# Music that evokes lost childhood?



## Arie (Jun 19, 2015)

Hi guys,
I'd like to receive suggestions for music that is likely to evoke my childhood memories. All of a sudden, I have been feeling nostalgic (and regret as well) over my lost childhood and I think music will make this nostalgia even sweeter and pleasurable.

Please suggest me works that are likely to help me re-live my childhood; that will make me feel like a child again; that will, at its best, make me cry and laugh at the same time over my reminiscences this work will inspire.

You needn't wonder if your suggestion will appeal to me; just suggest me whichever songs you think will inspire the yearning I have to re-live my lost childhood. Share your own experiences as well, if possible.
Thank you all.


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## Dim7 (Apr 24, 2009)

That's a very subjective and challenging request there, especially if you don't give examples of music which "evokes lost childhood" to you.


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## PierreN (Aug 4, 2013)

Here are two suggestions:

1) Richard Strauss, Schlagobers (Whipped Cream) Ballet.
"A group of children celebrate their confirmation in a Konditorei or Viennese cake shop, where many of the confections come alive, with marzipan marches and cocoa dances. Having overindulged, one boy falls ill and hallucinates, leading to the party of Princess Pralinée, a trio of amorous liquors, and a riot of cakes pacified by beer." --Wikipedia

Try Neeme Jarvi conducting the Suite from the ballet.

2) Shostakovich, Symphony no.6
"The musical character of the Sixth Symphony will differ from the mood and emotional tone of the Fifth Symphony, in which moments of tragedy and tension were characteristic. In my latest symphony, music of a contemplative and lyrical order predominates. I wanted to convey in it the moods of spring, joy, youth." --Shostakovich

Neeme Jarvi also recorded that one (together with all 15 symphonies)


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## QuietGuy (Mar 1, 2014)

Try Elmer Bernstein's main theme from "To Kill a Mockingbird". One comment I read once stated that, in one theme, he captured the angst, melancholy and bittersweet qualities of childhood. Eerie and familiar at the same time.


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## Celloman (Sep 30, 2006)

The overture to Tannhauser is my "Rosebud". My first musical memory consists of sitting in front of the speaker at my grandmother's house at 4 years old and listening to this piece. Listening to the overture today still takes me on a journey to those formative years.

Schumann's "Scenes of Childhood" seem nostalgic. Sometimes, I wonder if Schumann drew from memories of his own childhood.


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

Sir Edward Elgar's Nursery Suite is worth a shot.
Some of Allan Pettersson's symphonies evoke his childhood memories (in a darker vein I must point out. He was abused growing up).


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## Cheyenne (Aug 6, 2012)

Ah, I love this! I was very interested in this subject for a long time and studied it closely as tied to the Romantic tradition, especially in those Romantic literati such as William Hazlitt, William Wordsworth Thomas De Quincey who always returned to their idyllic childhood. The composer I found most closely allied to this is Gerald Finzi, a British pastoral composer whose work was elegiac from the start. His childhood was largely unhappy, growing up with many siblings and parents without respect for his musical talents, so he sought refuge in books and poetry. He was left with "a conviction that for many the reality of adult life and experience dims the instinctive freshness of childhood."

Nothing makes that more clear than his setting of Wordsworth's Intimations of Immortality from the Recollections of Early Childhood:

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, 
The earth, and every common sight, 
To me did seem 
Apparell'd in celestial light, 
The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
It is not now as it hath been of yore;- 
Turn wheresoe'er I may, 
By night or day, 
The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The rainbow comes and goes, 
And lovely is the rose; 
The moon doth with delight 
Look round her when the heavens are bare; 
Waters on a starry night 
Are beautiful and fair; 
The sunshine is a glorious birth; 
But yet I know, where'er I go, 
That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth.​
You'll find that sense of a glory having passed from the earth in many of his works, such as the lovely Eclogue for Piano and Strings, and the Clarinet Concerto. Speaking of the Clarinet, Brahms' works for clarinet also give me something vaguely reminiscent of the feeling you describe.

