This Parent's Choice Award winner, will surprise you with its calm nature despite its folk and cowboy focused songs. This is the perfect album for a quiet playtime, or to help slow down and control a too-rowdy playtime. Mary Lee and Nancy's voices harmonize beautifully, as they use a guitar, keyboard, recorder, harp, harmonica, violin, cello, pan flue, and percussion instruments.

Mary Lee Sunseri and Nancy Stewart have made many of the classic folk songs their own by slowing down the tempo and adding some personal tweaks. Down in the Valley and Oh, Susanna are slowed down to the pace of a relaxed ballad, and a harp and cello are very unique ways of presenting My Darlin' Clementine, creating a lovely song with a completely different tone than it is generally associated with. Skip To My Lou sounds folksy with the fiddle, and a slight slur to a minor note is added in the word "darlin". I've Been Working On the Railroad contains real sounds of a steam engine working and a train whistle blowing, while Happy Trails creates the clopping sound of horses hooves using a wooden block. The Navajo Night Chant is coupled with Colors Of The Wind, as they both follow the motif of wind and nature; "May it be beautiful before me/May it be beautiful behind me/May be beautiful all around me." (Navajo Night Chant). Old Texas/Sleep Little Cowboy is the only song on the album featuring the harmonica, and is sung in the call-and-response style between Mary Lee and Nancy.

Your little one can join in the songs quickly, as they will recognize some of them and quickly learn the others. The call-and-response songs take care of themselves, while others like the lullaby Beautiful Dreamer have a whole verse of ooo's, which is simple-yet-fun to sing along with. Watch as your little one joins in the "Whoppie ty yi ya!" of Back In the Saddle Again, the "Yippy-yi-oooooo, yip ha!" in I Am a Cowboy, or sings, "I've got my boots, I,ve got my hat, I'm a rootin' tootin' cowboy, Now what do you think of that?" in Jingle Jangle Jingle . Cows Are Cool is a great way to sneak in education, as the song teaches children about the names of different types of cows. Listeners learn that a Holstein in black and white and popular for creating milk, the Jersey is a great cow for butter and cheeses, and that the Angus is black, among many other cow facts.

My three-year-old friend Sam, loves the cowboy boots his grandma got him for Easter. He wore them almost every day in the summer, which is impressive with the heat. Sam had fun shuffling around, almost doing a tap dance, with his cowboy boots during the more upbeat songs on this CD, and then he would sit in my lap and play with my hair while humming to the slower songs. He sure is one cute cowboy!

--Audra

Mary Lee Sunseri and Nancy Stewart met when they were only 14 years old, and began performing together in Los Angeles at various venues, including "The New Hope Inn," "The Troubador," "Alice's Restaurant, " "McCabe's Guitar Shop" and the Renaissance Faire. They recorded radio jingles for "Ladies Choice Pickles" and the cycle of nursery rhymes for Mattel Toys "See 'n Say."

In 1971 they toured with Randy Sparks & the Back Porch Majority which performed nationwide, opening shows for: Burl Ives, Shirley Jones, Lily Tomlin, Bill Cosby and many others. After touring America for more than nine years, they decided to perform solo. However, Mary Lee and Nancy still perform together annually in "Tales of the Trails" at the Yakima Valley Museum in Washington State. They also perform at concerts for children at libraries and summer reading programs.

Mary Lee and Nancy have received the American Library Association Notable Children's Recording and the Parents Choice Award for their CD recording: "Rhythm of the Rocks," Parents Choice Award for "Singin' Sidesaddle" and the Sandman Seal of Approval for "Goodnight Sleep Tight."