JOPLIN, SCOTT

JOPLIN, SCOTT. Composer (24 November 1868 in Bowie County (now Texarkana), Texas; 1 April 1917 in New York, New York). He came from a musical family; his father played violin for plantation dances during slavery, his mother played banjo and sang, and four of the six children (in addition to Scott) sang or played strings. He early revealed talent, and his family purchased a used piano for him, which he taught himself to play. Even as a child he began playing...