
Saunders told Joplin to continue to write music and spontaneously thrill the audience. Joplin was playing the cornet with his band when Saunders spotted him. Joplin’s biggest encouragement came from Otis Saunders who heard him play at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair.

Joplin’s style of music was distinctive as it was composed of waltz and African American rhythms and melodies. Louis, he was introduced to Tom Turpin, a ragtime musician. Around the 1880s, Joplin moved around and when he was in St. He played the violin, the cornet, and sang. Having a strong musical background, Joplin began to perform during his high school years. Joplin also took lessons from Julius Weiss. From the early age of six, Joplin started to learn to play the piano on his mother’s boss’s piano. His father played the violin and his mother sang and performed on the banjo. His father was a laborer and his mother a cleaner. Scott Joplin was born in 1868 in Texas to Giles and Florence Joplin.
#SCOTT JOPLIN RAG SKIN#
Joplin was able to overcome the battle against his skin color to produce some of the greatest ragtime compositions. Ragtime had a “strong connotation to the low class Negro music in brothels and saloons” (History of Ragtime). The rising and aspiring musicians in ragtime were African America which intimated white musicians. There were high tensions between negroes and whites in the United States. On the other hand, many Americans associated the missed beats with the African American population. Composers use loose boundaries which made the music exciting. What distinguishes ragtime from other American music is that it has misplaced beats. It requires a high standard of pianistic ability. Instead ragtime syncopation had more of an animal dance to it, such as the grizzly bear, bunny hug, and turkey trot (History of Ragtime). Ragtime is composed for listening not for dancing. It spread rapidly in the southern and Midwestern states. Ragtime began prominently in the 1890s and throughout the 1900s. The syncopated rhythms found in the best rags were meant to evoke a looseness, natural flow, and drive recreated by reading and performing the music exactly as written” (History of Ragtime). Ragtime is syncopated music, which means that the beats in the music follow an irregular beat or rhythm, or are “ragged”. A ragtime composition is usually composed three or four contrasting sections or strains, each one being 16 or 32 measures in length” (History of Ragtime).

Ragtime can be defined as “musical composition for the piano, generally in duple meter and containing a highly syncopated treble lead over a rhythmically steady bass. Ragtime, unlike jazz and other genres, has a distinctiveness of its own. Joplin especially had his influence over the ragtime industry. Scott Joplin is a renowned musician from the late 19 and early 20 th century.
