New York classical pianist Richard Dowling kicked off the 36th annual Scott Joplin International Ragtime Festival Wednesday evening with a concert of 30 Joplin musical selections at the Hayden Liberty Center Association for the Arts.
Dowling played all 53 Scott Joplin pieces April 1 at Carnegie Hall in New York City. He is the first pianist in history to play all 53 compositions in one day. Dowling is also the first performer to play all of Joplin’s works during the annual Scott Joplin Festival. He will play the final 23 pieces at diverse venues while at the festival this year.
Wednesday evening’s concert titled “Great Scott! — A Joplin Centennial Celebration” is one of 70 scheduled performances Dowling is presenting from Jan. 1, 2017, through March 2018 all across the U.S.
“Next year is Scott Joplin’s 150th birthday,” Dowling told the Democrat Wednesday afternoon. “This is his death centennial this year, and then next year will be his sesquicentennial 150th birthday.”
Dowling said he planned to play both in 2017 and 2018 in celebration of these historical Joplin events.
“It’s been an enormous success so far,” he noted. “Every time I’ve played so far this year, I’ve gotten standing ovations. The audiences love this music.”
Dowling will not be using sheets of music during the concert. All of the music is memorized, all 54 pieces. No small feat for any musician, memorizing the music took two years. Dowling said he often practices three and four hours a day.
“Memorizing music is a multi-faceted approach,” he said. “It’s just like being an actress or actor. You get the script, you read it … pretty soon the lines start making sense in your mind through repetition.
“Memorizing is not difficult, it’s just extremely time-consuming,” Dowling added. “It’s not a magic pill, it’s practice, really.”
Dowling said his encore piece for Wednesday evening is a piano solo “transcription” of the final number of Scott Joplin’s opera “Treemonisha.”
“Actually, all-in-all for me, there are 54 pieces,” he said. “There are 53 solo piano pieces that were published during his lifetime … most likely there were a lot more …”
Dowling noted that many unpublished pieces were thrown away by a family lawyer after Joplin’s third wife died.
“But, 53 pieces take nearly four hours to play,” he added. “So, tonight my Great Scott program is usually about half of the repertoire. I mix and match it depending on where I’m going to play. I mix it up so I’m not playing the same pieces.”
Standard selections for the evening are of course the “Maple Leaf Rag” and “The Entertainer.”
“For tonight’s program it’s a little longer,” Dowling noted. “Because, playing here at the Scott Joplin is what I call preaching to the converted. Everybody in the audience will know every note. Here I feel like I have more liberty, because some of the pieces are less well-known. I feel like those I can play here, because I know the audience will appreciate them.”
During the evening Dowling also planned to play all six pieces from the 1973 Academy Award winning movie “The Sting.”
“To satisfy the masses, at the end of the program I’m doing what I call “Suite from the Sting,” he said. “Marvin Hamlisch used six Joplin piano pieces in ‘The Sting.’ So, I’m going to play those six pieces … sort of like a little ragtime sonata.”
Dowling also planned to offer an “Audience Choice” selection during the evening performance. He said he had a deck of playing cards inside the piano, 52 cards and two jokers, inscribed with all of Joplin’s piano pieces. He planned to allow one audience member to select a card and he would then play the named selection.
“That proves to the audience that I have all 54 (pieces) memorized,” he added. “Which ever one gets picked is the one that I play.”
Playing Joplin’s works at Carnegie Hall was a highlight for Dowling, but he is also grateful to be playing the pieces at the festival.
“It’s a big feather in my cap,” he said. “I’m very honored to get to do it at the Scott Joplin Festival. If you are doing Scott Joplin this is it. This and Carnegie Hall are it.
“I’d like to think Mr. Joplin would be pleased with the way I play his works,” Dowling added. “I know he would be grateful and happy to know that his works got played at Carnegie Hall, because that’s the legitimacy that he sought in his lifetime.”
Dowling said Schmitt Music, of Overland Park, Kansas, was supplying twin Steinway grand pianos this year for performances at Hayden LCAA. He added that he was also “very grateful” of Wilken Music, a local business, for their continued help and supply of pianos for festival venues.
Dowling recorded all 53 Scott Joplin pieces last year as a three-CD set. The “Complete Piano Works of Scott Joplin” are available in The Ragtime Store at Hayden LCAA
