Styles of Jazz: Ragtime

Ragtime's Influence

Like all great artists, Joplin did not restrict himself to this favored art form. Both before the advent of ragtime and after, Joplin composed marches and waltzes, including the syncopated waltz Bethena (1906). Eubie Blake has this to say about such compositions:

Anything that is syncopated is basically ragtime. I don't care whether it's Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody or Tchaikovsky (my favorite composer) in his Waltz of the Flowers.

A far different idea of ragtime from that of Stark.

The truth, of course, lies in the middle. There's more to ragtime than syncopation, while some very good ragtime is not of the classic form. But the lines are often blurred. Ragtime's influence on other musical genres dictates that part of the character of ragtime surface in those genres. The classical composers Charles Ives, Igor Stravinsky, and Darius Milhaud were all intrigued by the opportunities that ragtime offered to express new musical ideas. Joplin himself wrote ragtime operas, and in fact it was his final opera Treemonisha which drove him into poverty at the end of his life.

Classic ragtime was losing popularity in 1917 when Joplin died, but it hasn't died. Joseph Lamb was able to publish more ragtime piano solos and songs in the late 1950's, during a brief ragtime renaissance. The Entertainer reawakened America's love for ragtime again as accompaniment to the movie The Sting in 1973. And recordings are still available.

As performers began to rag both melody and accompaniment, ragtime began its transformation (or incorporation) into jazz. As classic ragtime was meant to be played as written, these artists also moved toward greater improvisation.

Jelly Roll Morton recognized the coherence of ragtime but gave it more freedom, especially in the bass line. This resulted in what is known as ``stomp'' piano. Charles (Cow-Cow) Davenport, who pioneered the Boogie-Woogie style, was trained in ragtime but recorded many blues pieces. James P. Johnson was instrumental in moving ragtime toward jazz and blues, creating Stride Piano. Other developments led to the ``trumpet-piano'' style of Earl Hines and Teddy Weatherford and to the swing style of Duke Ellington.

The story doesn't end here. The beauty, enthusiasm, and even haunting qualities of ragtime are recorded in print and in sound recordings so that, should we be so foolish as to forget this art, future generations will be able to rediscover it and it will influence the music of yet another generation.