Cleopha

At a glance

• What it isa piano piece in the ragtime style.
• Who and whenwritten by Scott Joplin and published in 1902, the same year as The Entertainer.
• What to listen forthe even, march-like step of the left hand, and the bouncing rhythm of the right hand above it.

Listen for

• March rootsragtime grew out of the frame of the march. Listen for whether you hear a band's footsteps as the left hand walks, alternating low notes and chords.
• Right-hand syncopationin a classic rag the right hand usually creates its lilt with syncopation, deliberately striking ahead of the beat. Tap the beat with your foot as you listen and you will feel more clearly when the right hand slips off it.
• Several sectionsclassic rags are usually built from several sections of around sixteen bars that follow one another and repeat. Follow along to hear whether a melody you heard earlier comes back or the music moves on to a new one.

When it was written

In the 1890s marches were hugely popular in America, and people danced a dance called the two-step to their beat. At the same time ragtime, which grew up among African American musicians, laid syncopated rhythm over the frame of the march and became music good both for dancing and for playing at home. With no radio, new music spread mainly as sheet music.

After making his name in 1899 with the Maple Leaf Rag, Joplin moved to St. Louis around 1901 and devoted himself to composing. In 1902, the year Cleopha came out, he also published The Entertainer. In 1908 he published an instruction book on how to play ragtime, urging that rags should not be played fast.

Joplin died in New York in 1917, and his music came to be widely loved again in the 1970s.