Dance on a Moonbeam: A Collection of Songs and Poems

It's hard to even begin hanging musical descriptors on the late Bill Crofut. He came up during the folk boom of the 1950s and even then quietly defied tradition by setting the words of American poets such as Robert Penn Warren to banjo-inflected music, something he continued doing throughout his career with a variety of wordsmiths. Dance on a Moonbeam is his final treasure, a gift of sorts to children and their parents, delivered after Crofut's death in January 1999. Steeped in Shakespeare's words and a magical ability to weave together Renaissance-era moods and American folk music, Moonbeam exudes a warmth and soulfulness that Crofut and musical partner Chris Brubeck create with the simplest instrumentations--banjo, bass, piano, cello, and voices, mostly. Meryl Streep interjects brief readings of Shakespeare, a lovely complement to an incredible mix of Crofut's rustic folk with classically trained singers such as Dawn Upshaw, Julianne Baird, and Frederica von Stade. "Dandling Songs," "The Bear," "Simple Gifts," and "All Through the Night" alone among these 26 stellar cuts make this one of the best children's music recordings in ages. It eschews the simple means to a child's ear and instead aims for the heart and soul, which Moonbeam reaches over and over with wit and creative depths that will unfold for ages. --Andrew Bartlett