Things were starting to look up for the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival- at least from a competition standpoint- as a new century arose. The contest was now firmly established as a Decatur, IL attraction, what with the perfect location (the newly-renamed Holiday Inn Select)...a venue where ragtime fans no longer had to worry about it raining on the parade.
What could go wrong?
We'll tell you later.
But first...let's talk about the 2000 version.
That year, 23 contestants weighed in (14 in the Regular Division, nine in the Junior Division); while eight JDs were trying to wrestle the division's crown away from the new kingpin, Adam Yarian, everybody in the RD group fought to get the newly-vacated title...left open because the then rules said that Brian Holland couldn't go after a fourth straight championship.
Two Reg Division contestants had never tasted the OTPP experience before: Barbara Curry and Michael Urban-Piette.
Meanwhile, John McElhaney ended a sixteen-year wait between berths in the contest (an event that underwent all sorts of changes since he last tried it in 1984...the biggest being the competition's move indoors in 1987).
One thing hadn't changed for Johnny Mac: He proved he was still RD semifinals material.
In the JD competition, Jerry Ailshie, Erin Long, and Ashley Leverenz were back to tussle with Adam Y. and Harrison Wade. But for 2000, they were joined by first-timers Will Best, Charles and Chris Korban, and the newest Danville (IL) discovery, Lauren Clayton.
When all was said and done, Harrison passed up Jerry (and Charles turned out to be the better Korban)...but Adam from Maryland was able to notch a third straight Junior Division championship.
Fourteen-year-old Adam did it...he punched his ticket into the contest's adult division.
Back in the adult-division wars, Mimi Blais was determined to leave no doubt that 2000 was her year...no questions asked.
The question was: "Who's gonna place second?"
At first, Michael Stalcup was running second...but he flamed out in the semifinals, and fell so far behind that Dan Mouyard, Marty Mincer, and Faye Ballard passed him up (with Faye taking second for herself at the end of the RD second round).
Well...if 2000 wasn't going to Mimi's year, would it be Faye's? (After all, when OTPP was still a one-division competition, Faye nearly ripped the crown away from Joybelle Squibb in 1976, the contest's second year.)
As it all turned out, Dan and the Two Martys (Mincer and Sammon) passed Faye up...but all four of 'em couldn't come out ahead of Mimi. (Marty S. placed second in the Regs.)
It all came down to dueling versions of "Kitten on the Keys:" Mimi's version was better than the rendition Marty M. brought home.
And no woman contestant has since snared the Regular Division's top prize.
Circumstances prevented Mimi from coming back to Decatur for the 2001 C&F...so that meant both division titles were there for the taking.
2001 was the year the Memorial Day weekend extravaganza boasted 24 contestants (sixteen RDs and eight JDs); seven pianists were new to the contest this time...and all but two were Regular Division performers.
David Feurzeig and Janet Bullock were two of 2001's first-timers; so were Al Roma (an American living in Germany at the time) and Andrew Barker (a Briton living in America back then).
Lauren's piano teacher, Bev Wolf, filled out an entry blank, too.
Bev was the instructor who also showed Ashley and Erin- as well as 1999 JD performer Marcie Hunt- the ropes.
Speaking of JD...it was a one-Korban year (Charles carried the family banner this time) and the first year Illinoisan Karah Gettleman and Iowan Sarah Davison (who grew up to become a Tennessean and help start a great band called High Road III) got in there.
I first met Sarah two years earlier, when I competed at the National Old-Time Country, Bluegrass, and Folk Music Festival and Contest (still held at that time in Avoca, IA). In 1999, the then sixteen-year-old grabbed that festival's ragtime piano championship...a title I'm told I almost won on my own first try.
Getting back to 2001...it looked as if Al was going to triumph on his first try. He boasted a four-point preliminary lead over David and the youngest of the RD performers, ol' Adam Y. But Adam Y. and Al R. lost ground in the division semifinals, and Dan went from a fourth-place tie with Faye to a second-place tie with Al...while David F. scooted to the top coming into the Reg finals.
