By C. Michael Bailey
Viridiana Productions is a music company based in Sandpoint Idaho that specializes in the production and promotion of a music genre called Terra Verde (literally "Green Earth"). Promotional material from the company describes Terra Verde as a "contemporary and distinctly American musical art form, fusing the elements of European romanticism, the New World Ethnic styles, such as ragtime, jazz, Latin American, and country." This label beats this critic to the punch by championing Nineteenth-Century composer Louis Moreau Gottschalk as a forefather of Ragtime, Jelly Roll Morton, and Jazz. For this reason alone is this "new genre" worthy of comment.
Ragtime music, not unlike "classical music," differs from Jazz in the respect that it and its most ardent supporters resist improvisation. Ragtime pieces are carefully and meticulously composed with very specific instructions directing the artist on how to perform a given piece. They are typically of three or four sections or parts, each sixteen measures long, possessing a syncopated melody juxtaposed against a duple rhythm. Not unlike the rigors imparted on the Japanese Haiku in literature, Ragtime is meant to be composed in close confines. There should be little surprise that Ragtime experienced growing pains as in excess of 2000 rags were composed between the years of 1897 and 1925. Musical genesis occurred when Jazz split off from Ragtime, fueled by one Ferdinand Joseph La Menthe, AKA "Jelly Roll" Morton, when he first sat down and syncopated his way fully into the Blues.
Many of the purveyors of "Terra Verde" contend that the music of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, Ernesto Nazareth, Juan Morel Campos and the like preceded stylistically Scott Joplin and classic Ragtime, and therefore, jazz. The family tree of jazz piano I have always promoted has Gottschalk begetting Joplin, Joplin begetting Morton. Morton begetting J.P. Johnson, Fats Waller and all of the stride masters, who give way to Art Tatum (and by proxy Oscar Peterson, Hank Jones, Thelonious Monk, Bud Powell, etc.) to Cecil Taylor and Matthew Ship and every other pianist to touch the ivory.
After Jazz broke away from Ragtime, Ragtime was left with at best a recapitulation of the past. While Scott Joplin is not the only composer to write Rags (Joe Lamb, James Scott, and Eubie Blake wrote many memorable rags) Joplin is the most visible in the public awareness of Ragtime. By the late Twentieth Century, Ragtime performers and composers were looking to expand the musical possibilities of Ragtime-like music. This effort was spearheaded by a group of young and talented Ragtime experts lead by David Thomas Roberts, Scott Kirby, and Frank French, all of whom record for Viridiana Productions. Kirby, whose the Complete Scott Joplin on the Green Pastures label was a Ragtime revelation (and who is repeating this survey for Viridiana), expands the definition of Terra Verde as a music that is
ÃÂÃÂÃÂÃÂ
"Primarily syncopated, primarily composed, contemporary works with strong ties both to folk genres of the New World and to 19th Century Romantic Music of the Old World. Louis Moreau Gottschalk, Ernesto Nazareth, and Scott Joplin are all true ancestors to Terra Verde, but the term is only for *new* music (roughly 20-30 years old.)
Viridiana Productions has released a variety of Terra Verde and pre-Terra Verde music. Included are collections of Gottschalk piano pieces and a collection of Creole Music for duo pianos.
On American Originals: The Piano Music of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, pianist Frank French recorded an assembly of 12 Gottschalk original compositions in 1997. Mr. French used a Bösendorfer Imperial model 290 piano to perform his collection of tastefully chosen pieces. This first thing to be noticed the glaring lack of the salon pieces "The Last Hope" and "The Dying Poet". Bravo, Mr. French. These are not among Gottschalk's greatest pieces and needn't be included here as they have been, in copious fashion, elsewhere. I do applaud the inclusion of "Pasquinade", "Le Banjo", and "Tournament Galop." These pieces play to the heart of Gottschalk's superb art. French, for his part, plays this music with a reverent love that never bores the listener. One big difference between Mr. French's performance and those of Alan Marks, Eugene List or Lambert Orkis is the almost total absence of pedal. French's style is crisp and exact, while retaining all of the Romantic character of the pieces. This disc may be obtained from Viridiana Productions, catalog number VRD 2005. For those listeners looking for a concise introduction to the piano music of Gottschalk, American Originals more than fills the bill.
Creole Music is a collection of traditional and original pieces reflecting the rich musical tradition of the Gulf of Mexico, specifically drawing from the legacy of Cuba, Haiti, and Puerto Rico, seasoned with South American, Afro-Caribbean and French popular melodies. Pianists Frank French and Scott Kirby recorded these pieces as duo piano examinations. Of note are French's and Kirby's original compositions, each that gives the listener an idea of what Terra Verde is intended to be. In addition to the Bösendorfer Imperial used by Frank French on American Originals: The Piano Music of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, a Schimmel model CC208T is employed as the second piano. Creole Music may be acquired from Viridiana Productions, catalog number VRD 2006. This collection will be immediately accessible by fans of both Ragtime and Gottschalk alike. It possesses a sweet yet sassy personality that exudes the humid physicality and pleasure of that great Creole melting pot.
