Posts Tagged ‘Fats Waller’

Friday Five Fun — The Eccentric Pianist

Friday, December 7th, 2007

This week’s Friday Five asks us to use these five words in a poem or story: mustard, piano, elastic, moat, and notorious.  As you can see, it set me off in a rather silly direction:

The Eccentric Pianist
By Madeleine Begun Kane

The notoriously eccentric pianist
Played electric stride piano
With an elastic reach worthy of Fats Waller
While perched on the deck of his moat-surrounded castle,
Then dined on a meal of mustard sandwiches.

For a post and limerick about a real (and not-nearly-so-eccentric) stride pianist, check out my Ode To Judy Carmichael.

(You can find more of my music humor here.)

Night On The Town — Judy Carmichael, Stride Pianist

Sunday, May 6th, 2007

I live in New York City, so my husband Mark and I often catch great musical acts, plays, art shows, and other entertainment and cultural diversions in the Big Apple.

Why don’t I write about our New York fun?  I keep meaning to, but quickly forget to. Blame ADD, a bad memory, or just being a wee bit disorganized.

Anyway, I’ve decided to launch a new posting category — Night On The Town — in which I’ll write more regularly about our Manhattan adventures … in theory, anyway.

And what better way to start, than with the wonderful Judy Carmichael!  We caught her stride piano act Friday night at the Knickerbocker Bar and Grill, and she was excellent, as always. Mark and I own every one of her recordings!

For those who don’t know what stride piano is, it’s a musical style that originated in Harlem early in the 20th century.  And nobody does it better than Judy Carmichael.  In fact I love her playing so much, I’ve written her a limerick:

Ode To Judy Carmichael (Limerick)
By Madeleine Begun Kane

Judy Carmichael’s known for her stride.
She’s a pianist of note far and wide—
A female Fats Waller.
You’ll whoop and you’ll holler
With joy at her musical ride.