"Unlike silly songs for children by, say, Raffi, or maudlin songs for parents like Dylan’s 'Forever Young' or Cat Stevens’s 'Father and Son'—two ballads eager to preserve their singers’ sons in amber..."

"... [Paul] Simon had genuinely intergenerational appeal. He shared with us young passengers the joyful and terrible news of adulthood with patty-cake rhymes ('mama pajama,' 'drop off the key, Lee') and jaunty rhythms, scored by a panoply of ludicrous and wonderful-sounding instruments—from the hooting cuíca in 'Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard' to the triumphant parade drums of 'The Obvious Child.'"

From "Paul Simon: Fathers, Sons, Troubled Water" by Daniel Drake (NYRB).

It's interesting, the music a parent shares with a child and imagines suits the child's interests and needs.

I agree that Dylan's "Forever Young" and Cat Stevens's "Father and Son" are not good children's music. And maybe the even both deserve the adjective "maudlin." Especially the Dylan song, which is one of the Dylan songs I dislike. Now, "Father and Son" — that's a great song. Love it. (And commenters: Don't revisit the old topic of Cat Stevens's religion. I will consider it a threadjack and delete.)



No, that's not maudlin at all. It's incredibly brilliant. But not a children's song. Maybe good for a teenage boy and his father, but it's hard to imagine any father and son who could both identify with it and enjoy it together.