A fun song for training a musical ear

by Susan Di Genova
(Sydney, NSW, Australia)

My 6 month old baby has loved the Do-Re-Mi song (from the Sound of Music) since he was only a few weeks old. I would sing that to him and add actions. It would calm him down if he was upset, and instantly turn up a smile on his face. His eyes just light up when I begin to sing it, especially when I do the actions I made up as well.

Being a qualified music teacher, I also recognize this particular song is very well structured to train the musical ear, as the notes are varied and go more or less sequentially, plus it teaches the little ones the basic "alphabets" of music, i.e. "do re mi fa so la ti". Being loved by my baby is just a bonus. My husband (who used to sing more out-of-tune) even improved in his pitches when singing, as he heard me sing this song so many times to our baby.