This is the most important document about the history of American composed music to have appeared in a long, long time. For a composer expert in ‘closed form’ - harmonic ambiguity overrode ragtime’s rigid 16-bar phrases to flat-pack the structure into itself - the wonder of Treemonisha is Joplin’s flair for dramatic trajectory, the intensity of thematic development making his writing spring eternal. Benjamin’s light-on-its-feet orchestration fits the music: genteel melodic lines swim like fish through pure water…. Understanding Treemonisha is not just about hearing Joplin’s achievements in the round it’s about gaining a proper understanding of black culture during that historically nebulous period when jazz was in its baroque infancy….

And I can’t think of a more worthwhile task - musical archaeology that needed doing - than rescuing Joplin’s sole surviving opera from obscurity and misunderstandings, some well-meaning, others inexplicably stupid and sloppy. This set is the culmination of two decades of research, social anthropology and painstaking forensic reconstruction. However, the one I prefer is by the Paragon Ragtime Orchestra and Singers which came out in 2011.

There are two recordings of Treemonisha, the first released in 1992 by the Houston Opera Company conducted by Gunther Schuller was an important event. Three years later, in 1976, Joplin’s opera Treemonisha won the coveted Pulitzer Prize. Then, in 1973, his music was featured in the motion picture, The Sting, which won and Academy Award for its film score. At the time, however, this resulted unsuccessfully.Īfter suffering deteriorating health due to syphilis that he contracted some years earlier, Joplin died on Apin Manhattan State Hospital.Īlthough Joplin’s music was popular and he received modest royalties during his lifetime, he did not receive recognition as a serious composer for more than fifty years after his death. In 1911, Joplin moved to New York City, where he devoted his energies to the production of his operatic work, Treemonisha, the first grand opera composed by an African American. Over the next fifteen years, Joplin added to his already impressive repertoire, which eventually totaled some sixty compositions. This was followed a few years later by The Entertainer, another well known Joplin composition. In the late 1890s, Joplin worked at the Maple Leaf Club in Sedalia, which provided the title for his best known composition, the Maple Leaf Rag, published in 1899. There he studied and led in the development of a music genre now known as ragtime–a unique blend of European classical styles combined with African American harmony and rhythm. As a teenager, he worked as a dance musician.Īfter several years as an itinerant pianist playing in saloons and brothels throughout the Midwest, he settled in St. By age eleven and under the tutelage of Julius Weiss, he was learning the finer points of harmony and style. Encouraged by his parents, he was already proficient on the banjo, and was beginning to play the piano. He moved with his family to Texarkana at the age of about seven.Įven at this early age, Joplin demonstrated his extraordinary talent for music. Scott Joplin, the “King of Ragtime” music, was born near Linden, Texas on November 24, 1868.

A finer focus joplin