Taking it in Stride

The Roots of Harlem “Stride” Piano

Dick Hyman, stride master

Describing Harlem “Stride” Piano is almost as tricky as playing it. The style, which originated in New York City—more specifically, Harlem—in the 1920’s, requires a virtuosic level of technique, with a left hand leaping between bass notes and chords—the “striding” sound that gives the music its name—and a right hand unfurling dizzying arrays of riffs and melodies. As Bay Area stride pianist and historian Mike Lipskin says: “When one first attempts stride after hearing a James P. or Fats…it’s as if you’ve disassembled your entire car, having the pieces all over the floor just as somebody drives by in a Ferrari.”

The “James P” and “Fats” Lipskin refers to are two paragons of stride, James P. Johnson and Thomas “Fats” Waller. All Music Guide calls Johnson the “king of stride pianists in the 1920s,” the era when the burgeoning musical form found its rhythm. A variation of ragtime, stride distinguished itself with hard-swinging rhythms and an emphasis on improvisation. Where a rag was generally a composed piece of music, often heard on a piano roll, a stride piece was “lightning in a bottle”—a masterful display of on-the-spot inspiration. 

Johnson, Willie “The Lion” Smith, and the other famed stride pianists brought classically honed technique to their compositions and improvisations. Johnson’s profound influence can be heard in the work of Duke Ellington (who attempted to learn Johnson’s “Carolina Shout” by slowing down the piano roll to copy the fingerings), his famed pupil Waller, and modern master Thelonious Monk.

A favorite story of jazz producer Orrin Keepnews features Monk, after recording the piano solo “Functional” from Thelonious Himself, exclaiming proudly “I sound just like James P!” “Monk’s Roots: Harlem Stride Piano,” the final concert in the Spring Season’s Monk Project, pays tribute to the storied jazz piano tradition with Lipskin, a former student of Willie “The Lion,” and two other modern stride masters, Butch Thompson and Dick Hyman.