On Friday May 3rd, 2002, I saw Diana Coleman perform at the Whatley Chapel on the Park Hill Campus. That campus is prettier and more college-like than the one over here. I saw the carillon over there and noticed how much smaller it was than the one over here. It didn’t sound like it had many low-note bells. Inside the chapel, it was nice - with the stained glass and the whole alter setup. It looked to me like they were going for a sermon-on-the-mountain look. The performance started at 7:30 and seemed to last a couple hours, though I forgot to time it. I really liked how the place sounded, but I would’ve liked a little less echo. The pews weren’t too uncomfortable. It seemed to be a crowd of old people (who may have been kids when ragtime was big) and kids from our class, so it was an all-ages affair.
Diana is a really good pianist from what I heard, and all the awards the program talks about attest to that. I was sitting behind a few people so I had to crane my neck to see her finger work, but on one song she played near the end, her right hand was creating a “shimmering” effect for the duration of the song, and her fingers were really moving to create the effect. She also had a lot of power, which she made frequent use of, which I didn’t expect. You could tell she’s a professional because she took a little time before each song to prepare or relax, or do whatever her routine is. One thing I’ve noticed is that people who take pride in what they do usually don’t jump in cold turkey when they want to do a good job of it. She even got dressed up for the benefit, which is more than I can say for many in the audience.
She played 12 songs, I think, tracing ragtime geographically from Havana to New Orleans to New York to Michigan to Australia. She covered a broad range of ragtime tunes, including some I wouldn’t have considered ragtime before. She started with Piano Sonata No. 1 by C.E. Ives, which I didn’t like much because the notes seemed to clash. The short Contradanses by Ignacio Cervantes of Cuba were next and they were all good. The Maple Leaf Rag is the only ragtime tune I can recognize and she played either all or part of it, which I enjoyed. The Graceful Ghost by W.E. Bolcom was a song about his dead father, I think, and I really liked it. It was kind of hard to pick out the ragtime rhythm, but it was there. The Finger Buster by Jelly Roll Moron sounded more like jazz than ragtime because of the bass line that sounded like a blues scale arpeggio. The Veni Creator Spiritus Boogie was supposed to be a rag/monk chant mix song, but I didn’t hear the monk chant part of the it. I forgot how Rialto Ripples Rag by George Gershwin and Turn Out Stars went, but I do remember The Man I Love and Love Walked In by Gershwin were good songs. Lullaby by Percy Aldridge Grainger was cool to hear because in my high school band we played his version of Irish Tunes from a Country Dairy. In Dahomey (“Cakewalk Smasher”) was a good, upbeat closer, though the cakewalk aspect of the song was lost on me.
I came away from the concert pleased. The only problem I had was that when she stopped talking but left the microphone on, the speakers would buzz while she played. The inter-song commentary was a definite plus because it made the show more interesting and it gave her a personality and voice, since she didn’t do any singing. I think it would’ve been cool if she had busted out a saloon piano (like the ones in Old Western movies) for some of the more jumping songs, but the regular piano was good for covering both mellow and lively songs. My mom plays piano and organ for a church and she really likes Baroque and other Classical music. I bought her the Rags to Riches cd for her birthday, and I think she’ll like it because Diana Coleman’s a quality musician.
