South Point students at the studio. (above) The screen accompanying the song The Ladder

Six-year-old Subhranil and Arunima have an album to their name, something that no one in their families has achieved. And the album may soon hit the market.

South Point School has produced a multimedia CD recorded in a studio, comprising songs sung by 20 of its tiniest students.

?Children learn rhymes in their music class from Nursery I itself. But often their parents fail to make out the words when they sing the same songs at home because of faulty pronunciation. So in 1996, we printed a book containing the lyrics. Even then, to pick up the composition correctly, the children started asking for cassettes of the songs. So we thought of recording the songs,? says Madhu Kohli, principal of South Point School.

Let?s Sing Together is an in-house compilation. The pictures and the digital formatting have been done by the art and the computer departments of the school.

?There is a karaoke option after each song for children to sing along after they pick up the composition. We have also left provisions to take printouts of black and white outlines of the pictures that accompany the songs. The children can use them for colouring,? says Joyrup Bhattacharya, who heads the school?s computer department.

The recording was done in a studio on Broad Street. ?I have worked with children during the school?s annual programmes. But recording live with kids was a different experience all together,? laughs Suparna Kanti Ghosh, who along with Rocket Mondal, provided the arrangement for 62 favourites like Do-Re-Mi, Jingle Bells and Five Hundred Miles.

The CD and the song book, priced at Rs 85, will reach 2,500 students of the three classes next week. ?It is the strength of our numbers that makes it viable for us to embark on such projects,? reflects Krishna Damani, a school official.

The school has other projects up its sleeve. Books brought out earlier by South Point Education Society (including those penned by founder Satikanta Guha) have been doing good business. The society plans to market the CD as well. ?We want to share the fruits of our labour with other schools,? Damani says.

The school?s question bank is also being digitised. ?Providing the past 10-15 years? questions on a CD would help students. There will be search options on key words and topics, so students can find out say, how many questions had come on Emperor Akbar and when.? The second volume of Let?s Sing Together (for Classes I and II) is also in the pipeline.

The singers have merry memories of the days of recording, which took place after their annual exams. ?It was great fun playing there with friends,? mutters little Arunima, now in Class I.