[Fuusm-l] "You Tell 'Em Ivories" - Zez Confrey

[Randall Kidder]

     This is a style or genre known as *novelty piano*, first developed by
Charley Straight and others composing piano rolls for player pianos,
invented in 1901 by Melville Clark and which had become popular by 1908 by
which time they had become more standardized.  The first recognized novelty
piano piece was "Nola" [1915] by Felix Arndt, who had recorded more than
3,000 piano rolls.  The novelty piano style became popular in the 1920's
(along with jazz) as a successor to ragtime after the appearence of Zez
Confrey's "Kitten on the Keys" in 1921, which "topped the charts."  Profit
considerations and marketing strategies had determined that most ragtime
sheet music be kept at a relatively easy to moderate level of difficulty
for amateur pianists to entertain themselves and others at home with
minimal practice.  However, novelty pianists were generally classically
trained, and incorporated more complex scale patterns, chords, and
harmonies than ragtime, sometimes borrowing compositional techniques from
French Impressionists like Ravel, Satie, and Debussey. The popularity of
the novelty piano style declined after the appearance of big bands during
the Swing Era of the 1930's.

Randall Kidder

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Randall Kidder <randallkidder88 at gmail.com>
Date: Sun, Sep 6, 2020, 7:05 AM
Subject: You Tell 'Em Ivories - Zez Confrey
To: Randall Kidder <randallkidder88 at gmail.com>




Randall Kidder
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