New Lullaby CD Review- Spirit of Change, Sep. 2010

Aaron Larget-Caplan
New Lullaby
Six String Sound 888-01

Sometimes a CD sounds so unpretentious, so simple, and so lovely that you just want to reach out and cradle someone in your arms. That’s what I did with our pooch, Daisy Mae Doven, as guitarist Aaron Larget-Caplan wove his spell. A faculty member at the New School of Music in Cambridge and co-founder of the monthly 3rd Wednesday Concert Series, Larget-Caplan began his Lullaby Project in 2006. The call for new lullabies of all sorts received an enthusiastic response. Soon after the first lullaby arrived from composers young and old, his house burned down. Two months later, his wife, who teaches body physics and sacred geometry, sustained major injuries in an accident. If anyone needed lullabies, it was Larget-Caplan.

Thankfully, lullabies kept coming. All 14 lullabies on the CD were first premiered at Harvard, the New School of Music, St. Paul’s Church in Brookline, or the Ogunquit Museum of American Art in Maine. All composers provide short introductions to their babies in the liner notes.
Every lullaby is different. “Disturbed, a Lullaby,” is by David Leisner, one of Larget-Caplan’s teachers at the New England Conservatory of Music. As its title reveals, it is a lullaby for a troubled time. Carson Cooman, who wrote “Unfolding the Gates of Dawn: A Morning Lullaby”, writes: “Though lullabies are usually thought of as ‘night music’, this lullaby is for the morning.”

In short, some of these non-stereotypical songs are one giant crib away from your usual innocuous cradlesong. Happy or sad, placid or perilous, I find them universally engrossing. And thanks to Larget-Caplan’s discernment and sensitive playing, even the most provocative is pretty much lovable. Move over, Daisy Mae. There’s room on the couch for two.

Jason Victor Serinus is a holistic author, bodyworker, whistling virtuoso and music critic (http://www.jasonserinus.com) who resides in Oakland, CA. Please send music review copies to Jason at 2749 E. 17th Street, Oakland, CA 94601 or emailjserinus@planeteria.net.