Readers who are interested in baby treatment may be interested to know that a symphony has been composed about a baby's outing with his nurse in a pram. Saffy has prepared an introduction, and these are followed by the composer's own notes. I have used the beautiful CD cover picture for the cover illustration of the 2001 edition of 'Dummy Discipline Digest'.

Recently while browsing a local record shop I came across a recording in the classical section that I thought would be suitable for adult babies everywhere. The title of the piece is 'Adventures in a Perambulator', by an American composer called John Alden Carpenter (1876-1951). I first became familiar with the piece several years ago, but this new CD is a modern recording and has the  advantage of costing under a fiver!

Although a largely forgotten figure now, John Alden Carpenter was among the foremost American composers of his generation. Many of the leading conductors and orchestras of the period performed his music. At the height of his fame in the 1920's he was even commisioned to write a ballet for Dyagilev's Ballets Russe. 'Adventures in a Perambulator' was written in 1914 for the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and became an instant hit. The depiction of a day in the life of a baby, inspired by the composer's only child, Ginny, represented an unusual scenario and the piece, in fact, was chosen by Walt Disney for an ultimately aborted sequel to 'Fantasia'.

There are six movements in total - each with a descriptive title:-

1. En Voiture
2. The Policeman
3. The Hurdy-Gurdy
4. The Lake
5. Dogs
6. Dreams

In the first movement, En Voiture! (All Aboard!), the baby sets out with its nurse, and the limping syncopation of the celesta melody is said to have been inspired by a minor defect in one of the wheels of Ginny's perambulator.

The second movement, The Policeman, introduces an Irish cop, who engages in a flirtation with the nurse before being interrupted by the impatient baby.

In the third movement, the baby falls under the spell of a Hurdy-Gurdy player, whose repertory includes the 'Miserere' from 'Il Trovarore', Eduardo Di Capuas popular 'Oh, Marie', and Irving Berlin's hit, 'Alexander's Ragtime Band'. At the movement's conclusion, the cop reappears, frightening away the player, and leaving only a memory of the "delightful forbidden music".

The fourth movement, composed in part while Carpenter was on holiday on Wisconsin's Lake Geneva, depicts the baby's impressions of The Lake.

For the baby's subsequent encounter with Dogs, Carpenter quotes both Septimus Winner's 'Where, Oh Where Has My Little Dog Gone', and 'Ach, du lieher Augustin'.

In the last movement, Dreams, the adventures of the day are recalled as Mother puts baby to sleep with a tune similar to the French lullaby, 'Dodo, L'enfant Do'.

The music is very easy going and pleasant to listen to - recommended for adult babies everywhere!
Saffron - July 2001

Every morning after my second breakfast - if the wind and the sun are favourable, I go out. I should like to go alone, but my will is overborne. My nurse is appointed to take me. She is older than I, and very powerful. While I wait for her, resigned, I hear her cheerful steps, always the same. I am wrapped in a vacuum of wool, where there are no drafts. A door opens and shuts. I am placed in my perambulator, a strap is buckled over my stomach, my nurse stands firmly behind, and we are off! 

Out is wonderful! It is always different, though one seems to have been there before. I cannot fathom it all. Some sounds seem like smells. Some sights have echoes, It is confusing, but it is Life! For instance; the policeman: an unprecedented man; round like a ball; taller than my father. Blue - fearful - fascinating! I feel him before he comes. I see him after he goes. I try to analyse his appeal. It is not buttons alone, nor belt, nor baton. I suspect it is his eye, and the way he walks. He walks like Doom.

My nurse feels it too. She becomes less firm, less powerful. My perambulator hurries, hesitates, and stops. They converse. They ask each other questions - some with answers, some without. I listen, with discretion. When I feel that they have gone far enough, I signal to my nurse, a private signal, and the policeman resumes his enormous blue march. He is gone, but I feel him after he goes. 

Then suddenly there is something else. I think it is a sound. We approach it. My ear is tickled to excess. I find the absorbing noise comes from a box - something like my music box, only much larger, and on wheels. A dark man is turning the music out of the box with a handle, just as I do with mine. A dark lady, richly dressed, turns when the man gets tired. They both smile, I smile too, with restraint, for music is the most insidious form of noise. And such music! So gay! I tug at the strap over my stomach. I have a wild thought of dancing with my nurse and my perambulator - all three of us together. Suddenly, at the climax of our excitement, I feel the approach of a phenomenon that I remember. It is the policeman. He has stopped the music. He has frightened away the dark man and lady with their music box. He seeks the admiration of my nurse for his act. He walks away, his buttons shine, but far off I hear again the forbidden music. Delightful, forbidden music! 

Almost satiated with adventure, my nurse firmly pushes me on, and almost before I recover my balance, I am face to face with a new sensation. The land comes to an end, and there at my feet is the lake. All my other sensations are joined in one. I see, I hear, I feel, the quiver of the little waves as they escape from the big ones and come rushing up over the sand. Their fear is pretended. They know the big waves are amiable, for they can see a thousand sunbeams dancing with impunity on their very backs. Waves and sunbeams! Waves and sunbeams! Blue water - white clouds -dancing, swinging! A white sea gull in the air. This is My Lake! 

We pass on. Probably there is nothing more in the world. If there is, it is superfluous. There IS. It is dogs! We come upon them without warning. Not one of them - all of them. First, one by one; then in pairs; then in societies. Little dogs with sisters; big dogs with aged parents. Kind dogs, brigand dogs, sad dogs and gay. They laugh, they fight, they flirt, they run. And at last, in order to hold my interest, the very littlest brigand starts a game of "Follow the Leader", followed by all the others. It is tremendous! 

Those dogs have gone! It is confusing, but it is life! My mind grows numb. My cup is too full. I have a sudden conviction that it is well that I am not alone. The firm step behind reassures me. The wheels of my perambulator make a sound that quiets my nerves. I lie very still. I am quite content. In order to think more clearly, I close my eyes. My thoughts are absorbing. I deliberate upon my mother. Most of the time my mother and my nurse have but one identity in my mind, but at night or when I close my eyes, I can easily tell them apart, for my mother has the greater charm. I hear her voice quite plainly now, and feel the touch of her hand. It is pleasant to live over again the adventures of the day - the long blue waves curling in the sun, the policeman who is bigger than my father, the music box and my friends, the dogs. It is pleasant to lie quite still and close my eyes, and listen to the wheels of my perambulator. "How very large the world is. How many things there are!"

John Alden Carpenter