Go to the Ant?

EDIT:I should have begun this by saying that I don't want to offend anyone who likes Judy Rogers, and I do see that her songs can be useful for instruction. I've just been subjected to a lot of her music lately, and I was trying to analyze in my own mind why I didn't care for it that much.

During my church's Vacation Bible School, our pastor wanted to teach the children two Judy Rogers songs. In case you are unfamiliar with Mrs. Rogers, she has set to music a lot of the Children's Catachism questions and other scripture-related songs for children. She has a very folksly sort of style, and my girls do really seem to enjoy the Judy Rogers album we own.

My problem with her is kind of hard to describe. Her lyrics are fine theologically, though she sometimes chooses words/prhases I personally find awkward. It's a little thing, but in "I'm Hiding from Mommy," she could easily have chosen to rhyme "no one will know" with "wherever I go." Instead, she sings, "no one will know" and "whatever I do." This does not seem to be because of an aesthetic preference for non-rhyming poetry, though, because that same song has other, similar phrases that do rhyme. I suppose I prefer a bit of symmetry and an easy-to-follow rhyming pattern, and I think children also find that easier to follow.

The second problem I have is with the dips and dives Mrs. Rogers takes in her melody lines. This one definitely seemed to be throwing the kids (and many of the adults) at VBS. Her melodies will be following a fairly simple, though not overly predictable, route, when suddenly she drops several notes below where you expected her to go, and in "Why Can't I See God?" she doesn't bring the chorus to a resolution the first time. Again, I suppose that would be okay, except this is supposed to be for children to sing, and I don't see why it's necessary to make it harder to learn. She also makes some strange rhythm changes in later verses, which seems slightly arbitrary and unnecessary, and again, these changes are inconsistent. The pattern will change in one phrase, but in a parallel spot, it stays the same as the first verse.

Lastly, Judy Rogers just seems to take herself so seriously. On the one hand, this is a good quality. She seems very sincere when she's singing. She also comes across a bit like Phoebe from "Friends," when she speaks a line instead of singing it, to give it a bit more emphasis. I can almost picture Mrs. Rogers, guitar in hand, eyes closed, singing her heart out to a less than inspired audience.

Of course, as I said, my children do like her songs, and they do teach something worthwhile. I don't really know why I'm criticizing this music in particular, except most of the reformed people I know have said so many wonderful things about Judy Rogers, without really analyzing it from an artistic perspective. I agree that these albums have their usefulness, but I wish someone would do it with more musicality and less influence from popular music, which can make songs sound dated pretty quickly. Unfortunately, I don't personally feel called to that particular line of work, so I guess we'll stick to the old-fashioned way of learning catachism for now.