The 2012 Ragtime to Riches Festival turned out to be the most successful one yet.
And it couldn't have happened if Nora and Mark Hulse (the husband-and-wife duo also known as Ragtime Razzmatazz- she plays piano, he plays banjo) hadn't brought their considerable talents to Omaha's First Central Congregational United Church of Christ.
The success of 7-8-2012 also wouldn't have come if Nick Holle hadn't brought the movie he and Michael Zimmer codirected, "The Entertainers," to R to R 8.0.
On top of all that, this year's event wouldn't have succeeded without the 38 people who came to savor the workshop, the documentary about Illinois' World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival, and the two R to R concerts. Because of the fans' enthusiasm for ragtime and old-time piano, the Great Plains Ragtime Society raised $380.
But the whole thing started out slowly...and I was really nervous about that, even with more publicity about the festival than before and the added attraction of a documentary, part of which was filmed here in the Big O.
Last year, we sold just ten tickets to the R to R get-together (the first one-day Ragtime to Riches Festival ever; this started out as a three-day event before we had to shed Fridays in 2009).
And by the time Nora and Mark got well into their workshop at this year's festival, only six people had paid to take in the festivities. (A camera operator from one of the local TV stations came by and taped footage...only to leave a few minutes later.)
But by 2:45 PM (Central time), more and more old-time piano fans (and people who were curious about the existence of a ragtime event in Huskerland) started to trickle into First Central's Memorial Hall.
Fifteen minutes later, the Hulses shifted from talking about the banjo's place in America's early pop music scene (and sprinkling the workshop with a spotlight on some of the 500 women who'd written at least one rag apiece) to giving the first of two R to R concerts for 2012.
And Mark and Nora put on a real humdinger!
The Lawrence, KS couple started it all out with "A Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight," then turned to a composition written by one of those 500 women, "The Missouri Girl March." They then strung together "Take Me Out to the Ball Game," "The Band Played On," and "The Sidewalks of New York" before mastering "Dill Pickles," "A Spanish Serenade," and Ed Claypoole's "Ragging the Scale."
It was reminiscent of when our piano-and-banjo duo did their thing at the old Shakey's Pizza Parlor in Columbia, MO during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
And it was FUN!
Nora and Mark pulled out one of their Shakey's showstoppers, "Hava Nagila," following that up with "The Piano Roll Blues" and Dick Hyman's "Ragtime Razzmatazz-" the piece that gave the duo their nickname.
And then a photographer from another local TV station (Fox affiliate KPTM) came in to get footage...and stayed long enough to seek an interview: "Who's the organizer?"
I raised my left hand and the photographer- Eric- motioned me into the hallway to take part in that interview...while more people kept coming into the church to dig the festival.
That did it.
By the time the workshop presenters ended their concert with BOTH "Maple Leaf Rag" and "The Stars and Stripes Forever," every seat in Memorial Hall was filled...in anticipation of "The Entertainers."
I wasn't sure how the film would go over when put in front of Omahans' eyes. It'd already passed five tests since its unveiling on 4-20-2012 (in Madison, WI)...but how would Nick Holle's and Michael Zimmer's presentation do in a city where one of the movie's six main subjects lives?
The documentary went over fine!
The film actually rolled at 4:30 PM so that technical glitches could be ironed out. Once the movie came to an end 93 minutes later, a Q-and-A session ensued...and it lasted longer and was livelier than the Peoria counterpart. (Nick fielded most of the questions.)
After dinner, it was time for one more concert...and that one got started at 7:08 PM.
I wanted to take a page out of Burns Davis' book and build my own show around a theme...and it stemmed from a missed opportunity to use such a theme on 4-15-2012, when the Great Plains Ragtime Society held a meeting at Omaha's Hollywood Candy/Fairmont Antiques store (at 1209 Jackson St.).
That April weekend marked the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic (you know, the ship that was supposedly too big to sink). And I had a chance to do some of the songs that were popular in 1912.
Well, almost three months later, I went ahead and played ten of 1912's most popular cuts...starting with 1911's final Number One song, "Let Me Call You Sweetheart." ("Sweetheart," recorded by the Peerless Quartet, was the top song in the land for seven weeks...as was the recording that knocked it off the top of the charts, Harry MacDonough's "Down by the Old Mill Stream.")
After doing those two songs, I went ahead with "Oh, You Beautiful Doll" and 1912's most successful song, "Moonlight Bay." (When the American Quartet- probably the New Kids on the Block of their day- cut "Moonlight Bay," they took it to Number One and kept it there for eight weeks.)