OTPP Weekend 2001 turned out to have quite a few firsts:
*Harrison emerged victorious (his initial title) in the younger competition...in a year where the second-place and third-place JD finishers finally got awarded prize money, too.
*Sarah became the first female Junior Division contestant to receive prize money (she finished third while Will got second place).
*David couldn't hang on to the top Regular Division spot...and, instead,
Dan M. became the first OTPP contestant to follow up a JD title with a championship in the RDs. (Adam, Al, and Faye rounded out the RD Top Five.)
2001 was also the year Decatur's Holiday Inn Select went under new management.
This new management group decided to remodel the hotel...lobby, rooms, and all. And the danger was that the makeover wouldn't be done in time for 2002's Memorial Day weekend.
Plus, the group's members felt the Holiday Inn Select had room for just one big musical event per year. As a result, the new team decided to prop up the Central Illinois Jazz Festival and turn its back on the OTPP Contest.
The clincher came from the Decatur Convention and Visitors Bureau, a group that had been giving the Old-Time Music Preservation Association $2,000 per year to help with advertising the contest.
On the eve of the 2001 get-together, bureau officials told OMPA: "We're cutting you off!"
And so, for the first time in fifteen years, Ted Lemen and Co. needed a place for contestants to show their stuff on the 1883 Weber upright piano nicknamed "Moby Dink."
When we come back to take another look at the history of the OTPP soiree, we'll learn about the contest's next site.
I'm Jim Boston...thanks for reading this blog!
So far, the 41st Annual World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival had been some kind of fun (personal and otherwise)...from the Thursday tuneups at West Peoria's Sky Harbor Steakhouse to the ride on the Spirit of Peoria (an excursion I wouldn't have been allowed to take if the ticket seller at the dock hadn't recognized me from last year; I hadn't signed up in advance in 2015) to watching the New Rag Contest and the Duet Contest to playing in the party room (the very room where Duet and New Rag were staged).
Still had an axe to grind.
Last year, at the very last moment at the very last OTPP afterglow party, I was jamming with two of the 2014 Regular Division finalists (including the man who'd just gotten through winning it all)...and the one who didn't win it all in 2014 liked what he was hearing from me.
He couldn't leave it at that.
This same contestant asked me: "Why don't you play like that onstage?"
Then he instructed me to play alongside recordings.
I started doing that, first with a Sony Walkman, then- starting this past February- with an MP3 player I'd won at our company's picnic in September of last year.
When I can't take my MP3 player to a piano practice session, I'll work those rags out on an organ (in an effort to slow down). Or else I'll watch ragtime videos on YouTube and study them.
Nevertheless, I was so darned put off by his (let's face it, Bill Edwards') question that I was all set to boycott the 2015 C&F party-room sessions.
Boycott a party room?
Isn't that a contradiction in terms?
Anyway, the Friday afterglow worked out fine, and I definitely was fired up about the next day...where nineteen contestants (eleven Regular Division ones and eight in the Junior Division) would duke it out.
For 2015, the folks at the Old-Time Music Preservation Association changed some rules around to get more older contestants in there. (For a while, more JDs than RDs had gone out for OTPP 41.0.)
First of all, they decided to change the cutoff year for contest songs to 1939 (it previously was 1929).
Second, contest coordinator Faye Ballard was given the green light to put her contestant's hat back on.
Then they did the unthinkable:
Ted Lemen and Co. opened this year's competition to Regular Division pianists who'd previously retired undefeated.
Well, the philosophy was: "If we're going to go out...we're going out WITH A BANG!!"
And all nineteen of us were going to show our stuff on...a 2010s era Charles Walter studio piano. (The plan was originally to replace the famous 1883 Weber upright with a 2015, fresh-out-of-the-box Knabe studio model...but the Knabe proved too stiff for many of this year's hopefuls. So, the fresh-out-of-the-crate piano was put in the other party room and the Walter shifted over to the contest stage at the hotel's conference center.)
