Ragtimify: How to Turn Any Song into Ragtime and Stride Piano

51 Pages·2013·6.63 MB·English

by  Scott Bradlee

SOLD TO THE FINE
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Ragtimify: How to Turn Any Song into Ragtime and Stride Piano
1st Edition
© 2013 by Scott Bradlee
www.postmodernjukebox.com
Cover by Anthony Zhang www.amazhang.com
HOW I LEARNED TO PLAY RAGTIME
.............................................................4
THE BIG IDEA.
.......................................................................................................5
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT RAGTIME
..............................6
THE LEFT HAND
...................................................................................................7
THE RIGHT HAND
..............................................................................................12
PUTTING BOTH HANDS TOGETHER.
...........................................................15
HOW TO PRACTICE RAGTIME (OR ANYTHING, REALLY)
......................18
GETTIN’ FANCY WITH THE LEFT HAND
.....................................................20
HOW TO PRACTICE FANCY LEFT HAND VARIATIONS
............................23
GETTIN’ FANCY WITH THE RIGHT HAND
..................................................23
HOW TO PRACTICE FANCY RIGHT HAND VARIATIONS
........................27
HOW TO PLAY WITH A SWING
.......................................................................29
HOW TO PLAY THE TETRIS THEME SONG AS RAGTIME
.......................30
A RAGTIME REHARMONIZATION OF “CALL ME MAYBE”
.....................34
HOW TO PLAY THE POSTMODERN JUKEBOX COVER OF “THRIFT
SHOP”
.....................................................................................................................36
FUTURE RAGTIME: TURNING A RAGTIME BEAT INTO A HIP HOP
BEAT
.......................................................................................................................44
A FEW WORDS ON EAR TRAINING
................................................................45
NEXT STEPS: TAKING YOUR RAGTIME SKILLS TO THE STREETS
.....47
REAL TALK ABOUT GOING TO COLLEGE FOR MUSIC
..........................48
CLOSING THOUGHTS
.......................................................................................50
HOW I LEARNED TO PLAY RAGTIME
I was a terrible piano student when I was a kid.

Each week, my well-intentioned teacher required me to fill out a daily practice log, to
keep track of how much I practiced. It soon became something of a ritual that I would fill this
out with fictitious amounts on the car ride to my piano lesson – even going as far as switching
between pen and pencil -- in an attempt to conceal the fact that I never practiced. These lessons
lasted until I was 12, when my piano teacher notified my parents that her schedule was (a bit
conveniently) filled up, and that she was unable to continue teaching me.
It was that summer that I discovered George Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue” and from
there, the sound of ragtime piano. This was the kind of piano playing that my adolescent self
could relate to: loud, brash, and with plenty of contempt for rules. I became determined to learn
how to play this style, no matter how many hours is took. My parents were confused.
The piano score for “Rhapsody in Blue” was well beyond my technical skill level, but I
persevered, hour after hour, attempting to get things to sound right. I was able to read music –
albeit slowly- and began to notice the sounds created by different combinations of notes. By the
end of the twenty-some odd pages, I may not have been able to play the piece at anything
resembling performance level, but I did figure out how to make cool blues-y sounds and play a
simple ragtime left hand. That was enough positive feedback to give me the confidence to stick
with piano.
I built upon that foundation by working through a book of rags by composer Scott Joplin,
which taught me the fundamentals of ragtime: a stride left hand and a syncopated right hand.
From there, I discovered jazz piano works by Jelly Roll Morton, James P. Johnson, and Fats
Waller. When there was no sheet music to be had, I would borrow cassettes and CDs from the
county library and try to pick out individual phrases by ear. I was teaching myself technique,
music theory, and ear training, all at once and completely by accident.
It was a time consuming process, but it managed to pay off some fifteen years later, when
I uploaded a ragtime medley of 80’s pop songs to YouTube and had my very first viral video.
Soon after, I was tapped to create ragtime versions of popular songs for the game Bioshock Infinite.
I realized that even in the digital age, there is still a demand for these “old” styles of music. My
hope is that by applying them to modern songs, a whole new generation will come to discover
and contribute to these timeless genres.
I decided to write this course for my 12 year old self- someone with basic piano skills and
a motivation to learn something new. As such, I’ll be assuming that you have a year or two of
piano playing already under your belt; if you’re completely new to piano, you should definitely
learn the basics first before starting this course. I’ve also designed this course to have something
for every skill level; although we’ll be starting with some pretty basic stuff, we’ll be playing pretty
difficult music by the end. My goal was to create a reference book that could last a lifetime (or as
long as e-books remain readable).
In the pages that follow, we’ll be examining the inner workings of ragtime and stride
piano, transforming a bunch of popular tunes into ragtime, and discussing ear training and
improvisation techniques. I’m going to cover a lot of stuff, but I’m going to avoid getting too
technical; it’s not meant to be an exhaustive, graduate-level tome on all things ragtime. I simply
want to give you the tools you need to experiment on your own, so that you can learn this music
in the most organic way possible.
So, let’s down to it.
THE BIG IDEA.
If a song has a melody and chords, it can be made into ragtime. Or doo wop, for that
matter. Or disco. Or dubstep.

