Child singers come of age on TV screens

Child singers come of age on TV screens

Cute moppets of both sexes slink across TV screens warbling
inane ditties about their fingernails or their nagging aunt. The
records sell but is it healthy to have kids grow up before their
time? The Jakarta Post's Rita Widiadana and Yogita Tahil Ramani,
along with Amorita of Jakarta Jakarta monthly shines a light on
child entertainers.

JAKARTA (JP): She wears a black leather jacket teamed with
tight pants and a pair of high-heeled boots. With heavy makeup on
her young face and red lipstick on her tiny lips, she sings a
song taken from her latest album while her body sways to the
music just like a lady rocker.

She is not Madonna but 7-year-old Maissy Pramaishella. This
energetic and charming little girl, along with other children
such as Enno Lerian, Trio Kwek Kwek, Joshua, Chikita Meidy,
Innez, Angie and Giovanni currently dominate Indonesia's junior
entertainment world.

They are a new generation of child singers emerging after an
almost 20-year interval, replacing the 1970s groups of junior
artists that included Chicha Koeswoyo, Adi Bing Slamet, Ira Maya
Sopha, Yoan Tanamal.

The establishment of private television stations in the early
1990s and the growth of recording companies played a very
important part in paving the way for today's child artists to
enter a competitive show-business world.

Almost every day, these young artists appear on television to
entertain and, of course, to promote their most recent albums,
targeting a preschooler to elementary-school-aged audience.

So don't be surprised to find your children sitting in front
of the tube, especially between 3 p.m and 5 p.m, when most
private stations shower them with children's music and cartoon
programs.

Surya Citra Televisi (SCTV), for instance, broadcasts programs
Ci Luk Ba and Dunia Anak (Children's World). Rajawali Citra
Televisi (RCTI) has Tralala Trilili, and education station TPI
screens Klab Klip.

Junior artists range from toddlers, whose verbal skills have
yet to develop, well on to preteen girls and boys trying to
showcase their singing talents through these programs. Some of
them are quite good but many are terrible because they posses
neither the talent nor vocal skills required by a singer.

People who deal with children, including psychologists,
teachers, songwriters and musicians also feel concern regarding
the current development of child entertainers in Indonesia.

A.T. Mahmud, a veteran child songwriter and educator, is one
of them.

"The children's world represented by most of these junior
artists today is far from a pure and innocent place any normal
kid should have live in," said Mahmud, who composed "classic"
children's songs like Pelangi (Rainbow).

He said that the lyrics in most songs do not really portray
children's lives and lack educative and moral values that any
child should absorb.

Some songs encourage children to mock older people, like Trio
Kwek Kwek's Tante Cerewet (The Nagging Aunt), which was a
favorite children's song last year.

There are also others packed with messages hardly understood
by children. Aku Cinta Rupiah (I Love the Rupiah) sang by a child
singer portrays the present economic crisis. But how can a child
understand the message of the rupiah campaign launched by adults?

The government's development programs are also expressed in a
number of songs, such as Si Komo Pulang Ke Desa (Si Komo Returns
to His Village), which is charged with promoting a rurality
scheme.

"These children are forced to sing "sponsored songs" without
understanding the words. What they do is just perform them in an
attractive way," Mahmud said.

Fauzia Azwin Hadis, a professor of psychology at the
University of Indonesia, warned that many parents of these
singers have the ambition to move their kids into show business.

Even if children sing horribly, their parents will keep
forcing them because they feel that outside of education, this is
a way of striking gold, she added.

As a matter of fact, child entertainment is a major and
lucrative business for those involved.

Top singers like Enno Lerian, Giovanni, Trio Kwek Kwek and Ria
Enes and her doll Susan receive paychecks of between Rp 4 million
and Rp 10 million per show. Writers of children's songs also draw
a lot of cash from the business. Papa T. Bob, a pseudonym of
Erwanda Lukas, who wrote Si Nyamuk Nakal (The Naughty Mosquito)
and Du Di Dam, receives between Rp 10 million and Rp 20 million
per song. Other songwriters, like Toto Noor, Ririn S. and Harry
Ch get Rp 2 million maximum, according to Theodore KS, a music
observer.

TV stations profit from commercial slots. Each company pays Rp
3 million to Rp 5 million per 30 seconds to advertise their
products, including candies, fast food, children's wear and
holiday packages during children's programs.

Zoemrotin, a leading consumer rights activist, is worried that
child artists will be exploited as "commodities" in the show
business world ruled by adults who are responsible for turning
innocent children into "dolls" that they like to dress up and
send out to perform.

Meidy Emde, father of singer Chikita Meidy, however, refuted
any charge of exploiting his daughter. "What we are doing now is
channeling our daughter's music talent and interest," said Meidy,
who spent Rp 130 million (US$13,000) to produce and promote his
daughter's debut album Kuku (Fingernails) when she was just three
years old.

On exploitation of child artists, Fauzia said there was a fine
line between honing a child's skills and exploitation.

"If the child is doing something on a rigorous and regular
basis only for the sake of his and her parents, that's
exploitation," she said.

Author Arswendo Atmowiloto said that the problems lied with
parents and other adults' failure to understand the world of
children. "It is up to parents and other adults to decide whether
they want to give their children the best world."