Music Styles   Dance  

Simon says: dance

Simon says: dance
Penny Ditch  |  by www.startribune.com. All rights reserved. 13.12 | 23:13

2 to 5 p.m.Oct.

21 and Nov. 18at the Foundation, 10 S.5th St.

, Minneapolis.
Tickets at the door or in advance at www.babylovesdisco.

com.
For other baby and toddler talk, check out www.startribune.

com/cribsheet.

Katherine and Steven Houdek met while dancing at Ground Zero in Minneapolis during the '90s and were married six years ago. These days, when they go out, they bring along an additional dance partner -- Aleksander, their almost-2-year-old son.

On a sunny Saturday afternoon last month, clubbers showed up in their party best -- princess dresses, Spider-Man undies and high tops, miniskirts, and onesies -- ready to dance for three hours to a DJ spinning Prince, Madonna and the Sugar Hill Gang. When they weren't dancing, they chilled out in tents, stared at the disco ball and drowned their prenap/postnap/need-a-nap sorrows with juice boxes at the Foundation, a swanky club in downtown Minneapolis. The club is host to Baby Loves Disco, a monthly afternoon dance party catering to the under-7 set and their parents.

Getting started only last month in the Twin Cities, it's just one in a trend of musical acts and events that cater to toddlers and their entourages. The organizers, veteran parents Heather Murphy Monteith and Andy Hurwitz, think of everything -- from healthful snacks, to a diaper-changing station, to a stroller park. Hurwitz, a record label promoter, began to take Baby Loves Disco from its start in Philadelphia to the rest of the country last year.

The party is held in 11 cities, with two locations in New York. Hurwitz flies into each new location wearing his signature silver sparkly button-down shirt, sets up the initial disco and turns subsequent ones over to local host moms to run. Hurwitz said the event routinely sells out in New York.

Tickets for three months of parties in San Francisco sold out in 91 minutes. The parties will be held monthly in Minneapolis and can host 600. Alyssa Polack recently moved to Minneapolis from New York, where she first attended Baby Loves Disco with her two sons.

As a mom, "you feel guilty totally doing something for yourself and you feel guilty if you're not stimulating and entertaining your child," she explained. With Baby Loves Disco, "it doesn't have to be either/or," said Polack, a self-proclaimed Dan Zanes groupie, who bans Barney from her household's CD players. "There's so much music that can be shared.

" Zanes, who used to be in the Del Fuegos, is among alternative acts from the '80s and '90s that have made the switch to family-oriented music. They Might Be Giants are another crossover hit. And former Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg wrote the soundtrack for the recently released animated film "Open Season.

" Some of these artists may have crossed over because they have their own kids, but it could also be a purely financial choice. While most genres are watching CD sales plummet, sales of children's music have skyrocketed. Through the middle of this year, sales of children's-music albums were up nearly 73 percent over the same point in 2005, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Sales of alternative albums over the same period were down 15 percent. And then there are kids requesting "adult" music. Ali Lozoff, marketing and membership specialist for 89.

3 the Current, said her best friend's daughter "doesn't want to hear Laurie Berkner, she doesn't want to hear Raffi. She wants to hear the Hopefuls." To cater to such kids and their parents, the Current, a Baby Loves Disco sponsor, created Rock the Cradle, which brings families together to learn about music and community parenting resources.

Last year, they expected 500 people, but 2,200 came. They won't be surprised to double attendance at this year's Rock the Cradle, to be held Dec. 10.

Lozoff says these events are so popular in part because parents know the importance of exposing kids to music at an early age and are concerned that school funding shortages will reduce classroom opportunities. But she also says it's because parents today aren't ready to grow up. "Our generation are prolonging the adolescent feeling," she said.

"There is the sense that it's OK to be lighthearted and fun later in life." It's a sentiment with its own name, ever since a New York magazine article this year adopted the term "grups" to mean hip 30- through 50-year-olds who don't let workplace promotions, graying hair or parenthood change the music they listen to or the way they dress. Fashion and culture are also reaching a younger audience.

Sweaters emblazoned with guitars, and onesies donning words such as "Rock Star" can be found at mass retailers such as Old Navy and Target. The Houdeks don't go dancing every weekend as they used to. But they do take Aleksander to concerts.

"He has his own earplugs," said Katherine. And he listens to "stuff we like," such as Green Day and the White Stripes, she said. Despite the $10 price tag in a town with many free kids' activities, the Houdeks said they'd be back for Baby Loves Disco in October.

"It's something different on the usual Saturday afternoon," Steven Houdek said. They weren't the only ones raving about the event, which organizers say attracted about 300 parents and their kids. At 5:13, just minutes after the balloons were put away and the brooms were out, the Foundation received an e-mail from Faye Foote, 28, who brought her son, Liam, 18 months, to the event.

"For those parents who feel they have missed out on a social life, Baby Loves Disco gives us a bit of that back.

Read more on by www.startribune.com. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Baby Loves Disco, Loves Disco, Baby Loves, New York, Steven Houdek
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