Essay in Ragtime: Ragtime Piano Classics

What did great ragtime music sound like? We know of only one recording of classic ragtime as it was performed in the years before World War I, Felix Arndt's 1915 “Desecration Rag.“ The rolls that were produced to play the music on mechanical pianos did not even include the compositions of Scott Joplin, James Scott, and other legendary ragtime composers. There is not too much to go on.

Joseph Lamb: A Study in Classic Ragtime, released by Folkways in 1960, documents the playing of the last of the great ragtime writers, although he performed only his own compositions. Pianist Ann Charters worked on that recording, and she had opportunities to talk and even play with Lamb. With the benefit of that experience, and her musicianship, she brings validity to her expression of classic ragtime compositions in the style and emotion of their era.

The liner notes, written by Charters’s husband, the musicologist Sam Charters, are illustrated with examples of ragtime sheet music and include a 1961 article from the St. Louis Post Dispatch about Missouri, the “birthplace of ragtime.”

Track Listing

101	Cataract Rag	Ann Charters	03:55
102	Wall Street Rag	Ann Charters	03:56
103	Solace, a Mexican Serenade	Ann Charters	04:56
104	Magnetic Rag, Syncopations Classiques	Ann Charters	04:44
105	Victory Rag	Ann Charters	03:30
201	Ethiopia Rag	Ann Charters	03:36
202	Pastime Rag No. 3 - A Slow Drag	Ann Charters	04:07
203	Echoes from the Snowball Club - Ragtime Waltz	Ann Charters	05:29
204	Harlem Rag - Two Step	Ann Charters	03:24
205	Rag Sentimental	Ann Charters	03:52