Ragtime

A syncopated, primarily African-American music, popular from about 1896 to 1918. During this period, the term included vocal and instrumental music and dance styles associated with the music. As an instrumental genre it existed as both a popular ballroom style and as a highly significant contribution to early JAZZ. In today's usage, the ragtime genre refers almost exclusively to piano works.

The usual explanation for the term ragtime (first used in 1896 by the black performer Ernest Hogan) is a derivation from "ragged time," i.e., SYNCOPATION. Syncopation was a prevalent component of American popular music in the 19th century, especially with the dance music and song of the black slaves and ex-slaves, and its adaptation into blackface MINSTRELSY, notably in the music of STEPHEN FOSTER, DANIEL D. EMMETT, and others. After the Civil War, black performers reasserted their musical birthright by moving into the world of minstrelsy, creating and performing vaudevillelike revues featuring the CAKEWALK, buck and wing, and walk-around dances.

As African-American minstrelsy moved into the theater in the late 19th century, songs and later instrumental pieces in syncopated QUADRUPLE or DUPLE time became popular. The other major influence came from the MARCH, a truly popular genre in the U.S. after the Civil War in the hands of JOHN PHILIP SOUSA, Patrick S. Gilmore, and others. In the cakewalk, walk-around, and related black popular genres, the march piano's left-hand accompaniment in the bass—the lowest single note on the downbeat, a single note on the third beat, triads in higher registers on the offbeats—became standard. The melody, in eighth notes, became more syncopated, using, among others, these rhythms:

Ragtime was the first African-American genre to attain wide popularity in the U.S. without the strongly racist overtones that accompanied blackface minstrelsy. It first emerged in piano playing for American saloons, barrooms, bordellos, and burlesque houses. In the vernacular such pianists were referred to as "perfessors" (professors). Later, in the compositional hands of SCOTT JOPLIN, Tom Turpin, James Scott, Joseph Lamb, and many others, ragtime acquired a "classic" quality of elegance in moderate tempo (cf. Joplin's warning that "ragtime should never be played too fast") or a lively and even humorous quality more suitable for dancing.

The rapid motion and cross-accents of ragtime proved irresistible to classical composers. CHARLES IVES cultivated ragtime rhythms early in the century. Ragtime became very popular in Europe as well: CLAUDE DEBUSSY made use of ragtime rhythms in his Golliwog's Cake Walk (from CHILDREN'S CORNER, 1908) and IGOR STRAVINSKY (see next entry) and others wrote pieces closely modeled on ragtime.