Fats Waller Carolina Shout Piano Transcription

Here’s my transcription of Fats performing his mentor, James P. Johnson's stride piano masterpiece, Carolina Shout, considered essential repertoire for any budding stride pianist.

By recording this piece in 1941, Fats was not only paying homage to his great piano mentor but was also coming full circle by returning to the very piece of music that he apparently won at a high school talent competition at age 15 after learning it note-by-note from James P. Johnson's 1921 piano roll.

Performed at a breath-taking speed - a much faster tempo than its originator ever performed it - it nevertheless displays the essence of his stride style: indefatigable swing and powerful momentum, use of contrasting dynamics and touch and an infectious bluesy fervour. To play at such a tempo, Fats' version has a slightly more streamlined and lighter treatment of the main theme, where he uses RH 6th intervals instead of the triad chords heard initially in the original plus a lighter LH stride texture. There's an unexpected use of an E-diminished LH harmony in bar 2 of the main theme which Fats plays consistently every time, so I've retained it.
Some ambiguous moments from a transcriptional point of view are in brackets.

This is actually take 2 of 2 takes that were performed in the session. It's always fascinating to compare the takes to observe the brilliance of Fats' improvisational skills, as stride piano is, like all jazz piano performances, a unique and spontaneous performance!

Interestingly, as Mike Lipskin points out in his liner notes to the Turn On The Heat CD set, Fats omits (deliberately or accidentally, we'll never know) one of the themes from the original piano solo and paraphrases another in both takes.

You can compare the performances in the links below:

Here is the original recording of take two:
   • Carolina Shout (2004 Remastered)  

Here is Fats' take one:
   • Carolina Shout (Take No. 1)  

Here is James P. Johnson's 1921 piano roll version:
   • Carolina Shout James P. Johnson 1921 ...  

Here is James P. Johnson's 1921 piano solo recording:
   • James P.  Johnson plays Carolina Shou...  


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