K.K. Ragtime

K.K. Ragtime this is a song that came from a Nintendo video game called "Animal Crossing." K.K. Slider is the name of the dog character seen in this video. Kazumi Totaka is the original composer of the song in the video but this K.K. Ragtime piano piece was arranged by Ron O'Dell. This is no old-timey ragtime song but it is certainly a modern ragtime piece that Tom Brier exclaimed after playing it for the first time, "Oh, that's cute!"

I love playing this piece. It is indeed fun to play it on my piano, especially my antique player piano.

Hope you like Tom Brier's video!

An update and slow down..

Still practicing though not as long as I want it to be on a daily basis (3 to 4 hours a day). Over the last 4 or 5 weeks my left hand, wrist and some in the forearm I am experiencing a bit of annoying pain after I play for an extended period (and that means like 20 minutes or so). My left hand/wrist area seems to get a bit inflamed where the tendons are getting rubbed from the repetitve action. So, I've adjusted my bench by getting rid of my cushion so I can sit a little lower that puts less awkward pressure on my left hand by changing the position some. Really, I just need to lay off for a 9 or 10 days straight and let it recuperate. But with the piano in the living room staring back at me I would just want to practice and have fun instead.

I got the Black and White Rag down to full memory and play it through without much problems. I'll tape it someday soon.

K.K. Ragtime is coming along as well as well as for a few other ragtime pieces. But with my constant injury to my left hand the practicing is slowing down and reducing my practicing hours. Kind of makes me a bit angry there. Oh well, until next time.

K.K. Ragtime by Tom Brier

If you haven't heard Tom Brier play ragtime you won't be disappointed. Here's Tom playing "K.K. Ragtime" for the first time by sight reading this piano piece. He stumbles about 1/4 way but his effort playing this piece for the first time by sight reading is still quite impressive. This tune was composed by Kazumi Totaka for the Nintendo video game series "Animal Crossing" where it was transcribed and put into a ragtime format. In the end Tom Brier remarked, "Oh, that's cute!"



Here's the music sheet if you want a copy of K.K. Ragtime. Of course, I'm going to practice this piece and give y'all a performance soon someday.

Just be patience. I'm curious how it'll sound on my "crappy" piano with me being the only deaf Ragtime pianist around. Of course, I'm not completely deaf but hard of hearing with the help of my new Siemen hearing aid which can pick up all of the notes on my piano and finally with volume control this time since my old digital hearing aid had an automatic volume control which was maddening whenever I played the piano because it would make it soft. So, thank goodness for getting one with volume control this time.

Anyway, enjoy K.K. Ragtime. A real diddy to enjoy listening to.

ADDENDUM: Here's a YouTube version of Tom Brier playing it again on a different piano a year later seen here. Still, I liked Tom's playing in the first video. It sounded much more livelier.




But a month earlier played that piece at the 2008 West Coast Ragtime Festival with the Raspberry Jam Band playing the "K.K. Ragtime" in one of their after-hours jam session. Pretty cool with all instruments playing. Even with a bit of "K.K." vocal piece thrown in for a short time.


Here's where K.K. Ragtime got it's inspiration from.