Zema Randale Portrait 1913 
 Zema Randale Portrait 1917
Zema D. Householder "Randale"
(October 10, 1893 to April 13, 1918)
Compositions    
Mutiliation Rag (1915)
On to Berlin [w/Jon T. McGiveran] (1917)
Selected Rollography    
1914-1918
Brazilian Polka (Amazonia)
Desecration (A Rag Humoresque)
I Work Eight Hours, Sleep Eight Hours...
Chinese Blues
Beets and Turnips
Mutilation Rag
Beatrice
Knockout Drops
The Original Chicago Blues
Blame It on the Blues
Ragging the Scale
Yaaka Hula Hickey Dula
Bugle Call Rag
Operatic Nightmare
Lei Poni Moi (Wreath of Carnations)
Blue Danube Waltz
The Old Oaken Bucket
Listen to This
Nigger Blues [Included for historical context] [1]
My Castle in the Air
When You Hear Jackson Moan on His Saxophone
Bull Frog Blues
Belle Mahone
On the Beach at Waikiki
There's a Little Bit of Bad in Every Good Little Girl [1]
There's Egypt in Your Dreamy Eyes
There's Just Two Things to Do on a Rainy Night
It Takes a Long, Tall Brown-Skin Gal
For You a Rose
There's a Long, Long Trail
I'm Sorry I Made You Cry
All the World Will be Jealous of Me
One Day in June (It Might Have Been You)
A Baby's Prayer at Twilight
The Tunes My Dear Old Daddy Loved [2]
Absence Brings You Nearer to My Heart
A Soldier's Rosary
La Paloma
He's Got Those Big Blue Eyes Like You Daddy Mine
Keep the Home Fires Burning [1]
A Perfect Day
My Old Kentucky Home
Kentucky Babe
She is the Sunshine of Virginia
Brown-Skin (Who You For?)
Missouri Waltz (Hush-a-bye, Ma Baby) [1]
They're Wearing 'Em Higher in Hawaii
When Shadows Fall
The Moonlight Waltz - "Jazz Rag"
Where the Black-Eyed Susans Grow
Ye Olde Time Christmas Music
Adeste Fideles
All Aboard for Chinatown
At the Fox Trot Ball
Back Home in Tennessee
The Best Things in Life are Free
Cotton Pickin' Time in Alabam'
Dancing the Jelly Roll
Destiny Waltz
Doodle-Oodle-Ee
The Dream of a Soldier Boy
Dyer-kiss Waltzes
Everyone Sings of Tipperary, So Why Not Sing the
    Wearing of the Green?
Fatima Brown
Fifty Fifty
Four Years More in the White House
Hawaiian One-Step Medley
Hello, Hawaii, How Are You?
I Called You My Sweetheart
I Can't Stop Loving You
I Want to Linger
In the Town Where I Was Born
I'm On My Way to Dublin Bay
Just You
Lorraine, My Beautiful Alsace-Lorraine
Lu Lu-Fado (Portuguese Dance)
Mighty Lak' a Rose
Millicent (Hesitation Waltz)
My Wife is Dancing Mad
Never Forget to Write Home
Now I'll Raise an Army of My Own
O What a Beautiful Baby
Pigeon Walk
Romany Waltz
Sally in Our Alley
The Siren's Song [2]
Sister Susie's Sewing Shirts for Soldiers
Sphinx Waltz
They Didn't Believe Me
Three Wonderful Letters from Home
Umbrellas to Mend
Valse Eternal
Waves of the Danube
When It's Night Time Down in Dixie Land
When Life Was Young
When the Roses Bloom in Avalon
When You Come Home
When You Sang "Hush-a-bye My Baby" to Me
Witching Hour
Who'll Take Care of the Harem when the Sultan Goes
    to War?

1. "assisted by" William Hartman
2. w/Charley Straight
Matrix
[Imperial 51613]
[Imperial 52035]
[Imperial 52703]
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Zema Randale represents one of the more tragic cases of a promising performer, and perhaps even composer, being taken from this world much too soon for our liking. At the time she died she was a shooting star, making inroads into jazz that exceeded many of her male counterparts in the same field. However, despite the pieces of speculative information that have long been in circulation concerning Miss Randale and her three year rise to fame, she did not achieve her playing fame and meet her death while still in her teens as previously thought.
Zema was one of two children born in Columbus, Ohio to Levi M. Householder and Matilda Mae Bowland in October 1893, the other being her older brother, Owen B. (7/1890).
