The Little People’s Music Label That Could

Deidre Gold-Engler didn’t know it, but the other day she delivered the ultimate compliment to the folks at Music for Little People.

She said she never heard of the children’s record company, but as she took mental stock of the large home musical library she and her young sons enjoy, the company’s “Choo Choo Boogaloo” by Buckwheat Zydeco came up on her short list.

“It’s a different kind of music. It’s not your everyday, like Barney,” said Gold-Engler about the raucous train ride to the Mardi Gras, released in 1994. “I like it ‘cause parents can get into it. We dance around.”

That, indeed, is the sweetest music to the ears of executives at the largest independent children’s record company in the United States. Sure, they would love it if every family with children was familiar with their label, especially after 15 years in business. But it’s tough if you’re not Disney or Sony, and your titles don’t bear names like Mickey or Pooh.

So, like the Little Engine That Could, Music for Little People continues to steadily pursue its mission--to create entertaining and educational music that introduces children to a wide variety of musical styles and cultures.

Its 15th anniversary collection is a lens into the breadth and uniqueness of the label’s 70 recordings.

The recording, with a numerically appropriate 15 songs, begins with the lively “Iko Iko” from “Choo Choo Boogaloo.” It’s followed by “Baby Beluga” by pioneer Raffi, which appears on “A Child’s Celebration of Song,” and “Yellow Submarine” by the Beatles, remade on “All You Need Is Love,” a collection of Beatles songs sung by kids. The recording winds up with “Mdube” (The Lion Sleeps Tonight) by South African singers Ladysmith Black Mambazo from their “Gift of the Tortoise.”

But the recording skims only the surface of the label’s offerings, which include two Grammy nominees. There are blues, rock, folk, a capella, country, reggae, Cajun, hip-hop and classical. Surf and Irish music is ready for release. Star power is provided by artists such as Linda Ronstadt, Los Lobos, the Persuasions, Sweet Honey in the Rock and Sheila E.

Maria Muldaur of “Midnight at the Oasis” fame has contributed to several Music for Little People collections and recorded two solo albums--”On the Sunny Side,” a group of vaudeville, minstrel and country classics, and “Swingin’ in the Rain,” which recalls the days when swing was king.

“I feel that children deserve to hear as wonderful musicianship as adults deserve to hear and as well-written songs as is possible for them to hear,” Muldaur says.

Leib Ostrow had always been into music. He listened to Pete Seeger as a kid. He owned a chain of musical instrument shops in the Detroit area before moving to California and opening a shop in the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. As a young father, he was disappointed in the music for kids.

“A lot of it tended to be condescending and there weren’t a lot of choices,” he says. “These days people take it for granted, but back then you went into record stores and all there was was Disney.”

So he and his former wife borrowed $10,000 from the local credit union and put together a catalog of the best kids’ music they could find--25 recordings from artists such as Raffi, Fred Penner and John McKutcheon. They named their distribution company Music for Little People.

“We mortgaged our home and land, and took a deep breath and the response was pretty incredible,” says Ostrow. “Pretty quickly we were hiring every neighbor in sight to help us pack boxes. Within four years, we were the biggest employer for 50 miles in any direction.

“We were a bunch of young, idealistic people trying to live in a different way, with more human values, and get closer to nature. There was a collective vision and I was being a spokesperson for it with children’s music.”

In a few years, Ostrow began to think what at first seemed too ambitious--that he could create new music for kids.

“Taj Mahal was one of my heroes and I had a connection and approached him and asked him if he wanted to do a kids’ thing,” said Ostrow.

The answer from the legendary blues guitarist was yes, and the result was “Shake Sugaree,” a collection of folksy, bluesy and sunshiny tunes. Since then, Ostrow has traveled the world to create great music for kids.

So how does Ostrow know what will work?

“It’s an instinctual thing,” he says. “I love world music and I’ve said music is an international passport and can bring people together and I’ve seen Music for Little People really do that.”

Reworked Classics Are a Label Staple

Most of the recordings include re-creations of classic songs the executives and artists grew up with or songs that have been passed through generations. Many are sung by children, including Ostrow’s.

Jerry Lawson, lead singer of the Persuasions, saw the gap close in response to “On the Good Ship Lollipop,” a collection of original and classic children’s tunes such as “Teddy Bear’s Picnic” and “Big Rock Candy Mountain” done in the group’s a capella style.

“Of all the albums I did over the years, I haven’t had the kind of reception in my hometown from another album,” says Lawson, who is from Brooklyn, where the group mapped out the recording. “For a company that far up in the woods, they’ve got a lot of power.”

Like many socially conscious companies, however, Music for Little People learned that it needed more than good music to stay viable.

So when Warner Bros. offered to buy the company, Ostrow agreed to sell a half-interest. But the company grew too quickly and almost went bankrupt in the mid-1990s. Ostrow ended the partnership and brought in as president Sheron Sherman, a turnaround specialist who had worked for a Christian music company in Nashville, Tenn.

Ironically, the mother of a 9-year-old and 23-year-old didn’t know anything about the company until she saw the job listing in Billboard magazine. She says that made her all the more committed to finding ways to spread the word.

“I didn’t have children’s music, just some Disney stuff and some funny little tapes. I think it was because of the region I was in,” says Sherman.

Sherman has her eyes set on the Internet, video and television.

The company also hopes to begin advertising on television with a spot on the TV Guide preview channel featuring Shelley Duvall. Duvall is working on “Seven Seas,” a recording about pirates and the water.