Throwing in some Gottschalk

The real creator of Ragtime in 1868 or 1869

And the prodigy who played it well in 1898

I have great amount of respect for Louis Moreau Gottschalk. And one of the reasons that I like Fred Hylands so much is because he is exactly the kind of pianist who would have played Gottschalk's music when he was a teenager. This fact can be heard all over the place in Hylands' playing, it's ever present in what he decided to improvise on those many a cylinders. There's no doubt that Hylands would have thrown many of the old classical pieces aside in his teen years, hungering for something hard on the piano keys and in need of strong force to play correctly. And his family was not a mix of musically inclined oddities like Fred and Ettie(his sister), so they were mostly on their own for musical training and stage experience. Fred was likely playing Gottschalk's "The Banjo" and "Tournament Galop" by the age of fourteen. That wouldn't be much of a stretch to say, as he was starting to create and manage shows by fifteen. 

In connecting Hylands' playing to Gottschalk's, first listen to Gottschalk's wonderful early syncopated piece "The Banjo" here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJ4UIdPXzhI

it's really something ain't it!

Now that that has been listed, listen to this record from around the middle of 1904 with Billy Murray singing and whistling with Hylands doing all of his usual little things, and playing out in ragtime at the end:

https://ia600506.us.archive.org/13/items/BillyMurray_part5/BillyMurray-WhistlingCoon.mp3

Classic Hylands, doing things reminiscent of Gottschalk, and playing all flashy to catch the ears of the listener to the piano playing. 

Now, for another great comparison of the two, listen to this Gottschalk rarity "Ojos Criollos"(Creole Eyes):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnB2crhTtws

Very graceful and fun! 

Now, listen to "The Bobolink" whistled by Joe Belmont and accompanied by you know who:

http://www.tinfoil.com/cm-1405.htm(remember, click the little "real" icon to play this)

Very interesting comparison indeed! That last cylinder is a fascinating one that I just found yesterday afternoon. This cylinder is a very good example of Hylands' flashy and Gottschalk inspired playing, with a quick and fun right hand and a steady strong left hand to accompany it; that was how to do it. Just like how Gottschalk beat the hell out of the piano, Hylands did as well, learning how to do this mostly on his own. This is also why I have the feeling that Hylands was not the most musically literate. He was certainly reasonably good at it, but it must have taken him quite a while to actually be a pretty decent sight reader by the late-1890's. What I'm saying is that he wasn't nearly as good at sight reading as Frank P. Banta was, because Banta was like a music machine when it came to him as Edison's pianist. 

Hylands can be compared to one of the slot machines that Russell Hunting went on to talk about so much in The Phonoscope, because he would only work if they paid him accordingly, much like the slot machines. If you put in the right amount of money, they would play for you. 

Hylands was a vaudeville pianist. 

That's all the needs to be said. He was a child prodigy who took up vaudeville, as the music of Gottschalk could easily fit into what became popular in the late-1890's(ehm! Rag time that is!), and it was flashy enough to catch quite a lot of attention when playing slightly like that behind a singer. And oh how it did! Even if he was accompanying someone as Vain and attention-hungry as:

Vess L. Ossman

Here's one from 1898 where Hylands is SO loud that you can barely hear Ossman:

http://cylinders.library.ucsb.edu/mp3s/5000/5286/cusb-cyl5286d.mp3

(still throwing in some Gottschalk!)

Ossman was very demanding of Hylands, and wasn't sure what to think of his ways in playing like the multi-racial composer Gottschalk, but it was what made his Rag-Time so distinct and likeable to Ossman, which is why left Banta in the dust for a few years. Really what we hear from Hylands, on his serious records and his Rag-Time records is true vaudeville piano, and to close off, here is a perfect example of vaudeville piano:

http://www.tinfoil.com/cm-0906.htm

(once again, click the "real" icon to play this)

This one is really fun! Len spencer and the whole crew are on this, and even w hear Hylands clapping from his nest. He even plays a section from  "Smokey Mokes" just a bit too fast!

I hope you enjoyed this!