Beethoven’s Wig: Sing Along Piano Classics CD Review + {Rafflecopter Giveaway - Ends 11/18} (CLOSED)

This giveaway is closed. Congrats to the winner below!

Ahh, classical music. I have always enjoyed classical music. There is something calming and relaxing about it. And as a pianist myself it has a special place in my heart. For Beethoven's Wig it's all about taking piano classics and making them into songs that kids will love.

FOUR-TIME GRAMMY NOMINEE BEETHOVEN'S WIG
FEATURING RICHARD PERLMUTTER
ADDS BRAINY, ZANY LYRICS TO KEYBOARD MASTERPIECES
'BEETHOVEN'S WIG: SING ALONG PIANO CLASSICS’
SET FOR SEPTEMBER RELEASE

"His songs are funny, but Perlmutter is not just a highbrow ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic. The lyrics are hummable mnemonics, each imparting information about the work or its composer."
– The Washington Post
“Perlmutter’s got goofball charm … the orchestra’s great, and his lyrics are truly hilarious.”
 – U.S. News & World Report 
"An irreverent, witty approach to music appreciation… pretty much guarantees listeners will forevermore recognize (the classics)."
–  Los Angeles Times

LOS ANGELES (July 7, 2011) – Beethoven once said, "If my music had words it'd be a lot more popular."    His wish has come true, but he had to wait 200 years for the other half of his team.   Modern day “co-writer” Richard Perlmutter, lyricist and lead singer with four-time GRAMMY® nominee Beethoven's Wig, has, in the Beethoven's Wig series of recordings, added witty and insightful lyrics to instrumental selections by Beethoven (and Bach, Mozart, et al.) that have zipped the works of the longhairs to the tops of the charts and created a charming, fresh, and memorable introduction to some of the world’s greatest music.  The fifth Beethoven's Wig album, Beethoven's Wig: Sing Along Piano Classics, will be releasedSeptember 27.Beethoven's Wig: Sing Along Piano Classics adds the Beethoven's Wig spin to giants of the keyboard: Chopin, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms, Schumann, Debussy, and Mussorgsky, as well as sprucing up works by modern composers Stravinsky, Schoenberg, and Henry Cowell with lyrics that are simultaneously thoughtful and highly amusing.  Scott Joplin’s ragtime classic “The Entertainer” becomes the setting for a hilarious narrative about a piano that got stuck in the door and contains some of the funniest rhymes in music history.  Perlmutter also makes sure not to overlook the most egalitarian piano composition of all, “Chopsticks.” Realizing that even the most erudite musical historians are a bit hazy about the origins of this ubiquitous two-finger keyboard classic, he comments ruefully, “‘Chopsticks’ is actually titled ‘The Celebrated Chop Waltz’ and was written by a sixteen-year-old English girl named Euphemia Allen who seemed to favor the pseudonym Arthur de Lulli.  My lyrics begin: ‘My little chicken is peck, peck, peck, pecking. Whatever she's pecking she's wreck, wreck, wreck wrecking.’  In one part of the song I get to cluck like a chicken, backed up by some of the finest professional opera singers around singing ‘peck, peck, peck, pecking’ with exemplary operatic vocal production.”

A number of years ago, Richard Perlmutter was toying with the idea of creating lyrics set to masterpieces of classical music when one day, while humming Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, the phrase “Beethoven's Wig is very big” popped into his head. "It really resonated with my objectives because the words fit perfectly with the first eight notes of the symphony,” recalls Perlmutter. “Besides, the wig is sort of like a mascot for classical music."  After dressing up the entire first movement with lyrics that are charged with “laugh out loud” humor that tickles funny bones of all ages, he turned to works of Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Haydn and other musical heavyweights. Eventually, his muse led him to a studio where he created a groundbreaking recording, backed up by full symphony orchestra and four opera singers.

Richard Perlmutter’s first album, Beethoven's Wig: Sing Along Symphonies, was released in 2002. Within a week of its debut, Perlmutter was featured on NPR’s All Things Considered, followed by an appearance on NBC’s Today Show.   The album shot to the top of Amazon’s Bestseller List, holding the #1 position on both the Amazon classical and children's music sales charts for four months. Over the next year, Beethoven's Wig received 15 national awards including a GRAMMY nomination for Best Musical Album for Children.

When Perlmutter followed up in 2004 with Beethoven's Wig 2 (featuring an additional assortment of classical masterpieces fitted with his brainy lyrics), the two albums simultaneously took over the #1 and #2 spots on Amazon's Bestseller List.  The overwhelming success of these two albums created a demand for live performances, and Beethoven's Wig soon began to appear throughout the country in their own sold out shows and asfeatured guest performers with symphony orchestras and other ensembles. Meanwhile, Perlmutter received his second GRAMMY nomination for Beethoven's Wig 2. Subsequent releases Beethoven'a Wig 3 (2006) and Beethoven's Wig 4 (2008) also garnered GRAMMY nominations.

To date, the Beethoven's Wig series has broken all records with an astounding 46 national awards. Hailed as opening the door to  "serious music" in a way that's fun, Beethoven's Wig is now the most honored musical group in family entertainment.

http://beethovenswig.com

I think this is a great way to introduce children to classics. Even though they like the funny lyrics, they will remember the music for years to come. What a great start. And you can't beat fun, entertaining music for children that we, as adults, can enjoy too.

You can learn more about Beethoven's Wig on their website- http://beethovenswig.com/. You can purchase a Beethoven's Wig: Sing Along Piano Classics CD for yourself on Amazon.com. And you can enter to win a copy of the CD for yourself in the Rafflecopter form below.

*Disclaimer: I received this CD for review. All opinions are my own.*