Me and my buddy are trying to put a set-list together with the theme mentioned in the title.
"Unassuming places" is intentionally a little vague, but the idea is that feeling of "damn, I did not expect a song from this [insert piece of media] to be that good," or when you sit down and really listen to something you are surprised at well-composed it is, or songs that sound simple and reach a wide audience, but are actually a lot more complicated under the hood.
Some examples of the sounds we're going for are:
You might also be able to call this list "songs geared towards children but are actually good" but I feel like that has more of a nursery rhyme-ish connotation and I'm hoping to branch out of that.
We're a guitar duo with a jazz background, so songs that could potentially fit that mold are preferred, but I don't want that to hinder anyone from giving suggestions! I'd love to see what anyone can come up with.
I really love this theme. Off the top of my head:
"Verdanturf Town" and "Dewford Town" from Pokemon Sapphire/Ruby.
"Fate and Destiny" from Patrick Doyle's score for Brave (or really anything by Patrick Doyle; his soundtrack for Goblet of Fire is lovely).
"Test Drive" and "Romantic Flight" from How to Train your Dragon.
"Thula Baba" from Civilization 6. (This one isn't streaming, so it's a little hard to find, but it's a beautiful rendition of a traditional lullabye: https://youtu.be/25X8JYsPqyg.")
"What are You" from Silvestri's soundtrack for Ready Player One.
Hope that helps! If I think of any more, I'll add them.