Scott Joplin Quotes

• Don t play this piece fast. It is never right to play ragtime fast.

  Scott Joplin

  Play, Pieces, Jazz

  Victoria J. Theodore, Scott Joplin, Stanford University. Dept. of Music (1990). “The ragtime solo piano works of Scott Joplin: an analysis and performing edition of three pieces”

  78 Copy quote

• When I'm dead twenty-five years, people are going to begin to recognize me.

  Scott Joplin

  Years, People, Twenties

  47 Copy quote

• One day the 'Maple Leaf' will make me King of Ragtime Composers.

  Scott Joplin

  Kings, One Day, Ragtime

  36 Copy quote

• Syncopations are no indication of light or trashy music, and to shy bricks at 'hateful ragtime' no longer passes for musical culture.

  Scott Joplin

  Light, Musical, Shy

  Scott Joplin, Maurice Hinson (1990). “Scott Joplin at the Piano”, p.5, Alfred Music Publishing

  73 Copy quote

• What is scurrilously called ragtime is an invention that is here to stay. That is now conceded by all classes of musicians... All publication s masquerading under the name of ragtime are not the genuine article... That real ragtime of the higher class is rather difficult to play is a painful truth which most pianists have discovered. Syncopations are no indication of light or trashy music... Joplin ragtime is destroyed by careless or imperfect rendering, and very often players lost the effect entirely by playing too fast.

  Scott Joplin

  Real, Player, Light

  39 Copy quote

• Marching onward, marching onward
  Marching to that lovely tune
  Marching onward, marching onward
  Happy as a bird in June
  
  Sliding onward, sliding onward
  Listen to that rag
  Hop and skip now do that slow, oh
  Do that slow drag
  
  Dance slowly, prance slowly
  Now you hear that pretty rag
  Dance slowly, prance slowly
  Now you do the real slow drag
  
  Waltz slowly, waltz slowly
  Listen to the ragtime
  Hop and skip
  Now do the slow, oh, do the slow drag

  Scott Joplin

  Real, June, Bird

  28 Copy quote

• Because it has such a ragged movement. It suggests something like that.

  Scott Joplin

  Movement, Jazz, Ragged

  21 Copy quote

• Let me see you do the 'rag time dance'...
  Turn left and do the 'Cake walk prance'...
  Turn the other way and do the 'Slow drag'...
  Now take your lady to the world's fair (...)
  And do the 'rag time dance.'

  Scott Joplin

  Cake, Rags, World

  20 Copy quote

• Panic in Wall Street, brokers feeling melancholy.

  Scott Joplin

  Wall, Feelings, Panic

  17 Copy quote

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