I like the suggestion of Shostakovich's 6th symphony, and raise with the first movement of his 15th symphony. Absolutely haunting when listened to in this regard.


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

What evokes childhood for me are pieces that were constantly played then, rather than music specifically about children or being young.
I will tell you what 'my' pieces are, but yours will be entirely different, of course:

Venus from Holst's The Planets (sweet & gentle)

Beethoven - Für Elise (wistful)

Dances from Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite - especially the dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy, and the Chinese Dance

Prokofiev - Peter And The Wolf (various series on the radio, used in class music)

De Falla - Ritual Fire Dance (the theme just caught my childhood imagination)


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Try Michael Tippett's 'Boyhood's End', a cantata for voice and piano. The text, by one W. H. Hudson, evokes a seemingly idyllic childhood growing up in Argentina and is somewhat florid - perhaps appropriately so bearing in mind he became a natural historian with a number of books to his name.


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## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Ingélou said:


> What evokes childhood for me are pieces that were constantly played then, rather than music specifically about children or being young.


Yes, I'm not sure how a piece of music can evoke childhood generally, without the aid of a programmatic title.

If I want to evoke my childhood I can just listen to the theme from _Sesame Street_.


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## Morimur (Jan 23, 2014)

Shostakovich's 5th. The opening was inadvertently drilled into my brain as a young child and it served as fitting precursor of what was to come.


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## Proms Fanatic (Nov 23, 2014)

I never really listened to/heard much Classical music as a child. I don't remember ever feeling that a Classical work took me back to my childhood.

On the other hand, many pop/rock/dance songs give me strong feelings/memories about my youth.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Carpenter's _Adventures in a Perambulator_?


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## leroy (Nov 23, 2014)

I'd second a few choices here namely Finzi's eclogue and Prokofiev's Peter And The Wolf, others I would add are Elgar's Nimrod from the enigma variations, Grieg's Solveig's Song , Delius's By The River from the Florida suite, Rimsky Korsakov Sheherazade, the Allegretto from Beethovens 7th symphony, Katchaturian's Spartacus suite no 2 Adagio of Sparticus and Phrygia, Saint-Saëns - Aquarium( though if you have seen harry potter you may have heard it too much already hehe), Tchaikovsky Lullaby Bercuese and the second movement of Goreki's 3rd symphony.


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## Balthazar (Aug 30, 2014)

Another vote for Schumann's _Kinderszenen_. Sketches of an adult's reminiscences of his childhood rather than a direct portrait of the events themselves.


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## Arie (Jun 19, 2015)

Dim7 said:


> That's a very subjective and challenging request there, especially if you don't give examples of music which "evokes lost childhood" to you.


Hi,
I'm aware that this is highly subjective and that's why I added a note at the end not to worry whether or not it will appeal to me; and to just share your personal experience.
I'm afraid I can't give you examples and that's why I came here.


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## Arie (Jun 19, 2015)

PierreN said:


> Here are two suggestions:
> 
> 1) Richard Strauss, Schlagobers (Whipped Cream) Ballet.
> "A group of children celebrate their confirmation in a Konditorei or Viennese cake shop, where many of the confections come alive, with marzipan marches and cocoa dances. Having overindulged, one boy falls ill and hallucinates, leading to the party of Princess Pralinée, a trio of amorous liquors, and a riot of cakes pacified by beer." --Wikipedia
> ...


Thank you, PierreN,
I will give them both a try.


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## Arie (Jun 19, 2015)

Orfeo said:


> Sir Edward Elgar's Nursery Suite is worth a shot.
> Some of Allan Pettersson's symphonies evoke his childhood memories (in a darker vein I must point out. He was abused growing up).


I will give them a shot.
Thank you, Orfeo.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

How about this one? One of my all-time favourite pieces of music.

Barber - Knoxville Summer of 1915 (YouTube link).


