Scott Joplin

The Ragtime Dance

At the turn of the century, Ragtime still had much of the aura of the saloons and sporting houses in which it was born, although the harmonic language used by Joplin goes beyond what one would expect of bawdy background music and, indeed, sometimes bears a striking resemblance to that of Chopin. Although a forerunner of Jazz, Ragtime is in essence a composed, rather than improvised art form. Nevertheless, a certain amount of extemporanous ornamentation is characteristic of authentic performance practice, particularly in repeated sections. Following on this model, the arrangement found here contains much in the way of ornamentation. The tempo marking - not too fast - is Joplin's original instruction.