This unique recording sets out to give a flavour of American ragtime through the medium of the mandolin. It is now believed that many of the original early twentieth-century rags were regularly performed by American-Italian mandolin orchestras whose numbers were swelled by Italian immigrants. Highlights on this disc include three of Scott Joplin’s best known rags (The Entertainer was dedicated to “James Brown and his Mandolin Club”), Julius Lenzberg’s Operatic Rag, a syncopated take on works by Leoncavallo, Mascagni, Wagner, Bizet and others, That Italian Rag by the Tin Pan Alley composer Alfredo “Al” Piantadosi, and the “Neapolitan two-step” A’ Frangesa by Edward George.