Creighton University

Music by Dean Jones.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  Rhyming quatrains -- heavy on "fox" and "socks" -- work through the fable.  This landscape book will appeal to young readers for the simple, direct art.  Multiple attempts by the fox yield nothing.  The music in this recording works with an echo effect, where the backup group echoes the words of the lead singer.  The story moralizes that it is easy to hate what we cannot have.

Music by Dean Jones.  The lyrics and music are printed at the end of the book.  Rhyming quatrains -- heavy on "fox" and "socks" -- work through the fable.  This landscape book will appeal to young readers for the simple, direct art.  Multiple attempts by the fox yield nothing.  The story moralizes that it is easy to hate what we cannot have.

Music by Erik Koskinen.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  Rhyming quatrains take the reader and listener through the fable.  The artist pictures the hare cleverly as having the same look on his face through about the first five pages.  The key moment comes when the rabbit "thought he could relax."  "Success comes not from what you say but how your talents are used!"  Hmmm….  Children will like the image of the rabbit trying to catch up at the end, where his legs become like fast-turning wheels.  Lively narrational music.

Music by Erik Koskinen.  The lyrics and music are printed at the end of the book.  Rhyming quatrains take the reader and listener through the fable.  The artist pictures the hare cleverly as having the same look on his face through about the first five pages.  The key moment comes when the rabbit "thought he could relax."  "Success comes not from what you say but how your talents are used!"  Hmmm….  Children will like the image of the rabbit trying to catch up at the end, where his legs become like fast-turning wheels.

Music by Dean Jones.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  Am I right to call the music something derived from dixieland jazz?  It is heavy on repeated lines.  The visual art moves nicely without textual reference through summer and fall and only then mentions winter.  The artist also has fun with the multiple limbs of the insects involved, as when the grasshopper on 11 waves with two right hands.  It is quite surprising when the ant simply takes the grasshopper into his home and says "I have plenty to eat."  For me it is even more surprising when the moral is announced: "Work hard, prepare, and you will not fail."  Does this version of the story bear that moral out?

Music by Dean Jones.  The lyrics and music are printed at the end of the book.  The text is heavy on repeated lines.  The visual art moves nicely without textual reference through summer and fall and only then mentions winter.  The artist also has fun with the multiple limbs of the insects involved, as when the grasshopper on 11 waves with two right hands.  It is quite surprising when the ant simply takes the grasshopper into his home and says "I have plenty to eat."  For me it is even more surprising when the moral is announced: "Work hard, prepare, and you will not fail."  Does this version of the story bear that moral out?

Music by Mark Oblinger.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  The melody line of the music is -- appropriately -- close to "Mary Had a Little Lamb."  There is also nice honky-tonk piano.  The villagers get angry upon even the first deception.  The visual art may be among the best in this series.  The architecture is Russian or at least Eastern European.  The trees are swirly and the sheep curly.  Those various things tend to make the boy -- and especially his face -- stand out in almost every scene.  They also highlight the wolf when he really does appear.  Does it help to add the phrase "lots of lies" to the moral?  "If you tell lies, lots of lies, then no one will ever know if you can be believed."  I think you may lose your credibility on the first fib!

Music by Mark Oblinger.  The lyrics and music are printed at the end of the book.  The melody line of the music is -- appropriately -- close to "Mary Had a Little Lamb."  The villagers get angry upon even the first deception.  The visual art may be among the best in this series.  The architecture is Russian or at least Eastern European.  The trees are swirly and the sheep curly.  Those various things tend to make the boy -- and especially his face -- stand out in almost every scene.  They also highlight the wolf when he really does appear.  Does it help to add the phrase "lots of lies" to the moral?  "If you tell lies, lots of lies, then no one will ever know if you can be believed."  I think you may lose your credibility on the first fib!

Music by Mark Oblinger.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  The mouse narrates this story in rhyming couplets.  Two things are unusual in the story and its visual depiction.  The lion laughs so hard that he lets the mouse go, and the mouse takes that as his cue to leave.  Visually, the artist enjoys using round blue dots on everyone's cheeks.  I wonder why.  I find those dots confusing.  Despite that question, the story and its depiction here carry the fable well.

