MASNO Joplin Concert - Richard Dowling
The New Orleans Advocate
BY DEAN M. SHAPIRO | Special to The Advocate
When Richard Dowling was 9, the movie
“The Sting” came out, with the famous Marvin Hamlisch soundtrack that
included six ragtime songs composed by Scott Joplin.
“I literally
fell in love with ‘The Entertainer,’ the way millions of other people
did at that time, and I begged my piano teacher to let me learn it,”
Dowling, now 52, recalled.
He learned the piece and several other
Joplin ragtime compositions from a songbook his mother bought for him at
a Houston music store. His affinity for the Joplin repertoire just took
off from there.
“I
never could have imagined that I would take that book — which I still
have — and memorize all 53 pieces in it,” said Dowling, who will be the
first pianist to perform the entire Joplin canon live in New York’s
Carnegie Hall on April 1 — the centennial of Joplin’s death in 1917.
New
Orleanians will be getting a sampling of that history-making concert
this Sunday afternoon when Dowling’s show, titled “Great Scott!” will
feature roughly half of the Joplin piano songbook at Le Petit Theatre
under the auspices of the Musical Arts Society of New Orleans.
As
the 1992 winner of MASNO’s International Piano Competition, he has been a
frequent guest performer in New Orleans and elsewhere in Louisiana over
the past 25 years.
Following Hurricane Katrina, Dowling donated
his Baldwin concert piano to the East Bank Branch of the Jefferson
Parish Library, and he has performed there several times since then.
Classically
trained with a master’s degree from Yale University and a doctorate
from the University of Texas, Dowling has performed internationally and
in some of the most prestigious American concert halls, including
Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall.
Joplin’s rags make up the
largest portion of his surviving canon of works, the best-known of which
was the 1899 composition, “Maple Leaf Rag.”
But, despite his
reputation as primarily a ragtime composer and performer, Joplin was
also classically trained by a German immigrant pianist and he wrote
waltzes, marches and cakewalk dance music. He even wrote two operas, one
of which — “Treemonisha” — is still performed.
Samplings of each
of these styles will be presented by Dowling in his Joplin tribute
concert, including the final number from “Treemonisha,” titled “A Real
Slow Drag.”
Comment by email:
Comment by email:
Wonderful!!! I was hoping it would come out in time. Mr. Shapiro
did a terrific job. Thanks mucho for alerting me about its appearance. Appreciatively,
---- Richard [Richard Dowling]
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