Online Encyclopedia
Ragtime
- This is an article about Ragtime music. For other uses of the word "Ragtime" see: Ragtime (disambiguation).
Ragtime is an American musical genre, enjoying its peak popularity around the years 1900–1918. Ragtime is a dance form written in 2/4 or 4/4 time, and utilizing a walking bass, that is, the bass note played legato on the 1-3 beats with a staccato chord played on the 2-4 beats. Much ragtime is written in Sonata form, with four distinct themes and a modified first theme appearing in the work. Ragtime music is syncopated, with the melodic notes landing largely on the off-beats.
The etymology of the word ragtime is not known with certainty. One theory is that the "ragged time" associated with the walking bass set against the melodic line gives the genre its name.
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Historical context
Ragtime originated in African-American musical communities, in the late 19th century. By the start of the 20th century it became widely popular throughout North America and was listened and danced to, performed, and written by people of many different subcultures.
Ragtime was preceded by its close relative the Cakewalk, but the emergence of mature ragtime is usually dated to 1897, the year in which several important early rags were published. In 1899 Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag was published, which became a great hit and demonstrated more depth and sophistication than earlier ragtime. Ragtime is usually seen as one of the main precursors of jazz (along with the blues). Jazz largely surpassed ragtime in mainstream popularity in the early 1920s, although ragtime compositions continue to be written up to the present, and periodic revivals of popular interest in ragtime occurred in the 1950s and the 1970s.
Some authorities consider ragtime to be a form of classical music, though this view is not universally held. The heyday of ragtime predated the widespread availability of audio recording. Like classical music, and unlike jazz, ragtime was and is primarily a written tradition, being distributed in sheet music rather than through recordings or by imitation of live performances. Ragtime music was also distributed via piano rolls for player pianos.
Ragtime also served as the roots for stride piano, a more improvisational piano style popular in the 1920s and 1930s. Elements of ragtime found their way into much of the American popular music of the early 20th century.
Nearly all important ragtime compositions were composed for piano. Transcriptions for other instruments and ensembles have been made, and there are a few ragtime compositions originally so scored. The best known of these were for dance bands and brass bands. Scott Joplin wrote a ragtime opera, Treemonisha .
1950s Ragtime Revival
Some interest in ragtime occurred in the 1950s. This presented mostly light-hearted novelty ragtime, looked to with nostalgia as the product of a supposedly more innocent time. A number of popular recordings featured "prepared pianos", playing rags on pianos with tacks on the keys and the instrument deliberately somewhat out of tune, supposedly to simulate the sound of a piano in an old honkey tonk.
1970s Ragtime Revival
The popular film The Sting featured a good deal of ragtime music and reawakened interest in the genre. Most of the tunes were by Scott Joplin. His rag, "The Entertainer," was a top 40 hit for a time during this period. This revived interest in ragtime as serious music, capable of evoking many moods. Much previously out of print sheet music was collected and republished. The New York Public Library gave ragtime considerable credibility as a legitimate musical form by republishing a compilation of Joplin's work. Nonesuch Records released a pivotal album in 1973 by Joshua Rifkin, recording a number of Joplin's rags, and it became a best seller, winning a Grammy in the classical music category. Treemonisha , Joplin's opera, written in 1911 and never performed during his lifetime, was revived for a two-month run on Broadway in 1975, and has since played in several opera houses.
Ragtime composers
Arguably the most sophisticated and famous, though by no means the only, ragtime composer was Scott Joplin. Joseph Lamb and James Scott are, together with Joplin, acknowledged as the three most sophisticated ragtime composers. Some rank Artie Matthews as belonging with this distinguished company. Other notable ragtime composers included May Aufderheide , Eubie Blake, Zez Confrey , Ben Harney, Charles L. Johnson , Luckey Roberts, Paul Sarebresole, Wilber Sweatman, and Tom Turpin . Modern ragtime composers include William Bolcom, David Thomas Roberts , Frank French , Trebor Tichenor and Mark Birnbaum .
Samples
- Download recording — "The Wagon" ragtime from the Library of Congress' Gordon Collection http://www.loc.gov/folklife/Gordon/sideBbandB4.html ; an early ragtime song sung by Ben Harney in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on about September 9, 1925
See also
| American roots music |
| Appalachian | Blues (Ragtime) | Cajun and Creole (Zydeco) | Country (Honky tonk and Bluegrass) | Jazz | Native American | Spirituals and Gospel | Tejano |