Sure, some songs will sound more appropriate in some genres rather than others, but the
BIG IDEA is that songs don’t have to be in any genre in particular. Genre is something you do to a
song- not a box in which a song remains forever trapped. I have an entire YouTube channel (first
of several shameless plugs: http://www.youtube.com/scottbradleelovesya) devoted to this idea—
that’s how strongly I believe it to be true.

If you know how to play the melody of a song and the chords that accompany the
melody, you can interpret in any style that you wish. That’s your privilege as a performer.

However, as the title of this book may suggest, we are going to stick with turning songs
into ragtime - a style of music that was originally written specifically for the piano, at a time when
the piano was the centerpiece of the 19th century home entertainment system, and the sweet
sounds of syncopation poured forth from every saloon…every saloon…saloon…
(cue the dream sequence music)
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT RAGTIME

Hold on- before we start, we should stop to discuss some common questions. After all, I’ve
always wanted to write a “Frequently Asked Questions” chapter…
RAGTIME OR STRIDE PIANO?
“Ragtime” piano, “Stride” piano, “Novelty” piano, “New Orleans” piano – what’s the
difference?? Pretty subtle ones, for the most part. In fact, I won’t even address them in this
guide- there are plenty of resources on the internet (and YouTube comment threads) that explain
the distinguishing features of each subgenre. To keep things simple, we are going to call it all
“ragtime” (sorry to offend the purists!), since all share the same fundamental characteristics: a
“stride” left hand and a syncopated right hand.
WHAT’S A STRIDE LEFT HAND?
A stride left hand alternates between bass notes and chords to simulate the “oom-pah”
sound of marching bands. This is the probably most recognizable feature of ragtime piano.
WHAT’S SYNCOPATION?
Syncopation is the effect that comes from putting accented notes on the offbeats- the
“unexpected” beats. It’s a little hard to describe, but you’ll know it when you hear it.
Syncopation first became widespread in ragtime music, but can be heard in practically every style
of popular music since then- it’s especially common in electronic dance music today.
Syncopation in ragtime piano is a bit difficult to get use to at first- it feels as though the right
hand is off beat from the left hand.
SO, HOW DO I CHANGE A SONG INTO RAGTIME?
The first step is to take the chords of a song and use them to build a stride left hand.
Think of the chords to a song as the building blocks of the left hand - you’ll always be starting
with them. You can find the chords to pretty much any song online by searching “[name of
song] chords.”
The next step is to take the melody of the song and add some syncopation, so that some
of the notes land on off beats and some notes land on on beats. We’ll talk more about what that
means later.
From there, it’s simply a matter of coordination and practice. As you get comfortable
with the basics, you’ll be able to add small embellishments and variations here and there, which
eventually will lead to true improvisation; that’s where things really get interesting.
I’ll be uncovering the inner mechanics of ragtime piano for you in the form of short, easy
excerpts that are designed to teach a particular technique. If you’ve downloaded this onto an e-
reader or mobile phone, the sheet music may be a bit too small to read easily-- I recommend
downloading this onto your computer or printing it out, like we did way back in the 20th century.
For the best results, take time to really observe how every chord, rhythmic pattern, and right
hand embellishment is constructed within each excerpt. For instance, you may like the way a
particular right hand pattern sounds. Don’t just memorize it! Find out why it sounds that way,
and then take this knowledge and add it to your metaphorical ragtime toolkit, so you can use it in
any song that you like.
Ok! Let’s get our hands dirty (not literally) and begin.
THE LEFT HAND
The left hand’s job is to keep a steady pulse and also communicate the chords of the song.
It is your rhythm section; the foundation of everything you play. It’s also going to be the most
frustrating and least fun part to learn.
Much of the difficulty comes from the fact that a stride left hand jumps around a lot,
moving nonstop from low register bass notes to middle register chords. The only way to get used
to making these jumps is to practice them regularly, understanding that it’s going to take a bit of
time for the muscle memory to develop.
Now, let’s begin with a simple chord progression and figure out how to turn it into a
ragtime left hand pattern. Let’s start with a good ol’ fashioned C chord – with the notes C, E,
and G.
Hopefully, you already know how to create an inversion, but if not, here’s how: take the
root position chord ( C, E, and G, with the C on the bottom) and switch the order of the notes so
that the middle note is on the bottom ( E, G, and C, in our example). That’s called a “1st
inversion.”
Now, repeat the process so that the middle note of the first inversion is on the bottom (G,
C, and E, in our example). That’s your “2nd inversion.”

