Have you ever seen a ghost playing a piano? You might have seen one at a fancy restaurant, an airport, or maybe a museum before. How did they capture this musical spirit and how did they convince it to play music for the living? Well that's not actually what is going on, what you are seeing (in most cases) is a player piano. A player piano is a mechanically automated piano that uses rolls of perforated paper to play the music on the paper. This video below explains a lot better:
What does this have to do with Ozarks? Music? History? We have to start in the year 1864. On May 17th, during the civil war a baby boy was born to William S. Belcher and Rachel Boone in Miami, Missouri. The boy was was named John William Boone or better known later as "Blind Boone". Boone was born with cerebral meningitis, which at the time, the only known treatment caused blindness. His mother moved home base to Warrensburg, MO where he spent most of his formative years. Growing up Boone had an immaculate talent for music. It has been said he only needed to hear a song once to play it. He learned various instruments in his musical journey but piano was his strong suit. Boone spent years battling against hardships to eventually land a business partner who would be looking out for his best interests. John Lange Jr. was a business man who met Boone at a Christmas event Lange booked in Columbia, MO. He took to the young man's talents and looked after his career for many years to come.
Boone's eclectic style was a culmination of classical, black gospel, and "ragged" rhythms. All of which would go on to create ragtime music and eventually create blues and RnB. His contributions to American music often goes uncredited or forgotten. Remember those piano rolls we went over? Well Boone was one of the first African American artists to be recorded by the QRS Piano Roll Company. A lot of his most popular compositions were put onto rolls. This is the only way to hear his music now because no sound recording was ever made and video wasn't a thing back then.
Unfortunately Boone's most popular song was "Marshfield Tornado" and it was never put to piano roll. "Marshfield Tornado" was a song Boone had written after hearing about the event of the same name in Marshfield, MO (April 18th, 1880). The song featured complex rhythms and cyclone sound effects, it would later go on to be his most popular piece. Boone was scheduled to perform there and Lange wasn't sure if the performance would still happen. The team decided to go on with the performance in the wake of the disaster and by lack of better judgement Boone played "Marshfield Tornado" to the survivors of the tragedy. Not the greatest song choice for a group of people who lost 100 and injured even more to the catastrophe your song is about. Rightfully so, the song caused alarm, and many evacuated the performance. From then on, Boone saved that song for last.
Blind musical geniuses altering the course of music, town leveling cyclones, and ghost-playing pianos - all of this happening in the Ozarks. Our region is rich with music history, we just have to do some digging.
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