Pork and Beans

Since January is the month of resolutions and diets, I thought I’d focus on a food-related cover this month. Pork and Beans is a one/two-step written in 1913 by a fellow with the unusual name of C. Luckyth Roberts. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of another person with the moniker “Luckyth”, and it’s unusual enough that I think I would remember if I had. Mr. Roberts is far from a lost name in ragtime, stride piano, and blues music, though.


Charles Roberts was born in 1887 in Philadelphia, PA and began his showbiz life early, touring with the Uncle Tom’s Cabin Company at the age of three and later with Gus Seeker’s and Mayme Remington’s Ethiopian Prodigies. He took up the piano at five and first played professionally in Philadelphia and moved to Harlem, NY in 1910.

Roberts founded the Harlem piano school, writing rags that inspired more complex compositions later in the ragtime era. Roberts influenced ragtime greats such as James P. Johnson, Fats Waller, Duke Ellington, and Willie-the-Lion Smith. Roberts toured Europe with James Reese Europe in 1915 and was music director for The Smart Set, a review show with a connection to Logansport, IN through its founders Salem Tutt Whitney and J. Homer Tutt, between 1913 and 1919. Roberts played Carnegie Hall and remained active as a soloist and band leader into the 1960’s.

As for the sheet music art, it’s a kind of cubist rendition of a pig apparently contemplating contributing to the bean pot. I’m always a little weirded out by artwork that features animals gladly going to slaughter or talking food and this one’s no exception. It’s a pretty simple image, nice bold colors, an easy connection with the theme. I even found a very nice recording of Pork and Beans on YouTube.