Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for A Birdly Debate.

A Birdly Debate

Inspiration for a song can come in a variety of ways. This song was written because of another cuckoo song I saw in a book. The song included repeated cuckoo lyrics but they were hard to sing and the song didn’t really work for me. For some reason, that sparked the idea of two birds talking back and forth. What would they talk about? Would they argue about who was the superior bird? I jotted down ideas and knew it was going to work as a song when it made me laugh as I was writing.

The cat showed up, almost the same as it does in the song, skulking about the edges of my thought process and inserting itself into the story. I wrote two different endings for the song. I thought both had merit and I couldn’t decide which one to include. My kids used to read “choose your own ending” books. I decided to include both lyric options and leave it up to the singer to choose the ending. As much as it was really a copout on my part not to make the choice, I also think it is fun for the singer to have a bit of say in the matter. I have tried to sing this song with Andy dividing up the cuckoo and rat-a-tat tats back and forth and we usually end up laughing. When the Coldbrook & District School Grade 4-5 Choir (in Nova Scotia) premiered A Birdly Debate, they did a super job and gave this song a good start in the world! Congratulations to the singers and their teacher, Joanna MacPhee Simpson.

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for Computer Cat.

Stream or Purchase from many streaming sites including:

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer.

The Computer Cat  CD (Donna & Andy performance and instrumental) tracks (24) are available for download or physical CD on this website.

10 Cross-curricular activities are provided in the PDF download extending the focus of this song to other subject areas including:

• Fine arts: music, visual art, drama, dance
• Language arts
• Math
• Technology

Computer Cat is one of my early songs. It was written in the mid 1990s as a result of a question posed by my six-year-old son, Daniel. He had seen me using the computer (or maybe he was using one himself at that point) and he said, “Mom, what would happen if the cat ate the mouse for the computer?” This was an interesting thought and evoked amusing images and it was a great foundation for a fun song. Cats are not known to be particularly cooperative at the best of times. I envisioned the necessity of chasing and catching the cat when it was time to do computer work and then the trouble of convincing it to agree to being pushed around on the desk. The issues of static electricity and being ticklish would certainly create some tension!

It is amazing to me that almost 30 years after writing this song, I can look back and see how much technology has changed since the song was originally written. Many of the computer innovations of the 1990s have been replaced and replaced again in the ensuing years. What we thought was leading-edge technology (which it was at the time) now looks very antiquated. Computer Cat still has appeal as a humorous song, although it may require a bit of historical context for young singers who wonder what a mouse and pad have to do with using a computer!

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for these Four Penguin Songs

You can purchase each Penguin song separately.

• I Wonder
• Penguin Parade
• Pondering Penguins
• The Penguin Ball

Save 25% when you purchase all Four Penguin Songs together.

Stream or Purchase the Four Penguin Songs from many streaming sites including:

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer.

The Computer Cat  CD (Donna & Andy performance and instrumental) tracks (24) is available for download or purchase physical CD on this website.

53 Cross-curricular activities are provided in the PDF download (divided over 4 penguin songs) extending the focus of these songs to other subject areas including:

• Fine arts: music, visual art, dance, drama,
• Language arts
• Math
• Social studies
• Science
• Technology

Four Penguin Songs

I wrote my collection of penguin songs as a result of a request made by a classroom teacher at my school. She was doing a penguin unit with her students and she asked me for a penguin song.  I didn’t know any, so I wrote my own! When her students came to my music class they told me lots of penguin facts to give me ideas for my songs. I discovered that penguins are amazing creatures. The conditions in which they live and the way they survive, live, and raise their babies are all fascinating. With all the facts I found out, I ended up writing four penguin songs.

Some of the songs rely on the facts that the students told me, but other songs in the set dive into the world of imagination with penguins checking their closets for clothing options, attending the ”penguin ball” for some romantic moonlit dancing on the beach, or having a parade in the snow. All in all, I had a grand time writing these four songs and the students enjoyed singing them. After almost three decades, I am happy to report my penguin songs are still being sung and enjoyed by young singers (and their audiences) around the world!

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for I Wonder

There are 3 more penguin songs for fun singing in your home school, classroom, vocal studio or choir. 

• Penguin Parade
• Pondering Penguins
• The Penguin Ball

Purchase all Four Penguin Songs together and save 25%

Stream or Purchase from many streaming sites including:

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer.

The Computer Cat  CD (Donna & Andy performance and instrumental) tracks (24) are available for download or physical CD on this website.

13 Cross-curricular activities are provided in the PDF download extending the focus of this song to other subject areas including:

• Fine arts: music, visual art, drama, dance
• Language arts
• Science
• Technology

I Wonder

This is one of four penguin songs I have written. I was asked by a teacher at my school if I had any penguin songs she could include as part of a penguin unit she was doing with her students. I didn’t have anything to offer her, so when her students came to music class and started telling me everything they knew about penguins, I used that information to write them some songs.