And Michigander Will Bennett became the first OTPP competitor to show the contest audience what the Walter can do...and he took advantage of the new song rules by playing "Jeepers Creepers" and "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)."
The crowd got a second helping of the Wolverine State Sound when John Remmers stepped up to the stage. John (a retired college professor) decided not to dip his toes into the waters of the 1930s, feeling comfortable with "My Sunny Tennessee" and "Scott Joplin's New Rag."
The next two performers were new to the contest...and neither one was from Michigan.
Junior Division contestant (and Illinoisan) Amberlyn Aimone turned in a pair of rags also written by ol' Scott himself: "Swipesy" and "The Ragtime Dance."
Nina Freeman (a JD'er) made the trip that fellow Texan Melissa Roen Williams had signed up for a year ago (and didn't take). And Nina made the trip really count by polishing off "Fig Leaf Rag" (Scott wrote it) and "Russian Rag," one of George Cobb's most famous compositions.
David Cavalari (fresh off his New Rag Contest triumph) put the ball back in the RD court in his bid to get back to that division's finals...and he started his 2015 quest out with a bang, playing "Fingerbuster" and "The Finger Breaker."
Then came the first performer to jump in on the most drastic rule change of all.
Instead of cohosting the ceremonies alongside Ted, Adam Swanson jumped back into the ring to add to his already matchless list of OTPP championships...and he launched his 2015 effort by saluting Eubie Blake (the most famous composer to come out of Adam's new stomping grounds, Baltimore, MD) with "Memories of You" and "Troublesome Ivories."
Pennsylvanian Michael J. Winstanley was the fifth of the eleven Regular Division performers to go up to bat, and he played "Deed I Do" (one of my favorite 1920s tunes) and "That Eccentric Rag."
Then came the youngest of the three Duet Contest partnerships.
Nathan Beasley went up first; he knocked it out with Luckey Roberts' "Pork and Beans" and Mark Janza's "Aviation Rag."
Fellow JD'er Danny Souvigny was trying to hook a third championship in that division (to go with his 2012 and 2014 triumphs). This year, Danny took to the stage with "After You've Gone" and "Go Wash an Elephant."
Adam Yarian (a Marylander-turned-Californian; he now lives and works in Los Angeles) was the last to go to the Charles Walter studio piano prior to the Saturday session's lunch break. The first C&F contestant to win three JD titles and three RD championships, Adam Y. showed the Embassy Suites crowd just how he helped raise the bar at a time when Adam S. was starting out (and learning fast!) as a contestant.
Adam Y. gave 'em "Handful of Keys" and "The Pearls."
Well, lunch time came and went; contest fans had a dizzying array of places to eat within (at the very least) walking distance of the Embassy Suites East Peoria...like the Steak 'n' Shake next door.
The place was packed.
In fact, that restaurant was so packed that Saturday afternoon that I had to leave that S 'n' S without eating a single bite.
This year, I drew eleventh position...and so, I had to kick off the second half of this year's prelims. (Yep...I followed Adam Y.)
I turned in a "Hardhearted Hannah" that had the same beat as Del Wood's version of "Down Yonder;" after that, I did "In My Merry Oldsmobile."
For "Olds," I took inspiration from 1980s-1990s OTPP contestant Mark Lutton, who used the lower keys to "start" his car. When it came to reworking "Hannah," I started thinking about all the crap some people at the C&F had given me through the years- from Steve Foster scolding me for starting over in a practice session in 1993 to Bill Edwards' 2014 question- and I did something I'd never set out to do in competition before:
I hit the keys with my forearms during the middle of "Hardhearted Hannah."
Well, the audience really liked it...and I'd never felt more comfortable about playing in C&F competition than on OTPP Saturday 2015.