If you have a chord with three notes, there are only two inversions- if you invert the
second inversion, you once again wind up in root position (C, E, and G).

Notice that all these inversions sound pretty much the same- they’re all using the same
notes, after all. The reason we use them in the left hand is because chords sound the best in the
middle register of the piano, and sometimes we need to invert a chord to get it to sound good
without getting in the way of the right hand.

So, in our case, let’s say that the C chord sounds best in 1st inversion (G, C, and E). This
is going to be the chord inversion that we use in our left hand; now we just need to figure out the
bass notes.
Each individual note in a chord has a name, related to its degree in the corresponding
scale. Don’t worry about understanding all that for now; just know that we call the C in the C
chord (remember: C, E, G) the root; the E the third; and the G the fifth.
(Quick ‘n easy formula for building a major triad in root position: the distance between
the root and third is always four half steps, and the distance between the third and fifth is always
three half steps. For minor triads: flip the distances, so it becomes three half steps/ four half
steps. Still, it’s A LOT easier to memorize the notes in each chord).
The bass lines in ragtime and other related genres usually consist of alternating roots and
fifths. Here’s an example of that:
So, if we have a measure with 4 beats, we’ll create the ragtime stride left hand by putting
the root on beat 1, the fifth on beat 3, and the three note chord on beats 2 and 4.
This is the fundamental design of a ragtime left hand. You’ll notice that it involves a lot
of jumping, and at first it is quite difficult to play accurately (Actually, it’s always difficult to play
accurately when you get it up to speed!). You’ll want to practice it slowly at first- the way to
develop the requisite muscle memory is to practice slowly and accurately. When I was started, I
wanted to play everything fast right away, and this led to me developing bad habits and having to
spend years unlearning certain things. Don’t do that! I’ll give some tips for practicing later on.
Once you feel comfortable with this passage, it’s time to introduce a new chord to our
song. Let’s put in a G7 chord, which contains G, B, D, F.
This chord has four notes, which means there are three inversions; first inversion (B, D,
F, G):

Second inversion (D, F, G, B):

And third inversion (F, G, B, D):

Again, we want to pick the inversion that places the chord near the middle of the
keyboard, where it sounds best. In the case, we’re going to use the third inversion (F, G, B, D):