I stuck in "Alexander's Ragtime Band" because Charles Prince's Orchestra tried the tune on for size in 1912...but had nowhere near the success Arthur Collins and Byron Harlan did with the song the previous year. (That duo's recording of Irving Berlin's first real songwriting triumph enjoyed a ten-week run at the top of the charts!)
It was then time for a couple of actual rags: Imogene Giles' "Red Peppers" and the Brandon Walsh-Charles Straight number, "Mockingbird Rag."
All this time, I'd sneaked in information about some of 1912's biggest news events. For instance, I told the audience- the biggest one I'd ever played for at an R to R Festival- that New Mexico became a state of the US during "Sweetheart's" chart run...and that "Beautiful Doll" peaked at Number One eleven days before Arizona got in...and that the Girl Scouts of America were founded while "Moonlight Bay" was on the charts...and that Charles Prince's ork's version of "Alexander's" was on the charts at the time the Titanic fell into the Atlantic Ocean.
More of that to come, with three more tunes: "Ragtime Cowboy Joe," Bob Roberts' smash (tops for six weeks) that came out as William Howard Taft sent US troops to Nicaragua over a debt that country owe America and some European lands; "Waiting for the Robert E. Lee," another number that spent six weeks on top (by the Heidelberg Quintet, which was actually the American Quartet Plus One) while the Boston Red Sox were stopping the then New York Giants in the World Series; and "The Ragtime Soldier Man," one of Irving's lesser-known tunes and one that I wanted to send out to today's members of this country's military.
What a time everybody had at this year's Ragtime to Riches!
Finally, the club has a bank account (and now, I can tell people who want to contribute financially to GPRS that they can make their checks out to the club...and I can really mean it).
More important than that, the sky's the limit for Great Plains and for its signature event.
Thanks, Omaha/Council Bluffs/Bellevue, for removing R to R from the area's list of secrets.
If it weren't for "The Entertainers," I wouldn't have been able to make it to Peoria, IL for the 2012 World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival. (That's right; this event- which dates back to 1975- has a new title, adding the "and Festival" this year.)
It all started when Nick Holle (one of the documentary's codirectors) gave me a call early in May and said: "Jim, how'd you like to come to Peoria?"
Result: The opportunity I didn't expect to get for this year.
It'd been three years since I last made the trip to Central Illinois. Since then, I'd gotten a bankruptcy discharge, gone exclusively to my debit card (no more credit cards!!), and fought to get all my bills paid up...especially my car note. I figured, in fact, that I'd have to wait until 2014 to do the kind of traveling I used to.
But then...the first documentary about Ted Lemen's claim to fame broke. (And so did increased overtime opportunities at the plastics factory I work at when I'm not writing a blog or getting involved in old-time piano.)
And so...after not being able to hit a metropolitan area other than Omaha/Council Bluffs/Bellevue during 2011, I've been on the road three times this year. (And all three excursions were in rental cars!)
The trip to baseball great Jim Thome's birth city this past Memorial Day weekend was the best as far as renting a car was concerned: Enterprise let me use a 2011 Hyundai Accent that had (ta da!) a satellite radio.
No AM or FM for me, what with Sirius XM's 40s on 4, 50s on 5, 60s on 6, 70s on 7, 80s on 8, 90s on 9, and Motown on 49 channels to make it a really groovin' trip. (After all, Sirius gives you a lot of the tunes FM-AM chiefs refuse to put back on the air. For instance, I got to hear Larry Williams' 1957 hit "Bony Moronie" as I was coming out of Iowa City, IA. And when I pulled into the parking garage attached to Peoria's Sheraton Four Points Hotel, XM played Ral Donner's 1961 biggie "You Don't Know What You've Got." We're talking about two jams Omaha's AM and FM stations have forgotten about!)
Didn't get into Peoria until about 7:30 PM on 5-25-2012...an hour before "The Entertainers" (the complete film, that is) got its first real Peoria screening.
This time, I was coming to Richard Pryor's birth city as a contest spectator, not a contestant. And Nick's and fellow codirector Michael Zimmer's offer enabled, for the first time, all six of the documentary's main subjects- Adam Swanson, "Perfessor" Bill Edwards, Ethan Uslan, Faye Ballard, Four Arrows, and me- to join with movie fans and old-time piano fans to check out a screening of "The Entertainers." In the same venue at the same time.
