(The Phonoscope July, 1898)
(The Phonoscope, September 1898)
Those boys at Columbia sure as hell had a special connection with their pianist.
Fred Hylands was his name. Hylands was pulled into their mess of a record company in early 1897 as a here-and-there pianist. By this I mean that he only came in here and there, as it was not his permanent chair yet. As when they found him, he was a prominent and progressive performer and music director at Pastor's Famous theatre(seen in the illustration below)
This illustration sort of parodies Pastor's stages that spread around the country after 1900 like mad.
Anyhow, Hylands was a musical director at the one of these Pastor stages that Mike Bernard and Ben Harney had been a part of at one point. Hylands, being a sort of genius pianist and performer, had made a name for himself in New York by 1896, only months after he first moved there from Chicago. So some of Columbia's staff must have been to a performance by Hylands either in blackface or not, doing his usual schtick and he must have been an immediate hit with them. They didn't exactly want to go at him yet, as he was one to hold off on for a little while. But when they came back to him, they just dove in to him. They must have found him either backstage at the theatre or in his office upstairs. He must not have been doing anything when they barged in on him. It must have been odd to them, he wasn't a rugged old music director who had done enough to ruin his face. He was the complete opposite; fresh-faced, rich blue-eyed, and had a vain look in his eye.
By late-1897, he was a regular at Columbia, ready to be worked the crap out of.
And how he was.
(as seen in the pictures from The Phonoscope above)
Here are a few goos examples of Fred Hylands getting worked till he dropped on cylinders:
Recorded in mid-1898 with Vess L. Ossman, "The Darkey's Dream":
(Notice! He speeds up gradually as the record pregresses
It's a bit hard to hear, but Hylands is playing some extraordinary things and hits the deep octaves in the left hand while playing these outrageous improvised melodies.
No sheet music needed. Clearly by how Hylands plays this, that was true. This fact was true often when Hylands played with Columbia's artists.
Here's a non-Ragtime number with J. W. Myers from 1898 as well with Hylands pounding the crap out of their terrible sounding piano behind Myers:
(Make sure you pause the record after just after the music ends!)
It didn't take the charmed Hylands too long to start to throw complaints at their management, and even his fellows in the studio. He was not used to ever working as much as these boys at Columbia demanded on a daily basis. But he was only 26, so he had some getting used to, to do.
The playing still wore him out,even as the years in the studio passed by him.
By 1899 and 1900, he was still playing he got almost too drunk to play straight and all tore up by playing so many takes. Here's an example of this:
(Skip to 6:00 for the music to finally start!)
One can just hear Hylands' exhaustion in his playing on this one, and it is also relevant, by how open and anxiously he plays, that his joints are more than just "oiled up" a little. The ending solo almost completely collapses also, notice that!
But even with all his faults, it's one of the best examples of pre-1900 recorded Rag-Time in my opinion. As it's from right at the height if the cakewalk era, and Hylands has the tempo and feel of a cakewalk almost as though it were a true stage sketch. This cylinder is where one can truly imagine the two of them performing in blackface on the stage doing the sketch and Hylands smiling out to the crowd with a crooked smile and contented face, calling as much attention as possible to the piano playing. That was Spencer's intention, and he got it spot on here. As Spencer's minstrels were touring around the time that this was recorded, it was no surprise that he was willing to work the hell out of Hylands to get his records to sound absolutely perfect. Hylands kept the complaining to himself after 1899, as it would do no good for the management. So he just drank till he couldn't play anymore to try to relieve and numb the stinging and heat in his hands and fingers. It numbed him, but it also kicked him around when it came to playing till he dropped for the ever demanding singers.
I hope you enjoyed this!
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