Ragtime

One argument that persists regarding jazz's early history is whether ragtime should be considered jazz. African American culture and the musicians it produced, especially in New Orleans in the 1890s and early 1900s, made little effort to separate ragtime (also called barrelhouse or honky tonk) from jazz. In fact, they used the word ragtime to identify music played by Bolden's band and others.

Is Ragtime jazz?

Ragtime, Popular during the late 1800s and early 1900s, was named for its ragged rhythms. Like jazz, ragtime counted New Orleans marching band music as one ancestor. Unlike Jazz, ragtime contained little improvisation, but it did lend jazz its jaunty, swinging one - two rhythms. And whether ragtime was played by two hands on a piano, or by several instruments, the music was rhythmically rich, with syncopated patterns layered over other, their accents falling in surprising places.

While ragtime shared jazz's loose, syncopated rhythms, it also drew from European traditions. The music was formerly composed on paper. It didn't use the simple blues structure common in early jazz, and it had little or no room for improvisation. Depending on the player, ragtime could sound concisely for improvisation or it could become a loose, swinging precursor of jazz.

Masters of Ragtime

Some of the most popular rags were composed by pianists Scott Joplin ("Maple Leaf Rag"), James Scott (":Hilarity Rag"), and Joseph Lamb ("American Beauty Rag") during the 1890s and early 1900s. Joplin surpassed his peers in later years by penning orchestral works that influenced both jazz and theatre music.

By 1910, ragtime was a national phenomenon, and in the quest for popularity, the music became diluted and less challenging. The ragtime came to a close in 1917 with Joplin's passing, and by the end of World War 1, elements of ragtime had merged into more sophisticated varieties of jazz including swing - although you could still hear distinctive rag sounds in the piano playing of Earl Hines, Fats Waller, Count Basie, and others for years to come.

James P. Johnson (1894 - 1955)

A prolific New York pianist and composer, Johnson was a key player in the cross - pollination between jazz and ragtime.

Johnson's evolution from ragtime to early jazz - in his playing and in his composing - pushed the music in fresh directions. Johnson was the most successful musician to make early player piano rolls (those perforated rolls of paper). Heard by countless musicians, his rolls helped spread ragtime and jazz across the country. Johnson's popular compositions "Carolina Shout," "Old Fashioned Love," and wildly successful "The Charleston" (written for the 1923 Broadway musical Running Wild) helped put what little jazz there was in the "Jazz Age" of the early 1920s. Early examples of his playing are available on CD: Carolina Shout (Biograph).

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