![Nola sheet music](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Nola_sheet_music.jpg)
Felix Arndt (May 20, 1889October 16, 1918) was an American
pianist
A pianist ( , ) is an individual musician who plays the piano. Since most forms of Western music can make use of the piano, pianists have a wide repertoire and a wide variety of styles to choose from, among them traditional classical music, ja ...
and
composer
A composer is a person who writes music. The term is especially used to indicate composers of Western classical music, or those who are composers by occupation. Many composers are, or were, also skilled performers of music.
Etymology and Defi ...
of
popular music
Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...
. His mother was the Countess Fevrier, related to
Napoleon III
Napoleon III (Charles Louis Napoléon Bonaparte; 20 April 18089 January 1873) was the first President of France (as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte) from 1848 to 1852 and the last monarch of France as Emperor of the French from 1852 to 1870. A nephew ...
. His father, Hugo Arndt, was Swiss-born.
Educated in New York (his music teachers included
Carl Lachmund
Carl V. Lachmund (27 March 185320 February 1928) was an American classical pianist, teacher, conductor, composer, and diarist. He was a student of Franz Liszt for three years, and his detailed diaries of his time with Liszt provide an invaluable i ...
), Arndt composed songs for the famous
vaudeville
Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment born in France at the end of the 19th century. A vaudeville was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a dramatic composition ...
team of
Jack Norworth
John Godfrey Knauff (January 5, 1879 – September 1, 1959), known professionally as Jack Norworth, was an American songwriter, singer and vaudeville performer.
Biography
Norworth is credited as writer of a number of Tin Pan Alley hits. He wr ...
and
Nora Bayes
Nora Bayes (born Rachel Eleonora "Dora" Goldberg; October 3, 1880March 19, 1928) was an American singer and vaudeville performer who was popular internationally between the 1900s and 1920s. She is credited with co-writing the song "Shine On, Har ...
, and recorded over 3000
piano rolls for
Duo-Art
Duo-Art was one of the leading reproducing piano technologies of the early 20th century, the others being American Piano Company (Ampico), introduced in 1913 too, and Welte-Mignon in 1905. These technologies flourished at that time because of th ...
and
QRS Records
QRS Music Technologies, Inc. is an American company that makes modern player pianos. It was founded as Q•R•S Music Company in 1900 to make piano rolls, the perforated rolls of paper read by player pianos to reproduce music. The company also ...
. He died in New York City from the "
Spanish flu
The 1918–1920 influenza pandemic, commonly known by the misnomer Spanish flu or as the Great Influenza epidemic, was an exceptionally deadly global influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 influenza A virus. The earliest documented case was ...
" influenza. Arndt is interred at Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Tarrytown, NY.
["Felix Arndt" (obituary) The Highland Democrat (Peekskill, NY), 26 October 1918.]
Arndt is best remembered for his 1915 composition "Nola," written as an engagement gift to his fiancée (and later wife), Nola Locke. It is sometimes considered to be the first example of the
novelty piano
Novelty piano is a genre of piano and novelty music that was popular during the 1920s. A successor to ragtime and an outgrowth of the piano roll music of the 1910s, it can be considered a pianistic cousin of jazz, which appeared around the same ti ...
or "novelty
ragtime
Ragtime, also spelled rag-time or rag time, is a musical style that flourished from the 1890s to 1910s. Its cardinal trait is its syncopated or "ragged" rhythm. Ragtime was popularized during the early 20th century by composers such as Scott ...
" genre, published by
Sam Fox Publishing Company. It was the signature theme of the
Vincent Lopez
Vincent Lopez (December 30, 1895 – September 20, 1975) was an American bandleader, actor, and pianist.
Early life and career
Vincent Lopez was born of Portuguese immigrant parents in Brooklyn, New York City, United States, Distinguished Am ...
orchestra, and a top ten hit for
Les Paul
Lester William Polsfuss (June 9, 1915 – August 12, 2009), known as Les Paul, was an American jazz, country, and blues guitarist, songwriter, luthier, and inventor. He was one of the pioneers of the solid-body electric guitar, and his prototype ...
in 1950. A vocal recording by
Billy Williams, featuring lyrics by
Sunny Skylar, became a minor hit in 1959.
Piano solos
* 71st Regiment – Waltz (1908)
* A Symphonic Nightmare – Desecration Rag No. 1 (1914)
* From Soup to Nuts – One Step Turkey Trot (1914)
* Kakuda – One Step Turkey Trot (1914)
* Marionette (1914)
* Nola (1915)
* Toots – Rag One Step (1915)
* An Operatic Nightmare – Desecration Rag No. 2 (1916)
* Clover Club – Fox Trot (1918)
Songs
* As Long As the Band Will Play – 1911 (with Harold Atteridge)
* Snow Time – 1911 (with Bert Fitzgibbon)
* If That is Not Love Wot? - 1911 (with Louis Weslyn)
* When Sunday Rolls Around – 1911 (with Louis Weslyn)
* Night Time – 1911 (with Louis Weslyn)
* When You Know Why – 1913 (with Louis Weslyn)
* Evr'y Rose Reminds Me of You – 1913 (with Louis Weslyn)
* In the Shade of the Mango Tree – 1918 (with Louis Weslyn)
* My Gal's Another Gal Like Galli-Curci – 1918 (with Louis Weslyn)
* Nola (song) – 1922 (with James F. Burns) (posthumous)
His
piano rolls reveal Arndt to be a fine pianist, and he is known to have been an influence on the young
George Gershwin
George Gershwin (; born Jacob Gershwine; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned popular, jazz and classical genres. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions ' ...
, who would visit him at his studio in the
Aeolian Building on
42nd Street in
Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...
.
References
External links
Bio: Felix ArndtThe Unconservatory
Felix ArndtLibrary of Congress
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Arndt, Felix
1889 births
1918 deaths
Ragtime composers
19th-century American pianists
20th-century American composers
20th-century American pianists
American male pianists
20th-century American male musicians
19th-century American male musicians
Deaths from the Spanish flu pandemic in New York (state)