I had the opportunity to first encounter Fire Truck! by Ivan Ulz in action in a room of 2-year-olds. It's a sing and read story book so the book is read to the children in the form of a song. In actuality, what happened was that Ulz wrote a song almost 19 years ago that was then turned into a picture book with illustrations by Jill Dubin. The song kind of works better this way. It's a little on the long side but the illustrations help cue the children on which words come next and make it really enjoyable when they can remember the lyrics themselves. Even at the mere mention of the possibility that we could listen to this song, the kids worked themselves into a frenzy but Ulz masterfully creates a musically controlled excitement. The song is repetitive but Ulz breaks this up by switching between singing, almost growling, and talking very calmly. The song undoubtedly gets louder at the chorus of "fire truck, fire truck, I wanna ride on a fire truck" but the tune itself is actually pretty slow, employing just an acoustic guitar and bass and a deliberate beat. Ulz has taken a frequently used model (pick something kids are awed by and curious about, such as fire trucks, and write a story in which they explore the object to the point of total familiarity) and added another layer by allowing the audience to learn the story and adopt as their own while they sing...and it's surprisingly fun.
