 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(February 2020) |
Thomas William Shea (November 14, 1931 – March 12, 1982) was an American ragtime composer. [1]
| | This article needs additional citations for verification .(February 2020) |
Thomas William Shea (November 14, 1931 – March 12, 1982) was an American ragtime composer. [1]
Born in Mattoon, Illinois, Shea studied piano briefly as a child, but later became interested in ragtime after hearing the "Maple Leaf Rag." After learning some ragtime by ear, he started composing his own rags. His style has been informally called "Prairie Ragtime." He was active in ragtime circles in the Detroit area and expanded his exposure to ragtime and its proponents by attending ragtime festivals in St. Louis. In 1970, he moved to Raleigh, North Carolina. He is known to have composed over 20 rags, some of which are performed today ("Brun Campbell Express," "Rosebud Rag," "Corncracker Rag," "Little Wabash Special") and two of which were published ("Brun Campbell Express" in They All Played Ragtime, Oak Publications, New York, 1966; and "Trillium Rag" in Max Morath's Guide to Ragtime, Hollis Music, Inc., New York, 1964). He recorded three albums which contain his compositions: Classic and Modern Rags (Ragtime Society Records RSR-1, 1963), Prairie Ragtime (Ragtime Society Records RSR-2, 1964) and Little Wabash Special (Stomp Off Records, SOS-1022, 1982).
Shea died in Raleigh from a heart attack in March 1982. Asteroid 60614 Tomshea, discovered by astronomers with the Catalina Sky Survey in 2000, was named in his memory. [1] The official naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on January 12, 2017 ( M.P.C. 103026). [2]
Ragtime, also spelled rag-time or rag time, is a musical style that had its peak from the 1890s to 1910s. Its cardinal trait is its syncopated or "ragged" rhythm. Ragtime was popularized during the early 20th century by composers such as Scott Joplin, James Scott, and Joseph Lamb. Ragtime pieces are typically composed for and performed on piano, though the genre has been adapted for a variety of instruments and styles.
Scott Joplin was an American composer and pianist. Dubbed the "King of Ragtime", he composed more than 40 ragtime pieces, one ragtime ballet, and two operas. One of his first and most popular pieces, the "Maple Leaf Rag", became the genre's first and most influential hit, later being recognized as the quintessential rag. Joplin considered ragtime to be a form of classical music meant to be played in concert halls and largely disdained the performance of ragtime as honky tonk music most common in saloons.
Events in the year 1897 in music.
Joseph Francis Lamb was an American composer of ragtime music. Lamb, of Irish descent, was the only non-African American of the "Big Three" composers of classical ragtime, the other two being Scott Joplin and James Scott. The ragtime of Joseph Lamb ranges from standard popular fare to complex and highly engaging. His use of long phrases was influenced by classical works he had learned from his sister and others while growing up, but his sense of structure was potentially derived from his study of Joplin's piano rags. By the time he added some polish to his later works in the 1950s, Lamb had mastered the classic rag genre in a way that almost no other composer was able to approach at that time, and continued to play it passably as well, as evidenced by at least two separate recordings done in his home, as well as a few recorded interviews.
James Sylvester Scott was an American ragtime composer and pianist. He is regarded as one of the "Big Three" composers of classical ragtime along with Scott Joplin and Joseph Lamb.
The "Maple Leaf Rag" is an early ragtime musical composition for piano composed by Scott Joplin. It was one of Joplin's early works, becoming the model for ragtime compositions by subsequent composers. It is one of the most famous of all ragtime pieces. Its success led to Joplin being dubbed the "King of Ragtime" by his contemporaries. The piece gave Joplin a steady if unspectacular income for the rest of his life.
John Stillwell Stark was an American publisher of ragtime music, best known for publishing and promoting the music of Scott Joplin.
George Botsford was an American composer of ragtime and other forms of music.
Thomas Million John Turpin was an American composer of ragtime music. Turpin is credited with the first published rag by an African American, his "Harlem Rag" of 1897.
Louis Chauvin was an American ragtime pianist and composer.
Euday Louis Bowman was an American pianist and composer of ragtime and blues who represented the style of Texas Ragtime. He is chiefly remembered as the composer of the highly popular "Twelfth Street Rag", a ragtime composition from 1914 out of a series of rags that Bowman wrote during or after a period in which he worked as a pianist in bordellos of Kansas City. These pieces, including "Sixth Street Rag", "Tenth Street Rag", "Eleventh Street Rag" and "Twelfth Street Rag," were named after streets of Fort Worth's redlight district.
Joshua Rifkin is an American conductor, pianist, and musicologist. He is currently a professor of music at Boston University. As a performer, he has recorded music by composers from Antoine Busnois to Silvestre Revueltas; as a scholar he has published research on composers from the Renaissance to the 20th century.
George Linus Cobb was an American composer. He composed over 200 pieces of music, including ragtime, marches, and waltzes. He also wrote columns for music trade publications.
Folk ragtime is a subgenre of ragtime, a distinctly American music. It is thought to have originated with illiterate itinerant African American piano players, who learned the syncopated music not formally, but through their peers. Folk Ragtime as a form stayed active until the early 1920s, when young America shifted its attention to early jazz. It was later revived, starting in 1947 with the 'rediscovery' of Sanford Brunson Campbell who was one of the most noted folk ragtimers as well as a student of Scott Joplin, and then in the early 1960s by the now foremost authority on Folk Ragtime, Trebor Jay Tichenor (1940-2014). Another exponent of folk ragtime was Thomas Shea ; his music is sometimes referred to as "prairie ragtime."
Clarence Homer Woods was an early American ragtime composer.
"Magnetic Rag" is a 1914 ragtime piano composition by American composer Scott Joplin. It is significant for being the last rag which Joplin published in his lifetime, three years before his death in 1917. It is also unique in form and in some of the musical techniques employed in the composition.
Brun Campbell was an American composer and pianist.
Trebor Jay Tichenor was a recognized authority on Scott Joplin and the ragtime era. He collected and published others' ragtime piano compositions and composed his own. He authored books about ragtime, and both on his own and as a member of The St. Louis Ragtimers, became a widely known ragtime pianist.
Max Edward Morath was an American ragtime pianist, composer, actor, and author. He was best known for his piano playing and is referred to as "Mr. Ragtime". He was a touring performer as well as being variously a composer, recording artist, actor, playwright, and radio and television presenter. Rudi Blesh billed Morath as a "one-man ragtime army".