awesome vocal performances by kids

there are already 3 threads about kids' contributions to other people's songs, ex. that one Smog song and that one Lou Reed song and that one Clash song and so on. but what are some good songs where kids (say, pre-teen) are the principal performers?

surely few things can beat the obscure Motown classic "Hang On Bill" by Little Lisa, 8-year-old daughter and niece of the similarly obscure Motown duo The Lewis Sisters:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpyOUJVW4v4

or, like, MJ in the Jackson 5. what else though?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUHYnOTJ_uk&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=063k8OfR-fE&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDErRCocwl0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jWSxev7eJvs

would also say...

-Brenda Lee's early rockabilly sides: "Dynamite", "Jambalaya", "Bigelow 6-200", "One Step at a Time", "Some People"
-all of the fast songs by Spanish tween popstar Alicia Granados (like this one about her Pekingese puppy)
-Prudence - "A Smile and a Ribbon"
-Hunky Dory - "It's Love"
-Fantastic Everlasting Gobstopper - "Schoolgirl Psychedelia"

(there's a chance that those last two are just twee grownups pretending to be kids. él Records and Siesta Records are like that sometimes :-/)

Stella - Porquoi Pas Moi

love the total lack of enthusiasm here. several years later she married Christian Vander and joined Magma)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HgI6CMdlHM0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F07o5_AP6zw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8VRNPPS1As

Kitsy Christner and Therese Williams recorded a novelty album as ten-year-olds. Forty years later, Dandelions is an Internet sensation.

yours for only $500 on ebay. really fun album though.

Chandra - Kate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6HtP7sy8pWs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzWAylk7G5Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3IxZ7ZXY-4U

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTYP0pYDbBo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-LwocqYj3f0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=He4leA1NdOQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzWAylk7G5Y

― sleeve, Friday, April 29, 2011 4:49 PM (7 hours ago)

this is...heartbreakingly unfunky. but mostly lol. I always wondered what the Langley Schools Music Project would sound like if their conductor was Wesley Willis.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oh9XgGGh4L4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V31ELGWqmxc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3AEL9bhftw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AeGLqYIrvVQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZhfGyRlSro

still probably the best song ever

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QONdRS0br1Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlEur-t28ZU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmL7FCNLICs

Miss Angela Denise Simpson is a six year old poet. A product of New York City. Miss Simpson has been speaking since she was two and is widely sought after for her recitations. She has appeared at the Apollo Theater and numerous places of entertainment. [...] Miss Simpson is one of the youngest members of the N.A.A.C.P. and at their first annual award affair she walked away with quite a few honors.

one of those "only in the '70s" things, I guess.

http://i54.tinypic.com/678t55.jpg

Lucky Peterson's father, bluesman James Peterson, owned a nightclub in Buffalo called The Governor's Inn. The club was a regular stop for fellow bluesmen such as Willie Dixon. Dixon saw a five-year-old Lucky Peterson performing at the club and, in Peterson's words, "Took me under his wing." Months later, Peterson performed on The Tonight Show, The Ed Sullivan Show and What's My Line?. Millions of people watched Peterson sing "1-2-3-4", a cover version of "Please, Please, Please" by James Brown. At the time, Peterson said "his father wrote it". Around this time he recorded his first album, Our Future: 5 Year Old Lucky Peterson for Today/Perception Records and appeared on the public televison show Soul!.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74EBgHn9zXQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rcq93txBdtM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJx-sNXhTEc&feature=related

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o5WzGlkeafo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmO4xdnf6Gk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIdFkjJKH14

WHOAH @ jazmine sullivan!

did frank robinson ever find his dad?

they are all beautiful, disconcerting player pianos

did frank robinson ever find his dad?

it is one of the great unsolved mysteries

they are all beautiful, disconcerting player pianos

really though? not all kid musicians are pushed around and exploited and deprived of creative input the way, for instance, Lena Zavaroni* was. I think it's possible to tell the difference between kids who are just parroting back their music lessons because mom and dad are evil stage parents and a prodegies who are lucky enough to have supportive adults and a public audience, and I don't think there's anything particularly disconcerting about the latter (tbf there can be some overlap between the former and the latter: see MJ).

that said, it does get annoying when acts like The Shaggs or the Langley Schools kids get held up as untaught innocents making music for the sheer joy of it, as if such a quality isn't accessible to anyone, regardless of age, who picks up an instrument in the right mindset. on the one hand some child stars are treated as novelties because they have a level of poise and technical skill that's normally reserved for adults, and on the other hand certain non-stars (again, The Shaggs) are treated as novelties because of the supposed rawness and outsider charm that stems from their lack of technical skill. it's hard, with adult ears, to hear any singer under the age of 14 or so as anything other than a novelty (good or bad), but that probably has more to do with the rarity of that age group in pop music than with the merits of the music itself. [/ramble]

*who made some of the most indefensibly shitty music of all time, even in her adulthood. um RIP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keknvMXL3Oo

written and recorded in 1968 when he was 11. Steve Tyler played drums on another one of his singles from that year, and Mark would later tour with Aerosmith.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QhCwQ8ETdoc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EwkhfG-BR4Q

Everything that was thrilling about 2008:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4TIitZpqv4

I wouldn't call this an awesome performance, but Miss Abrams and the Strawberry Point Third Grade Class's 'Mill Valley' is an interesting cultural curio that reached #90 on Billboard in 1970:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-YaWE0zu-c

(video directed by Francis Ford Coppola)

1. Kabin Krew & Lisdoonvarna Krew “The Spark“ fun rap song by Irish kids and maybe not awesome but worth checking out . Is on Chuck Eddy's songs of the year list for 2024 and has been nominated here on ilx as well

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=njE3EknkkBY