Maple Leaf Rag by Mike McConnell

Here's a video of me playing on my $50 crappy piano that I bought less than two months ago so I can be able to practice my ragtime and early jazz pieces with a full length keyboard for the first time in years (note: I had a shortened keyboard piano called the Melodigrand which was even worse than my current one). It has been too many years gone by where I didn't even play or practice my piano as much as I wanted to. Now, I am back into my piano playing by practicing 2 to 3 hours every day and the opportunity to learn new pieces such as a George Botsford's piece called "Black and White Rag" where I have almost memorized the whole piece. Just a need a few more weeks before I make my next video tape.

It has been less than two months of practicing so far just to get past my "rusty" stage first and allow time my dexterity and coordination to catch up. I'm still "rusty" but certainly much better when I first started. As you can tell in my Maple Leaf Rag piece I've missed a few notes and the tempo was not as smooth as I wanted it to be (that may be because it's very late at night and I was tired, too). You can hear the clacking noise while I play plus many of the notes are obviously out of tune. It's not so bad but I was playing it in my garage which makes the whole experience a little "echo-ey".

But here is where you can help! You can "donate" for a good cause. How?

As you may not know I am one of the very few hard of hearing or deaf musicians to play the piano, especially Ragtime. The problem is, ever try playing on a gawd awful piano? But you can help me get a better piano by purchasing some of my ragtime products at my Deaf Ragtime store and also help defray any costs for my upcoming Ragtime festival visits. One of the products available is a button seen at the top of this blog entry that says "I'd Rather Be Playing Ragtime!" Indeed. Wouldn't you rather be playing Ragtime?

You can visit my ragtime store at:
http://www.cafepress.com/deaf_ragtime

Ragtime Undergoing Another Revival?

A question arises from me on the issue of what really constitute a “ragtime revival” and whether ragtime is an underground phenomenon like it did during the late 1800s before it exploded into scene in the early 1900s as a true rival with 1900 being the pivotal point in time when more pianists were doing and composing ragtime crediting many of the black rag timers who piqued their interests in this new music genre of the time.

Of course, nowadays I don’t think we have this “underground” phenomenon since there are many venues or festivals that take place every year in the United States for many new and old ragtime enthusiasts, and those who hear it for the very first time.

But at what point would the revival of ragtime constitute a true revival and not something that is perennially dormant only to come out when called? Would it be the number of ragtime sheets being composed be a good way to gauge the interest in ragtime? What about CD's? Or the rising number of newer and/or younger rag timers whether it’s the piano, a band, a guitar rag timer playing Maple Leaf Rag, or a banjo? Or would the rising number of ragtime festivals being held around the United States be a good gauge to determine the “revival” question? Perhaps a revival or a long, slow awakening is underway in the form of an electronic format via the internet such as using YouTube to watch and listen to ragtime being played? Or increasing number of blogsites and websites that revolve around Ragtime?

I posed a similar question in Yahoo’s Ragtime newsgroup “Elite Syncopations” and one remarked that there were more older people in the audience (live performance I suppose) than younger ones. That may be the perception but are many of these older people internet-savvy enough to download midi ragtime files or go to YouTube and punch in “ragtime” in the search engine and see the numerous pages of videos of people playing ragtime (mostly on pianos)? Who would that audience most likely be on the internet, the younger audience or older ones?

As for the number of ragtime festivals it has grown over the years with a few of them being around for more than 2 decades such as Sedalia’s Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival to celebrate their 28th anniversary this year. And recently we have the Rocky Mountain Ragtime Festival which held it’s last festival in 2005 (13th anniversary) and no longer but that doesn’t mean it won’t come back. Then we have the numerous more “recent” festivals that are becoming more established such as the ever so popular and growing Sutter Creek Ragtime Festival which will celebrate their 10th anniversary this summer. And then the smaller ones such as the Eau Claire Ragtime Festival celebrating their 10th anniversary and so on. How many of these festivals are there in the United States that celebrate Ragtime annually in the form of festivals or hosted in an era Main Street like atmosphere with familiar ragtime pieces being played that can be heard in the distance?

How do we know for sure that Ragtime is really on the upswing and that more people are appreciating it more with each passing year? And lastly but not least is how do we get the rest of the people’s attention or in this case the world’s attention about Ragtime, a timeless era and music that will never (hopefully so) go out of style.