Heliotrope Bouquet (1907) is unique amongst Scott Joplin's (1868-1917) works, as it is a collaboration with Louis Chauvin. According to 'Perfessor' Bill Edwards, 'This rag contains the only known surviving compositional fragment of Louis Chauvin, who by most contemporary accounts was a very creative, skilled and prolific pianist who knew a multitude of pieces, though he was unschooled and could neither read nor write music. Chauvin lived a hard life as an itinerant pianist and died of complications from syphilis and multiple sclerosis shortly after his 24th birthday. The first two sections of Heliotrope are Chauvin's, which Joplin first heard while visiting Arthur Marshall in Chicago in 1906, and thought enough of them to put them down to paper. The harmonization and last two themes were later completed by Joplin, with some tie-ins to the first two. The A section, utilizing a tango rhythm, is fairly unique in all of ragtime for its structure, rhythm and melody. The B section also contains some unexpected syncopation. The C and D sections are obviously born of Joplin's writing in their nature, but the C section does contain a snippet of Chauvin's melody in the middle. I have also heard this piece interpreted on occasion as a tango throughout, much like Solace.'
James Reel, in an article about Hagen for Fanfare Magazine, quotes him: 'I studied piano with a Polish immigrant and Holocaust survivor named Adam Klecewski when I was about seven,' he says, 'and the only thing I remember, other than the fact that he slapped my knuckles with a pen when I made mistakes, is that I had perfect pitch -- he sat me backwards on the piano bench and had me identify pitches as he played them. [Ironically, this changed to relative pitch as I became more 'trained' as a musician.] I stopped studying with him because I used to pay my brother to tell my mother I'd practiced, even if I hadn't been, and my brother got too expensive. I started again when I was 14, because I had seen the movie The Sting and was fascinated with the Scott Joplin music they used all the way through it. That inspired me to teach myself to read music -- which I had forgotten how to do -- , and I asked for piano lessons again.'
In fact, Hagen writes, in the program note for his own 'orchestral two step,' Heliotrope, 'Before I began piano lessons as a child, I first taught myself to read music and play the piano by writing the letter names next to the noteheads in Louis Chauvin's haunting two-step for piano, Heliotrope Bouquet. It was completed after Chauvin's death by my first musical hero, Scott Joplin, and remains my favourite rag.'
In homage to Louis Chauvin and to Scott Joplin, Hagen overlays the theme of his own composition over the final strain of theirs in this arrangement. Published by E.C. Schirmer, this arrangement was first conducted by Hagen with the Orchestra Society of Philadelphia. It is dedicated to Morris Goldman (manager, at the time, of the orchestra) and was premiered in concert before Hagen's own Heliotrope by the Denver Chamber Orchestra conducted by Music Director JoAnn Falletta, at the Paramount Theater in Denver, Colorado on 14 November 1991.
--- Bill Rhoads, 2003