Dan Mouyard- the first to win a Reg crown after taking a Junior title- came up to bat next, and he wowed 'em with "I Found a New Baby" and "Steeplechase Rag." (Morgan Siever, the top JD contestant in 2010 and 2011, rocked those same two numbers when she was in competition.)
And then came...the contest coordinator, a woman who, when she was twelve, almost won the whole ball of wax (at a time when everybody competed for just one top prize).
Faye's first foray into OTPP competition since 2010 worked out fine (well, I like to think so!)...and she turned in a couple of her old standbys, "Royal Garden Blues" and "Honky Tonk." (Sorry, Bill Doggett fans...not that "Honky Tonk.")
Speaking of JD...three more younger pianists weighed in at that moment.
First up was the fifth of six Illinoisans to go at it in 2015, Megan Jobe (she came back after sitting out 2014).
I'm glad Megan came back, for it gave the Embassy Suites crowd a chance to hear her unique style, which she brought to "Cleaning Up in Georgia" and "The Entertainer."
Fourteen down...five to go.
It would've been seven to go if Isaac Smith (who delayed Danny's march to three Junior Division championships by winning the division in 2013) hadn't gone to Des Moines to compete in the Iowa High School Track and Field Championships...and if Madeline Yara (from Mint Hill, NC; one of the Charlotte suburbs) had found two pre-1940 tunes to work on.
So...it was left to Isaac's and Madeline's younger siblings to carry on the family names in the OTPP battles.
And carry on they did.
Mia Yara celebrated her thirteenth birthday by entering the New Rag Contest; the next day, she took to the Charles Walter to bat out "At the Jazz Band Ball" and "Mood Indigo."
Then the guitarist-keyboardist-vocalist in the Charlotte-area rock band Controll Freex (visit www.controllfreex.com) gave way to Eli Smith...who brought home "Grizzly Bear" and "Dizzy Fingers."
Two of last year's RD finalists were next...the two I jammed with at the final 2014 afterglow party at the Embassy Suites East Peoria.
Ethan Uslan (he's also Maddy's and Mia's old-time piano mentor) hadn't lost a beat in his effort to hang on to that Ted Lemen Traveling Trophy...and he started his defense of that title by firing up "Syboney" (I hope I spelled it right) and "Georgia on My Mind."
Bill himself (the only Bill in competition this time, since circumstances kept Bill McNally in the New York City area for Memorial Day weekend) was in fine, fine form himself as he brought back a couple of tunes he'd entered before: "Mississippi Rag" and "Toot, Toot Tootsie (Goodbye)."
Leo Volker rounded out the 2015 prelims, using "Maple Leaf Rag" and "Magnetic Rag" to close out the Saturday leg of a one-Smith, one-Yara weekend in East Peoria.
Well, that was it...nothing to do but (1) finish the food I'd finally gotten from Steak 'n' Shake and (2) join everybody else in finding out how the JD competition went. (To say nothing of wondering who was going to play the next day!)
When contest judges Paul Asaro, Patrick Holland, and Raymond Schwarzkopf came out of deliberation, they found out that Mia kept the Yara family rolling in the dough by pocketing $40 (good for fifth place in the Junior Division).
Nathan got fourth place among the J's (that's $60) and Eli made sure a Smith would get paid (he picked up $100, the third-place prize in the division). Meanwhile, Nina took her second-place prize of $125 back home to San Antonio, TX.
And Danny S. still had the magic...and it made him $250 richer.
One question remained: "Who's gonna play in the Regular Division semifinals?"
Wait for my next post and you'll get the answer!
It's gone from an event held outdoors and subject to at least the worst atmospheric conditions Central Illinois tends to face in late May to an event held in hotels that keep getting better. (Every time this event has to find a new venue, the next venue tends to work out better than the old one.)
At first, it was a contest hurting for participants. Then it got to the point where so many contestants entered that a limit was eventually put on the field (26 is now the max).
