Features and Reviews
28th Annual Old Town Music Hall Ragtime Festival, 2003
By Eric Marchese
Doesn't seem like 28 years since the first one – at least that was the consensus opinion – but indeed, it was in 1975 when Old Town Music Hall in El Segundo organized its first all-star ragtime festival, which was so popular it became an annual event. For you historians out there, that first concert featured Dick Zimmerman, Jim Turner, Bob Long and Patrick Gogerty.
What's billed as a "festival" is in actuality a wonderful concert of four performers, performed three times over the course of the third weekend in June – but no matter. This year, the four ragtime stars on the program – Kathy Craig, Bill Mitchell, Robbie Rhodes and Alex Hassan – gave two evening performances on June 21-22 as well as a Saturday matinee. (Mr. Mitchell and Mr. Rhodes are veterans of the events, having first appeared on the bill in 1977.)
This is the same quartet Old Town has employed for this event for each of the last several years, and they seem to have meshed more smoothly now than on any previous occasion. The duets were, for the most part, polished and the solos diverse, listenable and skillfully played. Perhaps the most welcome surprise was the opportunity to hear pieces by Kathy Craig and Bill Mitchell that neither is normally known for, while Alex Hassan – the only non-Californian of the four – continues to astonish L.A.-area audiences with his masterful presentation of what he self-mockingly calls "eternal medleys."
Mr. Mitchell opened things on the Boesendoerfer with May Aufderheide's seldom-heard 1910 masterpiece "A Totally Different Rag," with its lyrical first theme and pleasing dissonances in the second theme, which returns (in a new key) to end the rag; Abe Olman's 1908 "Honeymoon Rag," a real toe-tapper with a cool, busy trio that's rhythmically full and alive and an exciting finale; and Artie Matthews' "Pastime Rag No. 5," a "great Classic rag with a Spanish flavor," a Mortonesque-sounding A theme and an exciting ending.
As Miss Craig took over the Boesendorfer and Bill moved over to the Steinway, the two duetted on Joplin's "Elite Syncopations," providing especially pleasing counterpoint to the two middle strains. Kathy then provided a clean, enjoyable rendering of "an early song with 'rag' in the title, closer to the march form" – William Krell's "Mississippi Rag," an 1897 piece in the cakewalk-'patrol' mold, and a rarity – "A Real Slow Drag," Joplin's finale to his 1911 opera "Treemonisha," played expressively and with nice, delicate touches. Kathy ended her set with another rarity – E.T. Paull's "The Burning of Rome," a "character march" whose intricacies were easily mastered in Kathy's performance – the first two themes are rousing, the march-like trio is quiet, and a bridge leads back to A and B, with frantic syncopations (by Kathy) in the last statement of B and a terrific, rousing, classical-style coda.
Soloing at the Boesendorfer, Mr. Rhodes got warmed up with "Blue Goose Rag," by Charles L. Johnson under the pen name "Raymond Birch." This 1916 piece has an amiable first theme, catchy second theme using breaks and a quiet, lyrical trio, all given piano-roll touches to lead back into a lively reprise of the B theme. Robbie added more licks and tricks, and jazzy phrases, to the pop song "Superstitious Blues," then followed with a fast-tempo version of the Henry Lodge hit "Red Pepper, A Spicy Rag," loaded with a jazzy sound and piano-roll stylings.
With Mr. Hassan taking the Steinway, the duet of Rhodes and Hassan, as a tribute to Bill Coffman, OTMH's late, great co-owner, did Irving Berlin's 1922 song "Pack Up Your Sins and Go to the Devil," with Robbie picking up the patter straight off the sheet music – a very strong duet number, especially in its final third. Soloing, Alex then offered the latest of his "elaborate arrangements, piano roll licks and eternal medleys" (read: skilled pianistics) – this time, a "grand fantasy" from 1930s Warner Brothers cartoons. Transcribed by Alex off videotapes of classic Merry Melodies, they included "The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down," "Shake Your Powder Puff," "Let's Rub Noses Like the Eskimoses" and, of course, "Merrily We Roll Along."
With Alex and Kathy at the Steinway and Bill and Robbie at the Boesendorfer, we got a fast-tempo, eight-handed version of Wenrich's "The Smiler," and with a few neat piano-roll effects from Robbie and Alex (Saturday's duet was "Dill Pickles"). Kathy opened the second half with the beautiful, flowing legato of Lamb's "American Beauty," with its strong echo effect in the windup, and Hayden and Joplin's "Sunflower Slow Drag," with three pretty melodies and a strong rideout strain. She and Alex duetted on Nacio Herb Brown's "The Doll Dance" providing good back-and-forth between them on Jacques Frey's Novelty-style arrangement from the '40s of this 1927 perennial.
Alex proffered three "relatively short numbers," sounding like a human piano roll on all three: "You Ought to Be in Pictures" (from Bob Pinsker's transcription of an early '30s roll); "Sport Model Encore," a rare Zez Confrey piece (from 1937) that's jazzy, peppy and full of Novelty licks; and George Gershwin's "Do Do Do," which Alex transcribed from a 78 rpm of Gershwin's own arrangement.
Soloing, Bill gave a jazzy rendition of one of his favorites, James Scott's masterly "Grace and Beauty," and a genuine rarity: Scott's Strauss-like light classical waltz, "Suffragette" (from 1914), with a lovely, lyrical opening theme followed by a darker section, then an intricate yet lyrical trio. Finally, Bill added his original rag "Musty," a clever meshing of Aufderheide's "Dusty Rag" and Errol Garner's "Misty" (the latter syncopated, of course).
Then, more Scott, with Bill and Robbie duetting on the march-like "Peace and Plenty" before Robbie soloed on Wilbur Sweatman's "Down Home Rag" from 1911, with its many now-familiar "barnyard"-sounding melodies, and "She's Cryin' for Me," a "pop song of unknown origins" done by many a New Orleans jazz band, written by Santo Pecora and, strangely enough, "licensed by Jelly Roll Morton." In Robbie's hands, the piano version certainly sounds like a jazz band tune as Morton would play it.
All four stars rang down the curtain with the Lampe cakewalk "Creole Bells," with Bill adding lively treble trills, Alex fancy bass runs and Robbie the strains of "Aloha Oe" in counterpoint, just to see if anyone noticed (and, we did!). To thunderous applause, the Fab Four encored with everyone's favorite, "Maple Leaf Rag," suitably embellished by all.
OTMH proprietor Bill Field said he's already planning, for the 30th anniversary concert in 2005, to bring back every ragtime who has ever performed in Old Town's many, now-storied Annual Ragtime Festivals.
More OTMH Ragtime Festival Reviews:
2006 Festival
2005 Festival
2004 Festival
2002 Festival
2001 Festival
2000 Festival
1999 Festival
