Scott Joplin (b. c. 1868, Texarkana, Arkansas, USA or Linden, Texas, USA [disputed] – April 1, 1917, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA), known as the “King of Ragtime,” wrote over 40 ragtime pieces, a ragtime ballet, and two operas. Joplin grew up in Texarkana, Texas. In 1894, he moved to Sedalia, Missouri in 1894, where he worked as a piano teacher and taught students such as Arthur Marshall, Scott Hayden, and Brun Campbell. He began publishing in 1895 and published the first million-copy ragtime hit, “Maple Leaf Rag”, in 1899, which gave him a steady income for life. He moved to St. Louis in 1901, where he published and performed, moved to New York City in 1907, and was admitted to a mental asylum for dementia as a result of neurosyphilis in 1917, where he died. Joplin was rediscovered in the 1970s due to the movie “The Sting” and an million-copy selling album by Joshua Rifkin.

• Subgenre: Classic Ragtime

• Best known work(s): “Maple Leaf Rag” (1899), “The Entertainer” (1902)