Zema dressed for the title role of "Peck's Bad Boy", advertised in the Columbus Evening Dispatch, August 2, 1909.
zema randale as Peck's Bad Boy
Levi was originally a furniture, stoves and tinware dealer, and possibly worked as a construction contractor. By 1896 he was a furnishings salesman for Yardley & Harsh in Columbus. Matilda was listed as a dressmaker in the city directories. As of the 1900 census Zema was shown to be six, dispelling the notion she was born that same year. By 1905, Levi had switched careers to carpentry. He died in May of 1907.
Efforts to find the origin of the Randale name in association with Zema were met with no definitive answer. However, Zema's acquired stage name started to appear in vaudeville notices in the Midwest in late 1908. By this time she had become an actress and dancer of some versatility, and was known more for her stage talents than her piano playing, which was still developing. This versatility was underscored in 1909 when she appeared in Zanesville, Ohio, playing the lead role in Peck's Bad Boy, based on a series of stories about a teen-aged boy and his comic adventures. This was the same play in which young George M. Cohan starred in the 1880s and made his initial fame. The picture (right) that went with the ad shows her as clearly older than 8 or 9 years old, likely in her mid-teens. In spite of the acting, most of the advertisements found around from Michigan, Ohio and Indiana of this period touted her primarily as a dancer.
For the 1910 census Zema was shown living with her widowed mother, Mae Householder, in Columbus, but Owen, nearly 20, had evidently moved out of the home. Zema was also listed under her birth name rather than as Randale. Curiously, both mother and daughter relocated during the census period of April 15th to 26th as on April 16th they are shown at boarding at 153 Winter Avenue, and a week or so later they were found living at 1301 High Street. Mary was working as a seamstress or dressmaker in a dry goods store, and Zema was listed as sixteen, working as an actress on the vaudeville/theatrical circuit. It is also possible that these were both temporary residences as Zema was traveling in vaudeville by this time, or they may have simply been in the process of moving.
Another clue was revealed in 1910 as Zema was appearing with a Betty Randale. No direct relationship between the two was found, and they were not billed as a sister act; only as a girl act. Betty may have been a cousin or other relative, likely named Elizabeth, and the source of the Randale name, but anybody under that name was difficult to pinpoint in the census or any city directories. The act was advertised in the Bismarck [North Dakota] Daily Tribune on January 29, 1911, as appearing at the Grand Theater: "Zema and Betty Randale, in songs, dances and pianologue, are a pair that is hard to beat anywhere, and are considered as one of the best act[s] in the circuit. This being the fact leaves no doubt as to the high quality of the act." The subsequent review on January 31 read: "Zema and Betty Randale, who bill themselves 'a pair hard to beat,' more than make good that claim. We have yet to see their equal on a Bismarck stage."
It is surmised that in this act Zema was the pianist, but may have also done some singing and dancing. Since she later showed an excellent acuity as a writer, Zema may have also worked as a young piano monologist, a practice that stage veteran Cora Salisbury termed as a "pianologist." Notices were also found for Zema and Betty with a host of others at the Airdome in Lincoln, Nebraska, in August 1911, a brief mentions in Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and Ohio in 1911 and 1912.
The screen goes blank for a year or so, a period of time in which Zema, approaching twenty, was possibly receiving further training in her pianistic skills. By late 1913 these had become considerable within the vaudeville circuit in Illinois, where she had settled. She started recording piano rolls for the Imperial Player Roll Company as early as October, 1914, when she was 21. In the December, 1914, edition of The Piano Magazine, Imperial announced their new acquisition:
A remarkable player of 'rag time de luxe' discovered by the Imperial Player Roll Company of Chicago, Miss Randale is a resident of Chicago and her piano playing is characterized by remarkable originality and clarity of expression. Her hand played rolls will be featured in the Imperial catalogue exclusively.
Miss Randale's pianistic prowess got her noticed in other musical circles as well, as noted in The Music Trade Review of December 18, 1915:
Miss Zema Randale, a well-known pianist of Chicago, who has made scores of records [piano rolls] for the Cable piano player, is conducting the orchestra which has been engaged for the White and Black Room of the Livingston Hotel, where informal dances are held in connection with the cafe.
