| The Chris Finger piano showroom
at 101 Second Ave. is usually full of pianos, more than 30 of them.
But on Monday, July 17, 2000, it contained only five pianos. The
space was not empty however. It held a rapt audience of 150 Ragtime
music lovers. They were attending the final concert of the Ninth Annual
Rocky Mountain Ragtime
Festival in Boulder Colorado.
The festival began Thursday evening, July 13, in the Unity Church of Boulder. Musical concerts and symposia were held Friday and Saturday, all day and evening. A breakfast brunch concert took place at the Ramada Inn on Sunday morning. In addition to Scott Joplin and Jelly Roll Morton, the music of Gottschalk, Duke Ellington, Eubie Blake and music from South America was played. The final concert featured Frank French, Brian Keenan (a University of Colorado graduate), Scott Kirby, David Thomas Roberts and Morten Gunnar Larsen, a Norwegian composer and pianist. The closing pieces of the Monday concert were special arrangements for five pianos of ragtime standards. The five-featured artists played them. The concert was followed by a wonderful repast provided by Chris Finger Pianos, wine, cake, cookies and assorted finger food served on the porch of the old Rev Taylor’s Restaurant. Chris Finger told the crowd that his staff worked hard all day moving more than thirty pianos out of the showroom for the concert… but he never did reveal the location of the pianos.
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