Music by Mark Oblinger.  The mouse narrates this story in rhyming couplets.  Two things are unusual in the story and its visual depiction.  The lion laughs so hard that he lets the mouse go, and the mouse takes that as his cue to leave.  Visually, the artist enjoys using round blue dots on everyone's cheeks.  I wonder why.  I find those dots confusing.  Despite that question, the story and its depiction here carry the fable well.

Music by Joseph Faison IV.  With a CD containing the story and song, just the song, and just the instrumental background.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited by the disc to sing along.  Quatrains tell this engaging story.  This dark-skinned milkmaid sometimes has the pail in her hand and sometimes on her head.  That may complicate the telling of the story.  This milkmaid has a great vision of twirling dancing!  But as she is twirling and dancing on the road, she trips on a stone and the bucket comes crashing down on her head!  This telling of the story goes straight from chicks to a new gown.  It plays several times on the proverb about counting chickens before they are hatched.  Can we note that the poet enjoys missed rhymes, particularly "hatched" and "smashed."  There is no reference to the proverb about crying over spilt milk.

Music by Joseph Faison IV.  Not only are the editor, illustrator, and musician different here from the earlier six 2018 books by Cantata Learning, but the music has shifted to mp3 form available through a QR Code online.  The lyrics and music are still also printed at the end of the book.  Readers are invited to sing along.  A repeated quatrain – “If you have a lot, don’t be greedy too” -- recurs through the fable.  The music is set to the tune of “Camptown Races.”  This landscape book will appeal to young readers for the simple, direct art, including the imagined stockpile of gold eggs inside the goose.  In fact, that whole two page spread (14-15) typifies the artist’s good engagement with the emotions of both characters.  Rather than our seeing a dead goose, we see only feathers flying around a distraught farmer (18-19).

With this booklet, our collection has arrived at a further stage in Cantata's engagement with Aesop, marked by the mp3 available online by contrast with a disc earlier published with the book.  The mp3 consists of not just the music but the whole booklet.  Music by Erik Koskinen.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  The pattern is set by the song "Yankee Doodle."  Readers are invited to sing along.  Rhyming quatrains -- heavy on repetitions of "it" -- work through the fable.  The dog sees the bone in the water as bigger than his.  This landscape book will appeal to young readers for the simple, direct art.  The story moralises "Be glad for the things you've got.  Don't reach for someone else's.  You may lose the things you have if you're greedy or selfish."  "Else's" rhymes with "selfish"?

With this booklet, our collection has arrived at a further stage in Cantata's engagement with Aesop, marked by the mp3 available online by contrast with a disc earlier published with the book.  The mp3 consists of not just the music but the whole booklet.  Music by Dean Jones.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  The pattern is set by the song "O Susanna."  Readers are invited to sing along.  This version is strong on illustrating the ineffective early efforts of the crow, who finds a picnic table unattended.  The song's refrain is "When you have a problem, don't just sit and cry.  Look hard to find an answer.  You'll see one if you try."  The picnic people return at the end to the surprise of their pitcher filled with rocks.  Rhyming quatrains.

This booklet continues Cantata's engagement with Aesop, marked now by the mp3 available online by contrast with a disc earlier published with the book.  The mp3 consists of not just the music but the whole booklet.  Music by Mark Mallman.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  The musical pattern is set by the song "When Johnny Comes Marching Home."  Readers are invited to sing along.  The refrain here, repeated on each pair of pages, is "Don't trust those who say sweet words to you!  Sometimes they might want something else, too."  I find the verse here forced more than in other booklets in the series.  The fox here does not start with flattery.  She asks for a song, and the crow -- knowing the fox's ways -- resists.  "She just wants my treat."  The flattery develops later, and he forgets.

This booklet continues Cantata's engagement with Aesop, marked now by the mp3 available online by contrast with a disc earlier published with the book.  The mp3 consists of not just the music but the whole booklet.  Music by Erik Koskinen.  The lyrics and music are also printed at the end of the book.  The musical pattern is set by the song "I've Been Working on the Railroad."  Readers are invited to sing along.  Instead of an ancient god like Mercury, we have here a "magical spirit," imaged here as a stream of water with a head like a drop of water.  Aesop at the booklet's beginning frames the story by saying that the woodcutter has a choice, whether to be honest or not.  "For your honesty, you can keep all three."  The key refrain is "Rewards will come by and by."  Quatrains and sextets offer rhymes at their halfway and finishing points.