Obviously her focus had changed from overall stage performance to primarily piano, and that a female of her age was put in front of a mostly male orchestra also speaks well of her acquired reputation. Zema ventured into the field of composition as well, having her clever Mutilation Rag, commissioned and published by the Cable Piano Company in mid-1915. There were reportedly more pieces composed by her, but to date only one additional song has come to light.
mutilation rag cover
The Imperial Company had a good reputation for high quality "hand-played" (well edited) piano rolls with top local artists. Having added Zema to their roster around 1914, they started advertising her as a top "raggist" in 1916 along with their whiz kid from the University of Chicago, Lewis J. Fuiks. Her work was described in glowing terms in The Music Trade Review of September 30, 1916:
Zema Randale has run amuck with Felix Arndt's Operatic Nightmare in the Imperial Co.'s October bulletin. The demon Zema has ragged this naturally distorted composition until it sounds like a twelve-cylinder car with the ignition system out of order. However, in the "tutti" she strikes her stride, hitting smoothly on all twelve cylinders with nary a miss to the elaborate ending. This is one of Miss Randale's finest recordings and will stand for a long time as a splendid example of ultra-modern ragtime, the type of music for which America has become so renowned. For ragtime, if not the highest, is the most distinctive type of American music.
Miss Randale's aptitude for this type of playing was discovered at an early age. At the present time, she stands as one of the foremost exponents of real ragtime in this country. Her ragtime acrobatics have attracted the attention of managers of theatres. Some of the country's best musicians consider Zema's peculiar genius of intense interest from the standpoint of counterpoint. For this young lady, although lacking an academic musical education, can simultaneously play two different melodies, blending their contra-motion in a manner which would cause Bach to grow green with envy.
And she does it extemporaneously! That's what interests musicians. It's a gift with which few musical souls have been endowed. It is said that during her engagement at one of the Chicago theatres no less an authority than Fanny Bloomfield Zeisler found much interest in listening to Zema's original performances.
Even in her first two years at Imperial, Zema Randale's name quickly spread throughout the industry as a performer to pay attention to. A forward thinker in many ways, she was concerned with all facets of the process from the arrangements and recording of the rolls to how they were received by the consumer. Her thinking never got in the way of innovation, apparently, as this article in The Music Trade Review of November 14, 1916. would indicate:
Zema Gets Ahead of Herself
Zema Randale, one of the Imperial Co.'s staff pianists, is a musical enigma. A late display of her genius was quite accidentally caused by a discussion in the recording room between Miss Randale and William Hartmann, chief arranger, as to the most effective way to play the second chorus in a popular ragtime number. Mr. Hartmann, who constantly strives for new musical effects in player rolls, was suggesting to Miss Randale an idea of his. Miss Randale absorbed Mr. Hartmann's view and then with a display of versatility with which she is gifted, she agreed to play the second chorus with the right hand one beat ahead of the left hand, and yet producing a rhythmic and symmetrical composition which would satisfy the most ardent admirer of ultra-modern ragtime.
The result was that Miss Randale played the composition in such a manner that musicians who have studied the second chorus are at a loss to comprehend how she so entirely avoided the unity with which the two hands normally co-ordinate.
An eminent psychologist from the University of Chicago, who is also strongly musically inclined, has called this faculty of Miss Randale's one of her best exhibitions of real genius. For, in this number, she not only destroys the unity customarily existing, but she spreads over the whole a co-ordination of musical values which makes the entire production both musical and of decided interest to students of music and psychology.
Keyboard wizards Randale and Fuiks turned out some of the best of the Imperial arrangements of popular songs and instrumentals throughout 1916, after which Lewis left for New York to pursue a career with Ampico under the name Victor Arden. Zema remained in Chicago, not only venturing into jazz recordings in 1917, but gaining traction as one of the finest ballad interpreters in the industry. She was soon joined by Charley Straight who would also make his own mark on Imperial, and even record some duet rolls with her.
Randale had become the face of Imperial, known as one of the first female artists to record the new music, "jazz," to piano rolls. In a review of another trade exposition in Chicago in May, The Music Trade Review noted that:
The Imperial Player Roll Co., makers of 'Songrecord' player rolls, will be one of the exhibitors at the Coliseum during the Music Show, and will show a fine display of the company's product with strong specialization on the company's rolls with words and the "jazz" library with which the company has been doing such a fine business. Zema Randale, who is one of the best recorders of the popular in music, will be in charge, and will personally see that the Imperial line does not lack for adequate representation.
The end result of that effort, as written up two weeks later, was that:
The Imperial Music Roll Co. had a booth that, although it wasn't the largest, was one of the busiest and most popular of the entire exposition. Zema Randale, whose "jazz rolls" have been such a popular feature of the Imperial library, acted as hostess in a most charming fashion' and together with G. G. Bradford and other talented Chicago singers kept a crowd congregated continually about the exhibit and oftentimes obstructing traffic.
Zema's growing gravitas helped her lead the charge for Imperial at another piano trade show in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in mid-July of 1917.