Felt nervous about how the movie would go over with people who'd spent one Memorial Day weekend after another checking out OTPP and lending the contest/festival legendary support.
Film festival fans had twice rated "The Entertainers" tops in the documentary field...but how would people who've traveled to Peoria (and/or previous OTPP sites Decatur, IL and Monticello, IL) dig a film celebrating the music that ultimately served as the springboard to "Goody Goody" as well as to "Bony Moronie" and "You Don't Know What You've Got," et al?
THEY ATE IT UP!!
About two hours after the screening wrapped up, another personal point of apprehension completely exploded. That's because Raymond Schwarzkopf (a first-time OTPP judge in 2009 who'd been invited back for 2010 as well as for 2012) was one of the spectators who not only enjoyed the movie...but also liked me in it.
The showing was three years to the day after I first talked to Raymond at OTPP Weekend's final event (the Red, White, and Blue Brunch) to introduce myself...only to get brushed off with a warning to "keep practicing."
I spent the next three years wanting to get even with him...to the point of not wanting to play for him ever again.
Well, this time, Raymond and I had a really good conversation. Even told him about the humiliation I felt due to his two-word message of 5-25-2009.
And this time, he encouraged me not to give up on old-time piano.
Speaking of old-time piano...next time I post, I'm going to get to the business end of OTPP. (I'm talking about the actual competition.)
Stay tuned!
The weekend after I traveled to Des Moines (to see my younger brother, younger sister in law, and nephew) and to Madison (to check out the 2012 Wisconsin Film Festival), I made it to the Twin Cities...for this year's Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival.
That's right...the area that gave us James Arness and Peter Graves (to say nothing of Prince) became the second one to officially see "The Entertainers," that documentary about the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest (an event that's coming up next weekend).
The Minneapolis-St. Paul get-together has been taking place every year since the early 1980s (if not the late 1970s); this year's version ran from 4-12-2012 and finished up on 5-3-2012. The organizers treated moviegoers from everywhere to 300 films...and, as was the case at Madison's Wisconsin Film Festival, the Twin Cities fare ran the gamut from full-length features all the way to shorts.
70 of the 300 movies shown in Minnesota's biggest metro area were documentaries.
And all the motion pictures presented at the Gopher State festival were run at Minneapolis' St. Anthony Main Theater, overlooking the banks of the Mississippi River.
Festival organizers scheduled "The Entertainers" for 9:20 PM on Saturday, 4-28-2012...as well as for 3:30 PM the next day.
And both sets of audiences ate it up...as well as the live music "Perfessor" Bill Edwards, Ethan Uslan, and I were able to provide after each showing of the film.
In fact, the audiences liked "The Entertainers" so much that they voted it the International Film Festival's best documentary.
Meanwhile, I was eating up my stay in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.
It's a great, great place to walk around in...especially the underground walkways situated around and through downtown Minneapolis. With the walkways, you get a climate-controlled environment where, in winter, you don't have to worry so much about freezing your hind end off (and don't have to worry about facing the same demise as a Popsicle in the summer months).
The restaurants in the MSP area are no slouches, either. Just like in Madison, they have Qdobe restaurants...and I had a chance to eat late-night tacos again as a result.
The last place I ate at in Minny offers a $12 burger. (And let me tell you, that burger DOES have an act!)
So does the hotel they put us up in. It used to be the local Milwaukee Road train station, but now it's the Renaissance Depot Hotel. They did a great, great job transforming this historic station into a hotel...and it's got so much Milwaukee Road memorabilia it'll make your head swim. (Oops...I mean it'll make your wheels turn!)
Speaking of act...now comes the next one in this journey.
The question isn't "Will it play in Peoria?" (After all, "The Entertainers" will be shown there on 5-25-2012 at 8:00 PM; the free showing will be one of the events at the OTPP Contest itself. And the contest will take place in a new venue: The Sheraton Four Points Hotel.)
The real question is: "How will they like it in Peoria?"
I'm going to the city that gave Richard Pryor to the world...and when I get the answers, I'll sure enough let you know.
I'm Jim Boston, and thanks for reading this blog!
Been waiting almost three years to type this out...and here it is:
The first-ever documentary about the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest, "The Entertainers," is about to make its debut.
It's going to happen at the Wisconsin Film Festival, an event held from 4-18-2012 to 4-22-2012 in Madison.
And yep, I'm on my way to Wisconsin's capital city.
