Baby Music

My husband and I share a lot of love for music. We like all kinds of music, but lately, we've been trying to figure out what the best baby music is. Of course, there's always the classical music, and we got a Baby Einstein CD at a shower, and of course have lots of Debussy in our iTunes, but we are also looking in our own favorites to find what kinds of things we'll play for the baby.

Usually, it works like this: We're in the car, driving to somewhere, and one of us puts in a new CD.

"This would be good baby music, don't you think?"

"Um, I guess so. Well, actually, I think it definitely would. I think I'd like it if I was a baby."

We actually make a lot of hypothetical important parenting decisions this way. It's pretty effective so far, and we have amassed a fair sized mental list of music that the baby will be forced to listen to before it is old enough to tell us it hates it. Most of the music is either upbeat and poppy, like Of Montreal, and we feel will be fun to dance with baby to it, or is relaxing and pretty, like Bonnie Prince Billy (sort of folksy alt-country), which we will play when it's time to quiet down and get ready for bed. In any case, we'll have to see what actually works. We had hoped that Animal Collective would be a family favorite, but when we went to see their show at Variety Playhouse a few months back, the baby exhibited some distress calls. Mainly kicking me in the ribs repeatedly when the music got too loud. But don't worry, I did my research, and as long as you don't go to rock shows every day, you should be fine... Let's just hope I didn't scar the baby before it's born from liking music.