When the event began, pianists of all ages competed for one prize. Then in 1985, a Junior Division was created so that players 17 or younger could go for the glory. (Now, performers in that division and the Regular Division fight for ten cash prizes...and the winner in each sector gets a trophy.)
And it's gone from a competition whose first five championships went to two women (1975-76 champ Joybelle Squibb and 1977-79 titleholder Dorothy Herrold) to an event whose biggest prize hasn't gone to a woman since Mimi Blais added the 2000 title to the championship she won in 1994 to a contest where its Regular Division hasn't had a female participant since 2012...the first (and- thus far- only) year Tennessee's Diana Stein went for the Big Trophy.
This year, people who spent Memorial Day weekend at Illinois' Embassy Suites East Peoria missed out on the chance to hear a Texan named Melissa Roen Williams show off her old-time piano skills.
And that's how eleven RD contestants (to go with seven Junior Division participants) ended up competing in the 40th annual World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival.
After 13-year-old Daniel Souvigny got his Junior Division crown back on 5-24-2014, it was up to contest judges Brian Holland, Patrick Holland, and Terry Parrish to eliminate one Regular Division contestant and send the remaining ten into the next day's semifinals.
This year's unlucky so-and-so was...was...was...
Well, actually, all eleven RD players moved on to the OTPP semifinals!
As was the case in the previous day's prelims, Damit Senanayake went first. I didn't get to find out what his first semifinal piece was (maybe one of you reading this blog can disclose the answer)...but I do know his second selection was "Blue Room."
Another thing about OTPP: You get fifteen minutes of rehearsal time before it's your turn to play the contest piano, that 1883 Weber upright better known as "Moby Dink." (As contest coordinator Faye Ballard- who spent the 1976-2010 period as a contestant before becoming just the second coordinator in C&F history- likes to say: "If you snooze, you lose.")
I put in the rehearsal time...after hearing Michael J. Winstanley pump out his two semifinal tunes during his own rehearsal time: "If You Knew Susie" and "Smiles and Shuffles."
And so, while Michael J. went to River E and F (the combined space where the actual competition took place) to perform his two semifinal selections, I took over at the rehearsal piano (a 1960s Hamilton studio piano placed just outside the Green Room).
To tell you the truth...I felt more comfortable during the semifinal round (my first semis since 1994!) than I did during the 2014 prelims. This round, I picked out "In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree" and an obscurity from 1902, "Robardina Rag," a number written by a St. Louis composer named E. Warren Furry.
Plus: I was so pumped up about making the semifinals that I did the same thing that Sunday as the day before: I ran to the stage.
And, just like the day before, Ted Lemen had to tell me: "No running!"
Domingo Mancuello was next up to bat...and he DID hit it out the park, with "I Get the Blues When It Rains" and "She Was Just a Sailor's Sweetheart."
William McNally followed, playing Joseph Lamb's "Topliner Rag" and the weekend's second edition of "Limehouse Blues."
Then came the man with the only other "Limehouse" rendition: Ethan Uslan.
Whereas William M. came out in a different tuxedo than the one he put on for the prelims, Ethan hit the stage wearing a...straw hat, striped T-shirt, swim trunks, and a life preserver.
And when Kate's husband (and Ben's and Henry's dad) got to the Embassy Suites stage in that getup, I figured: "That did it. Give Ethan the trophy!"
Ethan made it stick by stroking out "By the Beautiful Sea" and one called "Yack-a-Hula-Wicki-Doola."
All of that gave William Bennett a tough, tough act to follow.
And the Ann Arbor native did it, too! His semifinal entries were "How'd You Like to Spoon with Me?" and "Hothouse Rag."
David Cavalari brings some interesting, off-the-beaten-path numbers to the contest, and this round was no exception. In it, David rocked out "Impecunious Davis" and "Running Water."