Robert E. Lauer, manager of the piano department of the Boston Store, this city, is continuing with much success the series of demonstrations of the Ampico Reproducing piano, which was inaugurated several weeks ago, when Zema Randale herself made her first public appearance in Milwaukee. Mr. Lauer is a great believer in the future of the player-piano and is pushing these instruments in every way possible.
The association with Ampico is not clear, as Zema continued working exclusively for Imperial as per her contract with them.
As Miss Randale's name and her product grew in popularity, there was a natural curiosity to find out who the girl behind this powerhouse musician really was and what motivated her. One of the best examples of this type of a window into her mind was printed in The Music Trade Review in their January 5, 1918 issue, which included a rare informative interview with the artist:
A 1917 advertisement for Imperial Rolls.
imperial piano roll advertisement
ZEMA RANDALE TALKS ON MUSIC
Imperial Player Roll Artist Tells of Progress Being Made in Securing Faithful Reproductions of the Work of the Pianist
A good many good folks still look upon the player-piano as a medium for the dispensing of "canned melodies," and this unwarranted judgment is usually due to the fact that the person who renders it has failed to keep pace with the marvelous progress made during the past year or two in the reproduction of pianistic effects through the medium of the greatly improved player roll.
The old machine-cut roll was mechanical and very often it was harsh and full of faults. But with the introduction of the hand-played roll these defects were gradually overcome, and the final perfection of a reproducing process by the Imperial Player Roll Co. has changed all of this. Now the artist, after careful preparation, plays a selection and every touch is truthfully reportrayed upon the master roll. Every artistic accomplishment is indelibly inscribed - ability is as if it were photographed - and after careful retouching under the direction of the artist the finished print in the form of the finished roll is passed on to the player-pianist, perfect in every detail.
In seeking information on the progress being made in this reportrayal of pianistic ability an interview was obtained with Miss Zema Randale, of the Imperial Player Roll Co. Miss Randale is probably best known through her interpretation of old-time melodies and popular ballads of the day, together with the best in modern dance music. Miss Randale said, in talking of her work:
"I have been playing dance music for a good many years, and, of course, you realize that in playing modern dance music perfect time is absolutely essential, and likewise one must be unusually careful of the harmony, and here it is that my work with the Imperial Co. has been of wonderful help.
"I played my first Imperial rolls with a great degree of confidence. I felt that I was in full command of the piano, and when the first proofs of these first numbers came to me and I played them on the player I must admit that I was delighted with the results. I felt that each roll was a true portrait of my ability, and, handing the roll to our advertising manager, I said, "It is I - I hope folks will like me.'
"But there is another thing about producing rolls as we produce them in the Imperial Co.: I said I felt confident of my mastery, my command of the piano. I felt that I knew just exactly what would come out on the rolls which I produced. Imagine my surprise and my delight on discovering in my rolls little touches of harmony which I had never heard before.
"I must have been putting these things into my playing unconsciously, and unquestionably these were the things which made my playing popular.
"You can well believe that I improved on this discovery I sought for more of these little touches, and I truly believe that my playing for Imperial rolls has clone more to improve my technique, to give a smoothness and a finish to my playing, than even my many years of study, my many hours of close application to my chosen life-work.
"One of these days I am going to put into print what I believe my Imperial player rolls can teach the music-loving public. For, although player roll music in the past has been largely recreational, I am confident that its future will be just as largely educational."
In her continuing development of a fluid ballad performance style, Zema realized that the end user was often uneducated in the facets of performance they could apply through controls on their own home player piano. Proper manipulation of treble or bass volume variances, pumping pressure, and even tempo changes can be rendered to enhance the playback of any edited "hand-played" roll to, in some cases, rival that of an automated reproducing piano. To that end, Imperial and Zema wanted to find a way to convey this to the consumer. So she had a large hand in creating a small booklet that could be included with rolls or given out separately which not only informed the pianolist how to utilize their piano's controls to great musical advantage, but also detailed the process of creating the rolls in layman's terms. The Music Trade Review enthusiastically commented on this development in their February 23, 1918 issue:
Imperial Educational Work
It is one thing to produce a good thing and another thing to secure its intelligent use by the ultimate purchaser. That makes two good things.
The Imperial Player Roll Co. have just published a little booklet on "Ballads," by Zema Randale, of the company's recording staff. Miss Randale first describes the manner in which she records for the Imperial rolls. This is decidedly interesting, but the most valuable part is found in her very lucid instructions to playerpiano operators by which they can get the most out of the ballads. She takes a specific song record, "Lorraine, My Beautiful Alsace-Lorraine," and gives valuable interpretative hints.
