The Third Stage at the Theatre Royal last night became a ragtime heaven. Liam Waddle a young affable talented pianist treated us to traditional ragtime; Scott Joplin, Jelly Roll Morton and then a surprise ragtime tribute to David Bowie, which was delightful.
This was Liam’s second visit to the Theatre Royal as he wowed a lunchtime standing room only crowd a couple of years ago. He introduced some of the pieces he played with a little background, for example the story of William George Crush and his staged train crash in 1896, in which tragedy ensued; Scott Joplin wrote the Great Crush Collision March in which you could hear the story played out in ragtime.
We heard Debussy, two cakewalks which were both enjoyable ‘General Levine’ and ‘Golliwog cakewalk’ that Debussy wrote for his daughter.
I enjoyed the Scott Joplin pieces, the silent movie style, of ‘Easy Winners’ and the more unusual ’Solace’ with its tango influence. I liked that Liam stopped playing this piece; really quite charming, and he restarted to do the piece better justice.
After the interval which was a bit too long, we were entertained with Jelly Roll Morton numbers, Art Tatum take on Sweet Lorraine, The Waddle Rag an accomplished composition by Liam himself. Next came the ‘Poor People of Paris’ , Liam told us a little about Winifred Atwell which I found fascinating, next, ‘The Black and White Rag’ played in the Atwell style was very familiar.
The encore of the tribute to David Bowie was even more pleasing on second hearing. All in all it was an enjoyable evening; Liam Waddle was enthusiastic and very personable talented young man.
If you get a chance to go to these third stage offerings go , they are very good value and informal plus a drink is normally included.
For more information:
liamwaddle.co.uk
www.trch.co.uk
Review by James Millichip