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## Poppy Popsicle (Jul 24, 2015)

For me two pieces that evoke my childhood (heard via music boxes) are:
Brahms: Lullaby
Mozart:Twinkle, twinkle litte star


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

Arie said:


> I will give them a shot.
> Thank you, Orfeo.


You're welcome.
DH


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## Schubussy (Nov 2, 2012)

Forgive me for bending the rules and choosing something non-classical, but this is Boards of Canada's whole thing.


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## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

Ingélou said:


> De Falla - Ritual Fire Dance (the theme just caught my childhood imagination)


My fifth grade teacher wanted us to love classical music, so every Thursday was classical day. Number one on her hit list was the Ritual Fire Dance. I can't listen to that piece without being transported back to that unairconditioned classroom, staring at the felt panel on the wall which she would decorate according to the season and running my fingers over the many carvings on my wood desk.


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## Orfeo (Nov 14, 2013)

I'll also add Erno Dohnanyi's Nursery Variations.


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## HaydnBearstheClock (Jul 6, 2013)

Arie said:


> Hi guys,
> I'd like to receive suggestions for music that is likely to evoke my childhood memories. All of a sudden, I have been feeling nostalgic (and regret as well) over my lost childhood and I think music will make this nostalgia even sweeter and pleasurable.
> 
> Please suggest me works that are likely to help me re-live my childhood; that will make me feel like a child again; that will, at its best, make me cry and laugh at the same time over my reminiscences this work will inspire.
> ...


Schumann's 'Kinderszenen' comes to mind.; F. J. Haydn - Seven Last Words- Sonata III: 'Frau, hier siehe deinen Sohn, und du, siehe deine Mutter!'
Bedrich Smetana - Ma Vlást - Cycle of symphonic Poems.
Antonin Dvorak - Symphony No. 9 in E minor, 'From the New World'
F. J. Haydn - Symphony No. 94 in G Major, 'Surprise'


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

Oliver Knussen wrote an opera based on Where the Wild Things Are.


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## violadude (May 2, 2011)

Yoshimatsu's 4th symphony sounds childish and playful to me.


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## Xaltotun (Sep 3, 2010)

This is of course very personal. I find Dvorak's symphonic poems rather fitting in this regard, they have this sense of wonder, but also incomprehension and darkness, and... this sense of _single-mindedness_ that I associate with childhood. All the good things, and all the bad things in childhood are... single-minded. Things that occupy your mind so that nothing else can fit there. That's what the devilish theme in _The Water Goblin_ does!


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## Ingélou (Feb 10, 2013)

Xaltotun said:


> This is of course very personal. I find Dvorak's symphonic poems rather fitting in this regard, they have this sense of wonder, but also incomprehension and darkness, and... this sense of _single-mindedness_ that I associate with childhood. All the good things, and all the bad things in childhood are... single-minded. Things that occupy your mind so that nothing else can fit there. That's what the devilish theme in _The Water Goblin_ does!


You are so right. :tiphat:
I'm now in my third age. Recently I've somehow accessed the part of my mind that feels 'as a child'. I was lying in bed, ready to go to sleep, and began to imagine my grandmother's house, room by room - she moved from the house when I was eight. I remembered a time that I'd been there and been packed off to bed late - I'd been allowed to stay up & watch ballet on television. I was four at the time. Suddenly, 60 years later, I was seeing the lounge, the hall, the white banisters, the grandfather clock all 'as if I were there' and with the same emotions.

In childhood we 'take things as they come' rather than thinking ahead or relating it to what has gone. We receive the flow of events with a sense of interest, curiosity, sometimes wonder (or fear). Because it's all new, and we're just *experiencing* life, not thinking our way round it, colours seem brighter, words seem to have more significance, flavours more 'zing', music more density.

One of the 78s we had in the family gramophone cabinet was Ravel's Bolero. Now - and as a teenager - this bored me. But when I was a child, I didn't get bored - I just *existed* in the music and received it as it came along, in the way I've tried to describe above.

Words, of course, can't do justice to our 'inside realness' (E. Nesbit's term), whether it's the child's personal consciousness, or the adult's individual perceptions.


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