tech
February 16, 2026
'I love you twenty-sixty times': how lyrics written by a three-year-old became tear-inducing viral hits
When Stephen Spencer began setting his daughter’s surreal stories to music, he had 36 followers. Now his banging pop miniatures have been streamed nearly 30m times – and are making parents cry
TL;DR
- Stephen Spencer, a music professor, creates viral songs using lyrics from his three-year-old daughter's stories.
- His songs, initially shared with a small audience, have gained over 250,000 followers and millions of streams on platforms like Instagram and TikTok.
- Listeners find the songs both entertaining and emotionally resonant, often bringing them to tears due to nostalgia and the perceived act of love in deeply listening to a child.
- Spencer, influenced by jazz and classical music, crafts infectious hooks while preserving the surreal nature and grammatical quirks of his daughter's lyrics.
- He views the songs as a way to capture the fleeting moments of early childhood and expresses hesitation about altering the original magic of the short pieces.
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