| Root Beer Rag |
| Composer |
Billy Joel |
| Released |
1974-10-11 |
| Length |
2:59 |
|
Root Beer Rag is a ragtime-styled song composed by Billy Joel from the 1974 album Streetlife Serenade. The song plays at about 145 BPM and the recording plays approximately a quarter-step (microtone) sharp.
Games
Blackjack (NES)
The song plays when the player first starts the game and they are brought to the American Video Entertainment logo. Surprisingly, this game contains the song in its entirety. The song plays at 225 BPM. Mike Smith arranged the song using his keyboard and created a MIDI file of it. It was then converted to Odyssey Software's sound driver.
When the game was re-released for the Maxi 15 (NES) cartridge, the song was replaced with an original piece from the arranger, Mike Smith. This was presumably because AVE and/or Odyssey either wanted to avoid a potential lawsuit, or were threatened with legal action from either Billy Joel or his record label.
Sheet Music
The song has been transcribed and arranged several times. Because the music is still in print, it cannot be shown on this site. The first arrangement of it was in the Billy Joel - Streetlife Serenade songbook for piano/vocal/guitar. You can find some of the arrangements here.
Links
