Searchlight Rag

Search-Light Rag
by Scott Joplin

A stylised line drawing of searchlights shining their beams into a cross against a dark sky

1907 frontal cover of the sheet music.
Genre Ragtime
Form A Syncopated March and Two Step
Published 1907
Publisher Joseph W.Stern & Co
Searchlight Rag
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Searchlight Rag is a ragtime composition by Scott Joplin, first published in 1907. It was named after the town of Searchlight, Nevada, where his friends had gone prospecting, inspiring the title.

Musical structure

Intro A A B B A C C D D[1]

Publication history

The copyright was registered August 12, 1907 to Joseph W. Stern and Company of New York.[1]

Like most Joplin compositions, "Searchlight Rag" was still under copyright during the ragtime revival of the 1970s, and the holder of copyrights for this piece, "Fig Leaf Rag" and "Rose Leaf Rag" withheld permission for their inclusion in the definitive New York Public Library edition of Joplin's works[2] and other collections.

In popular culture

The "Searchlight Rag" was used as "Ragtime Style" music in Roller Coaster Tycoon's Loopy Landscapes expansion pack and the game Roller Coaster Tycoon 2.

See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Jasen, David A.; Trebor Jay Tichenor (1978). Rags and Ragtime: A Musical History. New York, NY: Dover Publications, Inc. p. 93. ISBN 0-486-25922-6.
  2. ↑ Scott Joplin: Collected Piano Works, Vera Brodsky Lawrence, ed., The New York Public Library, 1971, p. xi

External links