Customer Reviews

A Century Of Ragtime

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Not to sound grand (...), but I rather enjoyed this compilation, bringing to life such music from our American past century. It's nice to have the variety available at ones finger tips all in on CD set. A great jumping off point to delve deeper into Ragtime. As a performing artist, I use this CD in my period work for inspiration on creative pieces that reflect the spirit of early America. Though, if you happen to be a Canadian music fan from British Columbia, you might want to try the Canadian brass ensemble instead.

Compilations such as this actually do a disservice to any of the artists who appear here. I can well imagine that the compiler of this set is none other than Richard Zimmerman, who gave himself at least three cuts on the album, 2 of which can be downloaded, which places him in a tie with EUBIE BLAKE!!!!!!!!!! The whole album is pretty much a plethora of unrelated styles. The piano disc has boring Rifkin, the crazed, out-of-control piano-roll style of Zimmerman, the barrel-echoing pianos of Arpin & Wilson, the non-ragtime performances of Roberts and Blais etc.Thank the Lord for the others -as the disk would be a total failure. I'm not into bands so I'll refrain from making comments about disc 2.

Compilations such as this actually do a disservice to any of the artists who appear here. I can well imagine that the compiler of this set is none other than Richard Zimmerman, who gave himself at least three cuts on the album, 2 of which can be downloaded, which places him in a tie with EUBIE BLAKE!!!!!!!!!! This guy continues to masquerade as the definitive performer of Scott Joplin, and ragtime in general, while attempting to actually discredit Joplin as the composer of any of the rags credited to him. Most confusing! The whole album is pretty much a plethora of unrelated styles. The piano disc has boring Rifkin, the crazed, out-of-control piano-roll style of Zimmerman, the barrel-echoing pianos of Arpin & Wilson, the non-ragtime performances of Roberts and Blais etc.Thank the Lord for the others -as the disk would be a total failure. I'm not into bands so I'll refrain from making comments about disc 2.

This 2-CD set featuring a wide array of artists is true to its title in presenting a good overview of the century. The first disc features piano solos and the second disc small-orchestra arrangements, each presented chronologically. One caveat is that ragtime fans may already own several of the selections, as they are taken from existing CDs (e.g., Morath, Rifkin, Zimmerman).