Musical Cast Recording - Ragtime lyrics

rate me

In 1902, father built a house at the crest<br />

Of the Broadview Avenue hill in New Rochelle, New York<br />

And it seemed for some years thereafter<br />

That all the family's days would be warm and fair<br />

<br />

The skies were blue and hazy<br />

Rarely a storm, barely a chill<br />

The afternoons were lazy<br />

Everyone warm, everything still<br />

<br />

And there was distant music<br />

Simple and somehow sublime<br />

Giving a nation, a new syncopation<br />

The people called it ragtime<br />

<br />

And there was distant music<br />

Skipping a beat, singing a dream<br />

A strange, insistent music<br />

Putting out heat, picking up steam<br />

<br />

A sound of distant thunder<br />

Suddenly starting to climb<br />

It was the music of something beginning<br />

An era exploding, a century spinning<br />

<br />

In riches and rags<br />

And in rhythm and rhyme<br />

The people called it ragtime<br />

Ragtime, ragtime, ragtime