SPECIAL EVENT
Paragon Ragtime Orchestra: Meet Me at the Fair!
Sunday, May 31, 2026 at 4pm
Please note: this event takes place at The Community House - 15 Borage Place, Forest Hills
The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra, Spring 2026, 40th Season
Arthur Moeller - 1st violin & concertmaster
Toby Winarto - 2nd violin
Nick Pauly - viola
Matt Armbruster - cello
Gregory Chudzik - bass
Leslie Cullen - flute & piccolo
Yasmina Spiegelberg - clarinet
Paul Murphy - cornet
Michael Blutman - cornet
Andrew Danforth - trombone
John Leister - drums & mallets
PROGRAM
Rick Benjamin, Director
“MEET ME AT THE FAIR!”—Sounds & Sights from the Great World’s Fairs
From the Panama-Pacific International Exposition — HELLO, FRISCO! (one-step)..................................Louis A. Hirsch (1881-1924)
The Centennial International Exhibition: Philadelphia, 1876
“America’s Centennial”
CENTENNIAL HYMN………………….……...John Knowles Paine (1839-1906)
BALLET MUSIC
(from Orpheus in the Underworld)……………..……..Jacques Offenbach (1819-1880)
TELEPHONE GALOP..........................................Theodore Moses-Tobani (1855-1933)
MY COUNTRY ‘TIS OF THEE.…..………..…anon./Samuel F. Smith (1808-1895)
The World’s Columbian Exposition: Chicago, 1893
“The White City”
HAIL COLUMBIA: FANTASIE BRILLIANTE (Op. 184)………….....Theodore Moses-Tobani
Arthur Moeller, violin
LA NUIT ET L’AMOUR………………..….........Augusta Holmès (1847-1903)
SWING ALONG! ………………………………..Will Marion Cook (1869-1944)
WORLD’S COLUMBIAN
EXPOSITION WALTZ…..……………………...Adelaide Marcelia Glück (1863-1934)
DANSE DU VENTRE..………………………….Sol Bloom (1870-1949)
THE BELLE OF CHICAGO MARCH……..…..John Philip Sousa (1854-1931)
INTERMISSION
ACT II:
The Pan-American Exposition: Buffalo, 1901
“The Rainbow City”
PANAMERICANA……………….…....................Victor Herbert (1859-1924)
HIAWATHA: A SUMMER IDYL………….........Charles N. Daniels (1878-1943)
NEARER MY GOD TO THEE………….............Eliza Flower (1803-1846)
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition: St. Louis, 1904
“Meet Me in St. Louis, Louis”
THE OFFICIAL ST. LOUIS WORLD’S FAIR MARCH (excerpt).......................Frank Van Der Stucken (1854-1929)
SCHERZO................................................................Edward McDowell (1860-1908)
THE SAINT LOUIS RAG.......................................Tom Turpin (c.1871-1922)
THE CASCADES…..................................................Scott Joplin (c.1867-1917)
MEET ME IN ST. LOUIS, LOUIS……...………...Kerry Mills (1869-1948)
Audience Sing Along
Meet me in St. Louis*, Louis, meet me at the Fair!
Don’t Tell me the lights are shining, any place but there.
We will dance the Hooch-ee Kooch-ee, I will be your toot-sie woots-ie.
If you will meet me in St. Louis, Louis, meet me at the Fair!
Now celebrating its 40th season, THE PARAGON RAGTIME ORCHESTRA is the world’s only year-round, professional ensemble specializing in the authentic recreation of “America’s Original Music” – the sounds of early theater, “silent” cinema, and vintage dance. PRO came into being as the result of Juilliard student Rick Benjamin's 1985 discovery of thousands of historic orchestra scores of legendary Victor recording company. This extraordinary collection sparked Mr. Benjamin’s formation of his “Paragon Ragtime Orchestra” at Juilliard the following year. In 1988 the Orchestra made its formal debut at Alice Tully Hall - the first concert ever presented at Lincoln Center by such an ensemble. Since then PRO has toured extensively across 48 States and several countries overseas. These travels have taken the Orchestra to more than 700 performing arts centers, including the Ravinia Festival, the Smithsonian Institution, Chautauqua, Philadelphia’s Kimmel Center, the Austria’s Brucknerhaus, the American Dance Festival, and in New York at the 92nd Street Y and City Center. PRO's music inspired legendary choreographer Paul Taylor's dance suite, Oh, You Kid!, which was premiered at The Kennedy Center jointly by the Paul Taylor Dance Company and the Paragon and has since toured the world. In 2003 the Orchestra premiered Rick Benjamin’s reconstruction of Scott Joplin’s opera Treemonisha at the Stern Grove Festival in a performance hailed by the San Francisco Chronicle as “ vigorous and utterly charming.” More recently, PRO has appeared twice as special guests of the Minnesota Orchestra, and in 2017 had the honor of presenting the official Scott Joplin Centennial Memorial concert at the composer’s grave.
In addition to its world-wide concert appearances, PRO has acquired a considerable following both here and abroad through its radio programs on National Public Radio, New York Times' WQXR, the BBC, the WWFM Classical, and the Voice of America networks. Since 1989 millions of people have enjoyed the Orchestra’s recorded area music on Main Street, U.S.A. at Disneyland, Disney World, and Disneyland Paris, and in 1992 PRO proudly served as "Ambassador of Goodwill" for the United States at the World's Fair in Seville, Spain. Over the years the Orchestra has been heard on the soundtracks of several films and television programs, including productions for PBS, HBO, the FX Channel, and Turner Classic Movies. In April 2026, the Orchestra made its on-camera television debut as featured performers on the PBS Great Performances music series Now Hear This!
The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra's widely praised discography includes 22 albums and 2 DVD sets of historic Hollywood films with authentic scores. PRO’s recordings have made the BillboardCharts (“Top Classical Albums”) and have won three major critic’s awards: Gramophone’s “Editor’s Choice,” BBC Music’s “Opera of the Month,” and Stereophile’s“Record of the Month.” (website: www.paragonragtime.com)
Conductor Rick Benjamin has built a unique career upon the discovery and performance of historic American music. He is the founder and director of the Paragon Ragtime Orchestra, which uses his extraordinary 20,000-title collection of antique theater and dance orchestra music (c. 1830-1930) as the basis of its repertoire. In addition to his work with Paragon, Mr. Benjamin maintains active careers as a pianist, researcher, author, and producer of concerts and recordings. As a conductor he leads many other innovative ensembles, including the National Orchestra of Ireland (Dublin), the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Aalborg and Aarhus Symfoniorkesters in Denmark, the Olympia Symphony (Washington State), the National Orchestra of Iceland, the Erie Philharmonic, the Anchorage (Alaska) Symphony, and Chamber Music Hawaii. Mr. Benjamin is also a leading researcher of music for silent films; he has unearthed the original orchestral accompaniments to many great motion pictures of the 1910s and ‘20s, and he has conducted nearly 800 silent film screenings – a current world record. His articles on American music appear in several publications, and lecture tours have taken him to over a hundred colleges and universities across North America. Mr. Benjamin's multi-year reconstruction of the Scott Joplin opera Treemonisha was premiered to great acclaim at San Francisco’s Stern Grove Festival and has since been performed nationally and internationally; recently the opera was recorded under his baton for New World Records. In 2023 Mr. Benjamin finally entered academia, designing and teaching his own courses in American music history at Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania. Rick Benjamin is a member of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI). He was educated at The Juilliard School in New York City. (website: www.rickbenjamin.com)