"Perfessor" Bill Edwards followed up with "Swampy River" and "Old Folks at Home." (That's right...THAT "Old Folks at Home!")
John Remmers carries Ann Arbor's banner, too (he used to teach at the University of Michigan). With that great style of his, you know you can count on John reaching the semis year after year. And this time, he staked his claim with James Scott's "Prosperity Rag" and one titled "The Whistler and His Dog."
Now it was Samuel Schalla's turn to round out the 2014 OTPP second round...and I like what this physics student did with Joe Jordan's "That Teasin' Rag" and Luckey Roberts' "Nothin'."
When the semifinals were finished, Brian, Patrick, and Terry went off to do some more ciphering; Ted and fellow emcee Adam Swanson kicked back for a while; and the audience did some kicking back all its own...either inside River E and F or just outside the two combined rooms.
After all the judges' ciphering came to an end...Bill Edwards came back onstage to tackle ol' Moby Dink.
And tackle that 1883 Weber upright he did, hammering out "Red Raven Rag" and "The Blues (My Naughty Sweetie Gives to Me)," a 1920 number made famous by Ted Lewis, the bandleader famous for "Is Everybody Happy Now?"
This year's wildcard theme was (drum roll)...color!
As things turned out, the other Bill ended up getting in line to get paid. As a result, we got a chance to hear the now four-time New Rag kingpin do "Green River Blues" and Maceo Pinkard's "Liza."
Bill McNally was followed by one of old-time piano's most passionate performers. (You guessed it...Domingo!)
After Domingo got the crowd a date with "Me and My Shadow," he invited the fans to say "Hello, Bluebird."
Adam and Ted regaled the OTPP audience with tunes (as well as old-time piano pointers) after Domingo's and the Two Bills' final sets. And after one last clinic, the two hosts turned it over to David...who turned in Duke Ellington's and Bub Miley's "Black and Tan Fantasy" as well as the romping "Shreveport Stomp."
This left Ethan as the last finalist...and he came out dressed like Abraham Lincoln (right down to the black suit, stovepipe hat, and fake beard).
Ethan picked up the Stephen Foster baton that "Perfessor" Bill ran with in the semifinals, and the 2007 and 2012 RD titleholder nailed "Old Black Joe" and "Oh, Susanna."
Well, in a nutshell, Bill E. finished fifth and won $250, David got fourth prize and earned $400 for it, Domingo outdid his 2013 showing by grabbing off third (that meant $550), and Bill M. won second place...and walked away with $800.
And Ethan racked up his third Regular Division title, good for $1,350 and that Ted Lemen Traveling Trophy.
And so it's time to practice up for next year...and to see what 2015 will bring. .
No more than 26 people can annually enter the main competition at the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival...and that means the Old-Time Music Preservation Association (the group that puts on the C&F) cuts the preliminary competition off at sixteen Regular Division contestants and ten Junior Division (seventeen and younger) combatants.
This time around, we had seven JDers and eleven RDers.
And the seven who competed for five Junior Division cash prizes came out of five families.
Speaking of families...births lightened the 2014 OTPP field. First of all, Martin Spitznagel (the contest's 2011 Reg champ) stayed home with his wife so that they could enjoy their first child.
And the reigning Regular Division titleholder, Russell Wilson (from the same Washington, DC area the Spitznagels now live and work in), couldn't come to the Embassy Suites East Peoria (IL) because his wife was due during OTPP Weekend with their first child.
So there we were...all eighteen of us gathered in the Green Room of the Conference Center portion of the Embassy Suites East Peoria at 7:30 AM (Central time) on Saturday, 5-24-2014. We'd gathered to draw numbers to determine playing order.
And, as things turned out...Washington's (America's 42nd State, not America's capitol city) Damit Senanayake became the first 2014 OTPP contestant...and the first Regular Division pianist to try and take Russell's 2013 title away.
Damit's got a pleasant, sedate, stately style...and he brought that style to Irene Giblin's most famous rag, "Chicken Chowder," as well as to Vincent Youmans' "Without a Song."
