Charles L. Johnson - Cloud Kisser 1911 (Ragtime Piano Synthesia)
Sequenced by Warren S. Trachtman
Cloud Kisser lifts off with bright syncopation in this ragtime piano Synthesia video of Charles L. Johnson's 1911 rag. Johnson spent his whole life in Kansas City and published over 300 pieces, including nearly 40 rags like Dill Pickles. Some experts believe that with a New York address, he would be named among the greatest ragtime composers next to Joplin, Scott, and Lamb. The falling notes make his cheerful, tuneful style easy to follow at the piano.
🎼 ABOUT CHARLES L. JOHNSON
Charles Leslie Johnson (1876-1950) spent his whole life in the two Kansas Cities and was one of the most commercially successful ragtime composers never to leave the Midwest. He was playing piano by six, studied harmony and theory, picked up guitar, banjo and mandolin along the way, and went to work plugging songs for a Kansas City publisher in the 1890s. By 1907 he had his own publishing house and a runaway hit: "Dill Pickles", whose title he supposedly invented on the spot when a bookkeeper walked past carrying a carton of pickles for his dinner. He published over three hundred pieces, around forty of them rags - "Crazy Bone Rag", "Powder Rag", "Apple Jack" - plus the ballad "Sweet and Low", which sold a million copies. Historians often say that had he worked in New York, he would be named beside Joplin, Scott and Lamb.
Folk ragtime with a Midwestern bounce: catchy, riff-based right-hand strains built on repeating three-note patterns that cut across the beat, over a straightforward alternating bass. Harmonically simple and immediately memorable, jauntier than the classic school, and comfortable for intermediate hands.
🎹 TURN ANY PIANO RECORDING INTO MIDI
Want to learn this piece — or any recording — with falling notes like in this video? I built Transcribe by Midiverse: upload audio and it becomes MIDI with left/right hand separation, a falling-notes practice mode, slow-down and looping. Free to start:
► https://transcribe.midiverse.ai
🎧 HOW TO PRACTISE THIS PIECE
Ragtime rewards patience: keep the left-hand bass-chord alternation strictly in time and let the right hand's syncopation float against it. Practise hands separately first, set the tempo to around 60% until the leaps are safe, and resist rushing — Joplin famously warned that ragtime should never be played fast.
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ABOUT THIS CHANNEL
itsRemco is a piano Synthesia channel dedicated to ragtime piano, the syncopated style of Scott Joplin, James Scott and Joseph Lamb that set the stage for early jazz. Every video shows the notes falling in real time so you can see exactly what both hands are playing, learn by ear and eye together, and practise along at your own pace. Subscribe for new piano transcriptions every week.
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