Stride employed left hand techniques from ragtime, wider use of the piano's range, and quick tempos. Compositions were written but were also intended to be improvised. The left hand characteristically plays a four-beat
pulse with a single
bass note (or an
octave,
major seventh,
minor seventh or
major tenth interval) on the first and third
beats, and a
chord on the second and fourth beats. Occasionally this pattern is reversed by placing the chord on the
downbeat and bass notes on the upbeat. Compared to the ragtime style popularized by
Scott Joplin, stride players' left hands travel greater distances on the keyboard. Stride piano is highly
rhythmic because of the alternating bass note and chord action of the left hand while the right hand plays
syncopated melody lines with
harmonic and
riff embellishments and
fill patterns. Proper playing of stride jazz involves a subtle rhythmic tension between the left hand which is close to the established tempo, and the right hand, which is often slightly anticipatory. Unlike ragtime pianists, stride pianists were not concerned with ragtime form and played
pop songs of the day in the stride style. Ragtime was composed, but many stride pianists improvised. Some stride players didn't read music. Stride used
tension and release and
dynamics. Stride can be played at all tempos, slow or fast depending on the underlying
composition and treatment the pianist is performing. On occasion a stride jazz pianist might have the left hand shift into double time. Some pianists have transcribed display pieces note for note from early recordings. However, this practice only illustrates a small part of stride jazz musical adventures.
James P. Johnson (1894–1955), known as the "Father of Stride", created this style of jazz piano along with fellow pianists
Willie "The Lion" Smith (1893–1973),
Thomas "Fats" Waller (1904–1943) and
Luckey Roberts (1887–1968). One of Johnson's contributions was to recast the "straight" feeling of ragtime with a more modern, swinging beat, sophisticated harmonies and dynamics. He discovered and employed the
tenth or "broken tenth" interval. The pianist could not only substitute tenths for single bass notes but could also play broken (staggered) tenths up and down the keyboard. Stride pianist
Art Tatum (1909–1956) (a fan of Fats Waller and
Lee Sims, who was himself a fan of the European "
Impressionist" pianists such as
Claude Debussy and
Erik Satie, and hosted a radio program Tatum enjoyed) introduced more complex harmonies into his playing, and, like Fats Waller, would start songs with
legato explorations of chordal intricacies before launching into swing. Tatum was given a posthumous Grammy Award in 1974. ==Practitioners==