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Dancing to a Black Man's Tune

A Life of Scott Joplin

Susan Curtis

Dancing to a Black Man's Tune

288 pages

Published: June 1994

21 illus.

ISBN: 9780826209498

Missouri Biography Series

Formats:

Hardcover
Paperback Digital download

Price: $45.00

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About This Book

By using Scott Joplin's life as a window onto American social and cultural development at the turn of the century, this biography dramatizes the role of one brilliant African American musician in defining the culture of a still-young nation.

Authors and Editors

Susan Curtis is Professor of History and American Studies and Director of Interdisciplinary Studies at Purdue University. She is the author of several books, including A Consuming Faith, The First Black Actors on the Great White Way, and Colored Memories (all with the University of Missouri Press).

The Missouri Biography Series, edited by William E. Foley

Praise For This Book

"A thoughtful and intriguing study of the life and world of ragtime creator Scott Joplin (1868-1917)."—Publishers Weekly

"A sensitive exploration of the complexities and anguish that an African American faced in producing music widely acknowledged today as quintessentially American."—American Historical Review

"Curtis sets Joplin in his context and evaluates the scope and importance of his contribution to American culture....Especially good in avoiding clichés while discussing the tensions between white commercial demands on Joplin and his desire to compose his more serious music, this is a highly useful book well done."—Booklist

"Curtis has written a fine book with a broad scope, one that needed to be written....Curtis has set impressive standards of historical inquiry in this book, creating a lucid argument about the meaning of Scott Joplin and ragtime."—Gateway Heritage

"What makes this biography truly outstanding is the author's skillful and always sharply analytical exploration of the varied worlds in which Joplin traveled....Curtis has composed an appealing tune of her own—a fine book that deserves a hearty ovation."—Historian

"For those who have fallen in love with Joplin's joyfully syncopated rags...or those who simply want to better understand the roots of the black contribution to American music, it is a rewarding read."—Christian Science Monitor

"Dancing to a Black Man's Tune is a much-needed addition. Aside from the general value of placing Joplin's life within the complex and dynamic cultural changes of his time, Curtis introduces or reinforces extremely important, but typically overlooked, facts....This is a significant contribution to the study of Joplin and his music and to the study of American culture."—Journal of Southern History

"Dancing to a Black Man's Tune renders Scott Joplin as a man and an artist whose musical genius served as his weapon in the struggle toward a whole America. Susan Curtis's book is more than biography, more than cultural history. It is a skillfully interwoven telling of Joplin's story within the mosaic of America's social and cultural evolution at the turn of the century."—John Hope Franklin

"If one is to know American culture and the place and `trials and tribulations' of African American music in setting the foundation and flavor of American music, Dancing to a Black Man's Tune is, to date, the primary source....This is a book that students of American serious and popular culture should quickly read and place in their libraries."—Journal of American History

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