Then came Isaac Smith, the seventeen-year-old Iowan out to make it two Junior Division championships in a row.
Isaac made a strong bid by playing "Kitten on the Keys" and a very interesting version of "She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain." (In Isaac's version, the "she" in the tune had to get six new horses!)
The audience assembled at the Conference Center's combined River E and F Rooms would soon find out that Isaac was the older half of a brother act (stay tuned).
It was back to the RD battles...and the next performer to get in the ring was Pennsylvanian Michael J. Winstanley, who brought his stompin' style to Scott Joplin's "Stoptime Rag" as well as to "Kansas City Stomp."
Michael J. gave way to the other Smith Brother in the competition, eleven-year-old Eli.
Isaac's 2013 success gave Eli plenty of reasons to see if he could get himself that Junior Division crown. Eli's two selections were "Twelfth Street Rag" and "Champagne Rag."
After meeting the younger half of a brother act, the OTPP enthusiasts then met the younger half of a sister act: North Carolinian Miasol Yara (Mia for short).
By the way...you pronounce Mia's first name "MEE uh," not "MY uh."
Mia turned in a really bluesy set, and it consisted of "Ma (He's Making Eyes at Me)" and an abbreviated "Rhapsody in Blue."
One thing about the JD competition...the younger performers have to prepare just two songs while the older ones have to get six tunes ready. That way, OMPA crowns the Junior champion that Saturday afternoon of OTPP Weekend.
Then it was back to the Regulars...with Virginian-turned-Minnesotan David Cavalari taking to the 1883 Weber upright (the piano better known as "Moby Dink").
David had a couple of interesting selections this round: "Ragtime Chimes" and "Tico Tico." (That's right, that "Tico Tico," the one made famous by organist Ethel Smith.)
So glad that Samuel Schalla made the trip from his native Tubingen, Germany this year. He's got a stately style of playing, too, and the 20-year-old Regular Division contestant brought that style of his to "Texas Fox Trot" and "Some of These Days," the Shelton Brooks number made famous by Sophie Tucker.
William McNally (he'd just won the New Rag competition the night before- the fourth time he's snagged that contest's "Remarkably Small Trophy") was looking to add this year's RD title to his collection. Bill likes to load his sets with very interesting tunes...stuff off the beaten path; in this year's prelims, the Pennsylvanian-turned-New Yorker brought home "Piano Puzzle" and something called "Chopinata." (I hope I got that name right!)
The next pianist in competition was a JDer from Illinois, Leo Volker.
Leo was having a great time up there as he delivered two Scott Joplin pieces: "Magnetic Rag" and "Reflection Rag."
Around 11:30 AM, we all took a lunch break (and took advantage of all the fine restaurant choices in and surrounding the hotel).
Then...
21-year-old Michigander William Bennett was the next performer to step up...and he didn't disappoint the crowd, either, with George Gershwin's "Rialto Ripples" and Irving Caesar's "Just a Gigolo."
I couldn't join that crowd at the moment, because I had to practice up for my own first-round set. And as a result, I didn't get to hear what "Perfessor" Bill Edwards (that Californian-turned-Coloradan-turned-Washington, DCer-turned-Virginian) brought to the first round. (Can somebody tell me what "Perfessor" Bill played?)
I had a good feeling about going up there for 2014; I wanted to show that I'd been taking the messages brought forth in "The Entertainers" to heart (messages like: "When you're playing a song, you're telling a story!")...and I wanted to have fun.
So...this time, I did "Hello Ma Baby" and followed that up with a 1925 number written by Billy Rose, Al Dubin, and Joseph Meyer: "A Cup of Coffee, a Sandwich, and You." (Really had a lot of fun with the latter tune!)
When I was done, I hurried back and found a seat in the audience...and caught Ethan Uslan's two first-round tunes: "Dardanelle" and the durable "Limehouse Blues."
