Recess! Media

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That’s the extraordinary South African singer Sibongile Khumalo (see-bone-GEE-lay koo-MAH-low) with the traditional Zulu lullaby, “Thula Mama.” It’s on a new CD called Dreamland — World Lullabies and Soothing Songs.

We never really outgrow the profound comforting effects of lullabies, and perhaps we are even more in need of them as we get older. The songs in this collection will take both you and your children to real places you may not have been to and may never get to. For Dreamland is there for all of us to inhabit, in the deep resonances of the cradle song of Madagascar’s Erick Manana:

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And once we have arrived on these shores, we know that we’re home — whether it’s Scotland or Argentina or on the beach in Okinawa, with the Sanshin Cafe Orchestra:

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