All The Blackbirds

Album: Young Maestros Vol. 1 (2021)
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Songfacts®:

  • The blackbirds in this song are the black keys on a piano, which when played together, make beautiful music. It's part of Tracy Bonham's album of kids' music, Young Maestros Vol. 1.

    Bonham, known for her 1996 hit "Mother Mother," has long been interested in teaching kids about music. She spent many years studying classical violin, which gave her an understanding of what works - and what doesn't - when it comes to music instruction.

    "I started teaching young children piano, and I wanted to find the right way to teach a child how to just play a song and have it sound beautiful," she told Songfacts. "I thought the black keys look a lot like blackbirds, and it developed from there. Little kids would really respond to that. Then I noticed the pattern of the keys sitting in groups of two and groups or three, and that's a really easy way to teach how to play the black notes on the piano. And whenever you play a black note with another black note, it's going to sound good."
  • The song is embedded with instructions on how to play a song, with Bonham singing out the fingerings for the piano. "if a child or grown-up actually goes up and plays those in that order, they're going to hear the song," she says.

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