Morgan Hill Rag (Ron O'Dell) played by Tom Brier

I composed this rag in October 2007. It was a rare case of me writing music without having a title in mind ahead of time.

It took longer to come up with a title than it did to compose the music. After two days of pondering, I suddenly remembered that I had wanted to write a rag for the 100th anniversary of the founding of the town of Morgan Hill, California, where I live. But that was in 2006, and I never got around to it... As this is a folksy rag, however, I figured naming it after a place was ideal, so that's what I did.

Morgan Hill is not a geographic feature of the area (though it is bordered by mountains), but rather the name of a man who owned a ranch by which the Union Pacific train station was built in the late 19th century. Thus people referred to it as the Morgan Hill station, since that was less of a mouthful than the area's official name at the time: Rancho Ojo de Agua de la Coche.

Tom Brier had first seen the sheet music for this rag at sometime after midnight on Friday night / early Saturday during the West Coast Ragtime Festival. He liked the rag so much that he played it in his 10:30 a.m. set Saturday morning. I was still waking up then, so I missed it. He was nice enough, however, to let me record him playing it again here at the post-festival party Sunday night, 18 November 2007.

Tom's latest CD, Rewind, can be purchased here:
http://cdbaby.com/cd/tombrier

West Coast Ragtime Festival:
http://www.westcoastragtime.com

Category:

Music

Tags:

• ragtime
• piano
• morganhill
• morgan
• hill
• yamaha
• grand
• tom
• brier
• ron
• o'dell

[Julispice7]

i live in morgan hill and i want a piano teacher....?

[Keeper1st]

@Julispice7 You might look up Candace Fazzio at the Music Academy of Gilroy.

[Julispice7]

@Keeper1st im poor i cant afford that lol

[Keeper1st]

@Julispice7 Try asking YouTuber "Ragmate" a.k.a. Chris Bradshaw. She lives in Gilroy and does a lot for young musicians, so she might have ideas. She's in Missouri right now for the Midwest summer ragtime festival circuit, so you probably won't get a response right away.

[EddieTheKing96]

I live in Morgan Hill. So when I saw this i was like "This couldnt be what im thinking"

[Keeper1st]

I lived in Morgan Hill from about 1999 until March of this year.

[Keeper1st]

@Harmonyww Tom & Julia, and the Raspberry Jam Band, do play "When I'm 64". It doesn't need to be ragged up because it already is.

[Julispice7]

@Keeper1st omg thank you so much!!!!!! <3

[Squarerig]

What a beautiful rag.Thank you Keeper of the Keys!