I Wonder explores the limited wardrobe options of a penguin. They always look like they are dressed up in a fancy suit. I think they look quite grand, but I wonder if they ever get tired of wearing the same thing day after day! I imagined a penguin standing at the open door of the closet looking at all those black and white shirts and black suits. I was amused as I wondered what would happen if he decided he wanted to be different and wear something red for a change? I had fun imagining the penguin in this song and writing the lyrics for I Wonder.

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for Midnight March.

Midnight March

I am always on the lookout for simple songs for my youngest students to sing. Kindergarten students have only a few short weeks of school before concert preparation begins. Often times this means they haven’t even discovered they have a singing voice, when suddenly they are being asked to sing in a group in front of a gym full of people. This can be daunting! The best plan of action is to choose songs with a melody that is easy for emerging singers to learn, simple repetitious words, and a few actions that help youngsters remember the words. Actions also give the audience a visually interesting performance.

At some point in my teaching career, I stumbled upon a song about toy soldiers. It had good “bones” but there were a few elements in the song that didn’t work the way I would have liked. I changed some lyrics, added some theatrical counting to begin and end the song and Midnight March was the result. Thanks to an unknown composer starting this song, I had a song that was a great addition to my concert. It became one of my favourite songs for young singers and I have included it several times over my teaching career, always with happy singers and great audience response.

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for Best Friends.

Stream or Purchase from many streaming sites including:

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer.

The Blue Skies and Pirates  CD (Donna & Andy performance and instrumental) tracks (24) are available for download or physical CD on this website.

Best Friends

I grew up in a small rural community with a population of less than 200 people. Fortunately for me, next door to our house was a family with seven children, the youngest of whom was my best friend. She was a year younger than I was, but once we were old enough to play together we were together at her house or at mine, kicking about on our family farm, or riding our bicycles in her dad’s paved store yard. The scenarios used in Best Friends are drawn from real events that occurred as our two families grew up together. The only “poetic license” I manipulated was the verse about the bees. Although we didn’t encounter swarms of bees, there were other injuries that resulted during our adventures. We also didn’t end up at the emergency department for many of the scrapes we received. Farm kids are often tough and the nearest emergency department was a 40-minute drive away. The bull turned out to be a curious steer, and no real threat to us. The mud was actually a hole in a barn floor (with a drop to the basement below) and my best friend’s brother taunted my older sister that she couldn’t jump over the hole. She assured him she could and she jumped. Unfortunately he was right and she was wrong and she landed on the concrete floor one floor below. Fortunately there were no injuries! I consider myself to have had an idyllic childhood. We worked hard on the farm but we also found time to play. There were swings my dad tied to large branches of oak and maple trees along the edge of our lawn. We rode bikes, played “Kick the Can”, had a few croquet tournaments, climbed trees, made forts, combed the ditches for glass pop bottles that could be returned to the store for 5 cents each, and a brook where we played even though our parents had told us not to play there. Best friends made all those activities that much more fun and it was worth every scrape, every adventure and every apology!

When you have enjoyed singing this song and doing the activities with your students - please drop by again and leave a Review on this page. Thanks!

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Follow along with the lyrics as you listen to the accompaniment with melody guide for Penguin Parade

Here are 3 more penguin songs for fun singing in your home school, classroom, vocal studio or choir. 

• I Wonder
• Pondering Penguins
• The Penguin Ball

Purchase all Four Penguin Songs together and save 25%

Stream or Purchase from many streaming sites including:

Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, Amazon, Pandora, Deezer.

The Computer Cat  CD (Donna & Andy performance and instrumental) tracks (24) are available for download or physical CD on this website.

15 Cross-curricular activities are provided in the PDF download extending the focus of this song to other subject areas including:

• Fine arts: music, visual art, drama,
• Language arts
• Physical Activity
• Social studies
• Science
• Technology

Penguin Parade

I wrote four penguin songs for a teacher at my school who wanted to add some music to a penguin unit she was doing with her students. I didn’t have any songs to offer her but I agreed to write her some. She had a poem about penguins going on parade and she gave me a copy in case it would be useful for my writing. I wrote a little melody to go along with the poem and the students had fun learning it as part of their penguin unit. Later, I wanted to include Penguin Parade in a printed collection of my songs (Computer Cat). Finding it difficult to track down the authors of the poem, I decided it would be easier to write my own lyrics. I already had the melody I had created so I added my new lyrics and then it was easy to include the song in my collection with the other three penguin songs I had written. The penguin set includes a march, a waltz, a country line dance and jaunty “boom chick” style song. It was so much fun to write this collection of songs. Just like the penguins in The Penguin Ball, I was rather sad to come to the end of my penguin song-writing fun. For now, four penguin songs will have to be enough, but you never know, there just might be another penguin song in my future!

When you have enjoyed singing this song and doing the activities with your students - please drop by again and leave a Review on this page. Thanks!

Please send us your performing video - we might be able to post it on this page!