“There are no ‘babies’, there are Marias and Manéis,” Paulo Lameiro firmly replies whenever he is asked what the best music is for this age group. “It’s the same as asking ‘what’s the best music for people in their forties?’; everyone has their own preferences.”

A musicologist, educator and artistic director of the Musicalmente company, he has over 30 years’ experience in educational and artistic production projects for early childhood. In 1992, at the age of 18, after being rejected by the Lisbon Conservatory for “being too old compared to the other applicants”, he returned to his home village, Pousos, in Leiria, to design an arts education programme starting with babies, called Berço das Artes.

Building on these classes, in 1996 he set up ‘Músicos de Fraldas’, a training programme for professionals in the field of early childhood arts education, heavily influenced by the first visit to Portugal in 1995 of Edwin Gordon, a professor and researcher in music education. “I realised that working with babies was not only possible, but essential.”

The following year, he founded Concertos para Bebés which, as he often says, “are simply concerts”. Throughout the year, there are 11 programmes with a repertoire ranging from classical to jazz, from traditional Portuguese to world music, from electronic to alternative music, and including improvisations and dances. “Going to a concert is just as important for a baby as it is for an adult to go and see an exhibition or watch the sunset,” explains the musicologist. “They will enjoy that moment, they will feel something and discover things about themselves that only the exposure to art allows.”

For 10 years, Concertos para Bebés were held monthly at Casa da Música, where Paulo Lameiro often returns with Musicalmente for other sessions. On the 9th, he will present O Bebé Compositor there, a programme forming part of Amplify, a project conceived by a European consortium to enable babies to ‘compose’ with the help of AI. The babies will have sensors attached to their bodies that will read their reactions to the music and translate them into sheet music, transmitted in real time to the musicians via virtual reality headsets. There will also be cameras filming the parents or carers.

“The extent to which a baby engages is linked to the extent to which the parents engage,” notes Paulo. In this sense, whilst it is true that some music is better suited to capturing babies’ attention – Baroque music, for example, is composed in shorter movements than Romantic music – the best pieces and composers to play for babies are those that you enjoy the most. “Essentially, the baby responds to a good relationship with music.”

For Indy Paiva, working with young children was “a chance encounter that turned into a passion and the discovery of a true calling”. In 2011, he was invited by the programming director of the extinct Clube Literário do Porto – where he taught guitar – to lead a music workshop for children and families. He eagerly accepted the challenge, but not before attending the Músicos de Fraldas programme, run by Paulo Lameiro in Pousos, Leiria.

“I had become a father for the second time in August 2010, and my daughter was both an inspiration and a 'test subject' in the process,” he says. In late April, Música com Bebés & Papás kicked off, a trio project with Lipe Paiva (piano and other instruments) and Kate Rodrigues (vocals and percussion), in which Indy takes on narration, vocals, guitar and percussion.

Over the past 15 years, Indy & Trupe have run hundreds of music and musical expression sessions for babies and families. Typically, there is a monthly theme, from which stories are chosen that include “songs and soundscapes with tonal and rhythmic patterns”. Indy emphasises the collaborative nature of the shows. “We share ergonomic instruments adapted for babies and children with whom we make music.”

Making the most of music as a language in which “verbal expression is not always the most important thing”, Indy & Trupe focus primarily on aspects such as “learning songs, developing a range of vocal timbres and active listening” when preparing their sessions. Issues such as motor skills, lateral coordination and balance are also taken into account.

As part of Música com Bebés & Papás, a project that regularly tours various municipalities on the outskirts of Porto, events such as Música com Dragõezinhos have emerged, with monthly sessions at the FC Porto Museum (on the 3rd, they’ll be there with the theme “Mum”). From time to time, Indy & Trupe perform at nurseries, schools, associations and local councils from north to south of the country.

Founded by a group of artist-educators, Frenesim began as “a cultural mediation service that started with babies and ended with grandparents”. In the early days, they ran art workshops whilst exploring “how to work with each age group”. “We developed a working methodology based on the many sessions we held with families,” explains Rita Campos Costa.

First comes ‘start by starting’, a moment that involves those who arrive early without excluding those who are late. This is followed by ‘a welcome, a rhythmic pattern, something to get people moving, something to sing, an ostinato [a phrase or motif repeated throughout a piece of music], a strange collective instrument, and a song to see people off’.

“Children thrive on routines,” emphasises the project’s artistic and educational coordinator. “There’s a sense of anticipation where they think: ‘Oh, she’s going to do that again!’” The staging is also designed to serve these creations, which are a combination of a show and a workshop – musicians and families form two crescent shapes facing each other.

The sound of Frenesim’s activities draws on the musical experiences of Zé Figueiredo (a member of peixe:avião with links to rock and electronic music) and Rita Campos Costa (a member of Sopa de Pedra, an all-female traditional music ensemble), and is reflected in adapted or original compositions. “There’s no such thing as ‘cute’ music for babies,” says Rita. “There is music, and whether it is relevant or not depends on the narrative and context we have.”

Families are invited to help create the ‘layers of sound’ for the workshop-performances by recording their voices with the help of the team, who use only unconventional instruments – that is, ‘things that make sound’ that they have made themselves.

There is also a significant artistic dimension. One example of this is the show Há Um Rio Nesta Gota, which will be performed at the Almeida Garrett Library on May 3rd at 10.30 am. There are handkerchiefs that serve as boats, paintbrushes that act as oars and, at the end, an open river made from a large roll of kraft paper, where the babies paint with water. “Parents are surprised that they stay there for so long,” reveals Rita. “You don’t need to do much; you need to do less, because children are overstimulated.”