celebrated children’s author with well-known best sellers including The Wide Mouth Frog. They also have JOHN DAVIS on board, who mastered the album, and whose discography reads like a who’s who of music: The Killers, Led Zeppelin, U2, Dua Lipa, Noel Gallagher and Primal Scream among many others.
MY DAY, the CD album, comes packaged with a beautifully illustrated, hardback lyric book, with songs that can also be streamed and downloaded via all the usual platforms, and may be the first album that parents will truly love as much as their kids.
Each song on the album introduces a different genre of music. From the breakfast rap, to the rock n roll arrival at school, to the bath time sea shanty, it’s a musical experience that can help children identify and develop their personal tastes, encouraging them to sing and read along throughout.
As Lottie Faulkner says: “We wanted to create an album of high-quality music that kids and grown-ups can enjoy together, one that hopefully also makes those often-tough jobs such as making friends, eating greens and going to bed just that little bit easier. It’s an album that we hope will make a great soundtrack to their day. We understand the important role that music plays in helping children develop; we want to encourage and motivate them to grow into great little humans.”
As well as offering families an album that won’t make parents want to tear their hair out, it has also been designed to support kids and their development, exploring key themes such as the value of kindness, healthy eating, why we learn and everything in between. MY DAY considers the role that music can play in helping children manage routine and develop emotional intelligence.
DR ROSANNA EDEY, a researcher in Developmental Neuropsychology, explains: “We often forget that a child’s brain works very differently to that of an adult, which can make simple tasks seem much harder. Throughout childhood, the brain is busily absorbing information from the environment as it builds a neural network to help the child make sense of everything around them. Music is an ideal way to engage children and to help them learn. At around the age of four, children start to get much better at detecting basic elements of music, such as tempo and mode, which is why simple nursery rhymes start to get a bit boring for them. The more complex and varied songs in My Day are therefore not only more interesting to the developing brain, they also help to scaffold a route and teach some important social lessons.”
Newton, Lottie, Toby and Jimmy had a schedule planned to tour schools, kids’ festivals and book fairs throughout the UK in 2020 with signings, photo opportunities and all-singing all-dancing live shows featuring six children (Kitty, Joel, Daisy, Delilah, Beau and Zak) singing their way through a day in the life of a child. Titled MY FIRST GIG, the events were designed for families to experience live music together. Those plans naturally had to be postponed but rescheduling is under way to resurrect everything for 2021. In the meantime, MY DAY, provides what all of them hope will be an important step in a child’s experience, understanding and, importantly, love of music.