Nick Holle's and Michael Zimmer's (they're the movie's codirectors) project gets two showings- each at a different festival venue: Friday, 4-20-2012 at 9:30 PM and Saturday, 4-21-2012 at 1:30 PM.
Afterwards, Mike and Nick (who did the bulk of the filming in 2009 and 2010...after shooting "The Entertainers'" trailer at the 2008 OTPP Contest) will aim to get the documentary shown not only at different film festivals nationwide, but also at various ragtime festivals throughout the United States.
And one of those ragtime festivals will be here in Omaha.
So if you don't get a chance to come to the Wisconsin Film Festival or to this year's World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest (5-25-2012 to 5-28-2012 at Peoria's Five Points by Sheraton Hotel), maybe you'll be coming to Omaha for the Ragtime to Riches Festival (7-8-2012 at First Central Congregational United Church of Christ)...and if you're in the Big O that day, you're in for a real treat.
Had a ball getting involved in said documentary...and I hope you'll have a ball seeing the movie, wherever and whenever it's shown in your town.
Oh, by the way...R to R's showing of "The Entertainers" will take place at 4:15 PM, right after Nora and Mark Hulse play.
This past Monday, my favorite PBS series, American Experience, presented one of the most riveting documentaries in the program's history.
Nebraska's PBS stations (they're called NET) have since been rerunning this week's American Experience, and as a matter of fact, the program's back on the air right now this afternoon...just as I'm typing out this post.
This week's AE focused on an event that took place fifty years ago this very month...an event that helped shape the America we've got now.
On 5-4-1961, twelve people set out on regularly-scheduled buses from Washington, DC, with the goal of making it to New Orleans, LA, two weeks later.
All they wanted to do was test- and put an end to- America's Jim Crow laws, especially as they pertained to interstate travel.
The Freedom Rides of 1961 were designed as a way to, among other things, get this country's brand-new chief executive (and his people) to start thinking about- and acting on- putting domestic issues (especially the BIG one, civil rights) on the front burner.
That's right: John F. Kennedy's inaugural speech was more than "the torch has been passed" and "Ask not what your country can do you for you...ask what you can do for your country." During that address, JFK talked about spreading freedom all over the world.
He just didn't talk about spreading that freedom all over these fifty states.
Two buses- a Greyhound and a Trailways- pulled out of the nation's capital that first Thursday in the fifth month of 1961.
The Greyhound bus didn't make it, because a mob at Forsyth & Son Grocery, just outside Anniston, AL, firebombed it.
But the six people who'd traveled on that Greyhound bus made it alive.
The Anniston incident didn't stop the Freedom Riders. Neither did mob violence in Birmingham and Montgomery, the Camellia State's two biggest cities...and neither did then Mississippi Gov. Ross Barnett's decision to throw one rider after another- 340 in all- in jail (Parchman Farm, one of the worst jails in the world).
And not even Bobby Kennedy's plea to get the Freedom Riders to get off the road and let the government do its job could stop the trips.
RFK's plea came not long after Montgomery was put under martial law...in the wake of vandalism directed at that city's First Baptist Church. (First Baptist was the one where Ralph Abernathy- the man who became the head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference after Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated almost seven years later- preached.)
Martial law came to Alabama's capital city all of eighteen days into the Freedom Rides.
At last, thanks mainly to MLK's and RFK's frequent telephone conversations, did the US government finally decide to give the riders protection.
And you can bet the whole planet was watching.
They were watching a country whose very name is supposed to mean "freedom" continue a situation that couldn't possibly mean "freedom."
Like it or not, the mob violence- and Barnett's and John Patterson's (Alabama's then governor; in fact, George Wallace's predecessor) endorsing of said violence, to say nothing of Birmingham Police Chief Bull Connor's hand in creating and endorsing that violence- gave the United States a real egg stain.
And that violence couldn't prevent the September 1961 ruling that, at long last, outlawed segregation in interstate travel...from the bus stations to the buses themselves.
The documentary, "Freedom Riders," showed interviews of people on both sides of the Jim Crow-in-travel issue...from original Freedom Rider John Lewis (now, of course, a US representative from Georgia) to Patterson himself.
To this day, I'm not really sure if Patterson ever showed any, any, ANY remorse for his hand in helping to make the Freedom Rides some kind of difficult.
One thing I'm really sure about is this: People such as Lewis, Jim Zwerg, Diane Nash, Hank Thomas, Genevieve Houghton, Benjamin Cox, Jim Peck, Bernard Lafayette, and hundreds of others, did something completely and totally courageous...and America is much the better for it.
