Family history and Music
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Family history and Music
Family music is an undeniably important part of our family memories, even if you don’t fully realize it at first. Think about all the family memories associated with music—Christmas parties with favourite songs that everyone quiets down to listen to, that “one song” that grandma always has to play when she’s riding in the passenger seat, and so many other family history moments associated with music.
Nat King Cole in 1952
One of the best ways you can preserve your family music is by creating playlists related to the songs that make up such an important part of your family’s life and history. The following guide will help you learn how to create music playlists associated with your family history, along with some tips for sharing the playlists with the rest of your family.
How to Create Family Music Playlists
Thanks to modern technology, creating family music playlists is fairly easy. You can use a platform such as Spotify, which lets you create playlists of music that is active on the Spotify platform. Since there are millions of songs on Spotify, you can find just about any music you like there. You can also create a playlist using iTunes or a similar music program, but this requires you to have purchased the music or have the music on CD, which can then be transferred to the computer as a digital mp3 file.
Aretha Franklin in 1968
Creating the list itself will take some patience and creativity on your part. You can create family music playlists that are direct, such as: “Grandma’s Favourite Music,” “Aunt Susan’s Favourite Music,” etc. Or you can create playlists with a more creative slant, such as, “The Family’s Favourite Christmas Songs,” or “The Songs that Drive Everyone Crazy but the Kids Love Them,” and so on.
Janis Joplin in 1970
How to Share Family Music Playlists
There are a few different ways you can share music playlists, depending on the platform you’ve used. If you used Spotify, all you need to do is send a link to the Spotify playlist to your family members. They may need an account to listen to it, so make sure you set this up for the family members who aren’t technology savvy. This is the simplest way to share playlists, since you don’t need to pay for the music as long as it’s on the Spotify platform.
If you’ve used a program such as iTunes which doesn’t work using cloud-hosted music, then you can share the playlist by burning it to a CD. Copies of the CD can then be made and passed around the family. Having a hard copy of the playlist is a good idea for family members who aren’t technology-savvy.
The singing group the Boswell Sisters in 1931. From left-"Vet", Connie and Martha.
Remember, family history is about more than old photos or written-down family trees: our memories are intrinsically linked to music, which plays a large part in our lives and our hearts. A family music playlist is the perfect way to embrace your family history and preserve a unique part of it that can be passed down to future generations.