When he's not tickling those keys all around the world, New Jerseyite-turned-North Carolinian Ethan also teaches others to tickle those 88s. Some of his students include his eight-year-old son Ben and...the Yara Sisters (one of whom we've already met).
Glad to see Pennsylvanian (and RD contestant) Domingo Mancuello come back to get another crack at the Ted Lemen Traveling Trophy. Domingo's one of the most passionate performers in all of old-time piano, and in the prelims, he showed just why...doing "When You're Smiling" and a rag called "Chickenfoot Bob."
Then one of the steadiest performers in old-time piano, Michigan's John Remmers, stepped up to the plate. I really enjoyed his version of "Where the River Shannon Flows," which the one-time college math professor followed with "Under the Southern Moon."
The Junior Division provided the 2014 OTPP competition with the last three performers...starting with Miasol's thirteen-year-old sister, Madeline.
Maddy brought a bluesy style of her own to "Dolly Dimples" and to Mabel Wayne's "In a Little Spanish Town."
By the way...Maddy and Mia really do have a sister act going: When they're not playing old-time piano, the Two Yaras make up half a local (Charlotte area) rock band, the Control Freax. In the Control Freax, Mia and Savanah play guitars (Savanah also plays keyboards), Maddy plays the bass, and Maureen rounds out the act on drums.
The Freax really have it going on, and if you'd like to find out for yourself, just log on to www.youtube.com and type in "Maureen's band" or "The Control Freax." (I like what the band did with "Roll Over Beethoven.")
An Illinoisan named Reed Phillips rounded out the newcomers in the 2014 OTPP field. And he let 'em know that he was after Isaac's JD title, too. Reed (as did Leo) turned to the King of Ragtime to make his bid, selecting "Peacherine Rag" and the second "Stoptime Rag" heard in the prelims.
All through the competition, Ted and fellow emcee Adam Swanson (that's right, that Adam Swanson) showed the audience just what makes old-time piano so infectuous. (One of their most memorable interludes featured Ted- the man behind OTPP- playing a tune like "Happy Birthday to You" in the conventional way...only to see Adam- the most decorated pianist in contest history- turn the number into a rag.)
Yep...2014 not only was a year without Martin or Russell competing, it also was a year without Morgan Siever, the sole 2005 JD newcomer to not only come back for 2006...but also keep competing at the C&F into the 2010s.
Morgan's two-year reign atop the Junior Division (2010 and 2011) was ended by the last contestant to tackle Moby Dink for 2014: Fellow Illinoisan Daniel Souvigny.
And thirteen-year-old Daniel let EVERYBODY know he wanted that JD championship back. Big time.
Daniel came out roaring, putting over killer versions of "King Chanticleer" and "Tiger Rag." (To prepare for "Tiger Rag," Daniel even turned his vest inside out...to reveal tiger stripes!)
Well, with the competing over for the day, contest judges Brian Holland (the 1997-99 RD champ), Terry Parrish, and Patrick Holland got together to tally up scores...and, along the way, they found out the Smith Brothers outdid the Yara Sisters.
And as things turned out, Reed won fifth place (and $40), Eli got fourth place (and was able to pocket $60), and Madeline earned $100 for finishing third.
Isaac settled for second place and its $125 prize. (And 2014 started to look like 2008 in the JD competition; that year, the previous year's Junior Division kingpin, Missourian Wesley Reznicek, surrendered his title to the last pianist to compete: Cassidy Gephart from neighboring Kentucky.)
Eli's older brother surrendered his JD crown to...the last 2014 pianist to compete.
And that's how Daniel was able to go home $250 richer (and with his second JD trophy).
After the Saturday smoke cleared, it was time to find out which ten Regular Division contestants would do their thing at the hotel's River E and F rooms the next day.
Yep...according to the rules, one RDer would have to be sidelined.
And when I come back, I'll tell you who got sidelined.
