John Farrell wrote in 980723 MMDigest

> D. L. Bullock said "Scott Joplin invented the ragtime form"; I'm no
> ragtime expert but I'm pretty confident that was not the case --
> perhaps Ed Berlin (an eminent ragtime historian of world renown who
> has written the definitive Joplin biography) will be good enough to
> let us know who has first claim on the invention of ragtime.


All right, John.  It's been a long day, but I can't refuse you....

No one person can legitimately claim the "invention of ragtime."
Marches with ragtime-type rhythms were already being used to represent
blacks on the minstrel stage in the 1880s.  I give a few sheet music
examples of this in my book "Ragtime."   According to a newspaper
report in 1912, the first actual rag was Tom Turpin's "Harlem Rag,"
published in 1897 but supposedly composed in 1892.  Of course, we have
no proof of its 1892 composition date.

Another early contender would be Jesse Pickett's "Dream Rag" (or "The
Dream," or, "The Dykes Dream," etc.), which he supposedly performed at
(or near) the Chicago World's Fair, in 1893.  Pickett never published,
and we know it only in versions by his younger colleagues (including
Eubie Blake).

Ben Harney often claimed to be ragtime's originator, and he certainly
was in on it early.  His "You've Been a Good Old Wagon But You've Done
Broke Down" is clearly a ragtime song, with a ragtime dance attached.
It was published originally in 1895 in Louisville, without any
reference to ragtime.  When republished in 1896 (October copyright), a
banner on the cover announces it as a rag.

But the first sheet music publication with the word "rag" as a musical
reference is the song "All Coons Look Alike to Me" (copyrighted August
1896), which specifies a "Negro rag" arrangement of the chorus.  The
first use of the word "ragtime" (so far) in a newspaper is a reference,
in an October 1896 issue of the Indianapolis Freeman, to Harney as "The
Rag-Time Piano Player."

"Mississippi Rag" (Jan. 1897) was the first sheet to use "rag" in the
title, but the musical conventions had by this time been well known.

By the time Joplin published rags (1899), there were more than 100 in
print.

> Likewise for stride piano (I just love that style of playing).
> Popular belief credits James P. Johnson as the originator of stride;
> I do not subscribe to that opinion.  There were quite a number of
> black stride pianists around in the late 1910s/early 1920s -- for
> instance: Jimmy Blythe, who played in that hotbed of hot black
> pianists, the South Side of Chicago.

One can also name Fred Tunstall, a colleague of Johnson's (and the first
husband of Johnson's wife), who reportedly played just like Johnson.
But, like many others, he left no aural evidence.

> They learned from, copied and fed off, each other; I believe that
> James P. was no exception.  He was certainly an extremely gifted
> performer and composer, but the inventor of stride piano? -- I am
> not at all convinced about that.

Styles are never invented by a single individual.  (Well, maybe Arnold
Schoenberg .....)

Ed Berlin