Ragtime Annie: A Song History
"Ragtime Annie" is a popular tune in North American fiddling, but where it came from is not known.[1] Stories have long circulated that Texas fiddlers were playing it around 1900 to 1910, though the Traditional Tune Archive finds no firm evidence for them. One published collection suggested the tune grew out of a piano piece called "Raggedy Ann Rag," but it gave no source, and no similar piano melody has yet been located.[1] The earliest version that can be documented is the record made by Texas fiddler Eck Robertson.[1] Sources differ slightly on the date: the Smithsonian's catalog gives 1922 as the recording date of his Victor disc, issued as Victor 19149 with "Turkey in the Straw" on the other side,[2] while the Traditional Tune Archive gives 1923. Other early recordings followed, including one in 1926 by Charlie Poole and the North Carolina Ramblers, with Posey Rorer on fiddle, issued as Columbia 15127-D. Folklorist Vance Randolph later recorded Ozark fiddlers playing it for the Library of Congress in the early 1940s.[1]
Arthur Rothstein, Weslaco, Texas. FSA camp. Square dancing, Saturday night, photograph, 1942. Farm Security Administration collection, Library of Congress. No known restrictions on publication. A Texas square dance of the era; the photograph is not connected to the tune.
Fiddlers are often unsure whether to play the tune in two parts or three, and either can be correct, depending on regional custom.[1] Robertson played three, with the first two in D major and the third moving into G major; many older Southwestern versions also have three parts. Other Texas fiddlers learned only two. Fiddler Glen Godsey remembered that in Amarillo in the 1940s and 1950s, Robertson was the only fiddler he knew who played the third part, and Godsey himself picked it up only later, from Robertson's record. According to Missouri fiddler Howard Marshall, the third part has long mattered a great deal in that state, and Gordon McCann recalled a Missouri fiddler and frequent contest judge who marked down contestants who skipped it.[1] One local theory, offered only as speculation, holds that the third part was added to give square-dance fiddlers a break from the main tune during long sets.[1]
The tune is now a standard part of the North American fiddle repertoire.[1] Among mountain dulcimer players, it is one of the 75 tunes in Stephen Seifert's Join the Jam, a book of melodies commonly played at mountain dulcimer jams.[3]
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