Ragtime music, with its syncopated, polyrhythmic style, was born, in the 1890s in the black saloons and brothels of southern and mid-western cities like Baltimore and St. Louis. It was at the center of American popular music from the end of the nineteenth century until the 1920s. One of the most enduring ragtime pianists was Eubie Blake, who took that music well into the 1980s. Eubie Blake was one of the most important figures in early-20th-century African-American music, and one whose longevity