This is excellent work and of a genuinely good nature. As a matter of fact not enough of this kind of educational campaigning is done by the music roll manufacturers. They are beginning to learn, however, that they can through the means of the printed word give concise and easily comprehended instructions for getting the most out of their rolls. It is to be hoped that we will see a constantly increasing effort of this kind.
Zema in a "glamour shot" from 1917 or 1918.
zema randale glamour shot
More detail was provided about this groundbreaking booklet in their March 30 issue:
The brochure is small enough to slip into a music roll box. It contains a portrait of Miss Randale, and comprises a short talk, ostensibly by that lady, setting forth the manner in which she prepares her records of popular ballads for publication as Imperial hand-played rolls. The story tells simply the whole process, bearing hard on the personal side of the work and very lightly on the technical side. It is very interesting indeed, and shows the amount of care and skill needed to get a satisfactory and successful record of even a simple song. Indeed, without any desire to conceal the fact that the story is rather highly colored in its tone, it does not tell other than the truth; and tells it in a way that cannot but be popular. Following the description of her own work, the gifted lady demon of the keyboard goes on to tell how the person who takes her roll to his or her playerpiano should play the same to get satisfactory results. Here also, allowing for some pardonable and slight musical solecisms, the story is well and simply, but effectively told. A list of Randale interpretations concludes the contents of this interesting little booklet.
An excerpt from "Imperial Ballads," extracted from the excellent Billings Rollography compiled by Bob and Ginny Billings, reads as follows:
After selecting some particular number, I make it a practice to go over it carefully, note by note. I study the harmony with exacting care. I search diligently for those sections in every song which I know from experience are liable to become harsh, to predominate in its finished roll, when, in fact, they should be carefully subdued. Then I make it a practice to practice the chosen number over and over and over again, until I can play it with unerring exactness.
Then comes a period of playing the entire selection, passage by passage, to discover possible pianistic effects not present in the original score, and here, if I may say it, is the real test of an artist's ability in reproducing for the Player Piano. Of course, one must be letter perfect, one must have perfect command of the piano, and in addition, one must have the ability to discover these pianistic possibilities or the finished roll will be flat, uninteresting, a mere technical reproduction of so many notes in such and such sequence.
After all of these preliminaries, the first proof is cut directly from my playing on the piano in the Imperial Studio, and in this work I use a big Concert Grand...
When these first proofs are cut, I first play them on the players, and you can imagine the delightful experience of hearing one's technique and talent on such occasions. True, I am not always flattered by the results...
I then have an assistant play [the first proof] while I accompany the roll on the Grand Piano to detect every possible flaw. After innumerable changes, all designed to effect perfection, the master roll is finished and its replicas boxed and passed on to you.
Zema contracted diphtheria, a highly contagious and serious respiratory ailment, in early April. During her week in the hospital it was reported in an article from The Music Trade Review of April 20, 1918, that the piano whiz "...made a brave battle for life, and the specialists and nurses in attendance marveled at her wonderful resistance and her cheerfulness and optimism throughout the siege of sickness." Sadly she made it only to Saturday, April 13, when she passed on at the age of 24½. To add to the tragedy, her fiancée, Mr. George Reed Wright, Jr. (5/1892), was "somewhere on the Atlantic" as a member of the United States Government Scout Patrol service, part of the Navy. The couple was to have been married at the end of April, and Mr. Wright did not find out about the tragedy until he arrived in Chicago to prepare for the wedding. As of the 1930 enumeration, George was still unmarried, and living with his widowed mother.
Miss Randale was interred at Oakwoods Cemetery in Chicago. On the anniversary of her death from at least 1919 to 1921 there was a notice printed in the Chicago Tribune obituaries section that read similarly to this one from 1920: "IN MEMORIAM. HOUSEHOLDER -- Zema Randale Householder. In loving memory of our dear daughter and sister, who passed to beyond two years ago April 13. We Mourn for you, dear Zema, Though not with outward show; For hearts that mourn sincerely, mourn solemnly and low. MOTHER AND BROTHER." Mae Householder eventually died in 1924.
Zema Randale's amazing musical legacy in both words and music was no puzzle, and her rolls continued to be featured by Imperial for some time, and later by QRS when they obtained the Imperial catalog around 1923. The legendary Zema Randale still resonates with many piano roll enthusiasts today who marvel at this lovely "demon of the keyboard."
Article Copyright© by the author, Bill Edwards. Research notes and sources available on request at ragpiano.com - click on Bill's head.