Tom Turpin

From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist

Tom Turpin · Thomas Million John Turpin was an American composer of ragtime. He was born around 1871 in Savannah, Georgia, and died in 1922 of peritonitis. His exact year of birth is uncertain, since both 1871 and 1873 appear in sources, and his gravestone says 1871. At a young age he opened a saloon in St. Louis, the Rosebud Café, which became a meeting place for local pianists, among them Joe Jordan and Scott Joplin. Joplin's Rosebud March from 1905 is named after the café. The saloon closed in 1906.

Music and breakthrough

Turpin is regarded as the composer of the first published rag by an African American: Harlem Rag from 1897, although according to the source the piece had already been composed in 1892, a year before the 1893 World's Fair, where ragtime found its first large audience. In total he published seven compositions. Two were recorded at the time: St. Louis Rag from 1903, by the United States Marine Band and by Arthur Pryor's orchestra in 1906, among others, and Buffalo Rag from 1904, by Vess L. Ossman.

Influence

Turpin was a big man, and his piano stood on blocks so that he could play standing up. Besides the café he ran a theatre, gambling houses and dance halls together with his brother Charles, and he was a deputy constable, one of the first politically powerful African Americans in St. Louis. His influence on local music earned him the title Father of St. Louis Ragtime.

Listening

In School of Rock

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