Tom Turpin

Biography

Tom Turpin was a pioneering ragtime musician whose piano saloon became a gathering place for performers in St. Louis; he is credited with publishing the first rag written by an African American, and he championed the lively syncopations that defined the era.

He encouraged other musicians to develop and share their music, and though he died in 1922 his influence endures through the ragtime rhythms that continue to echo from Saint Peter's Cemetery.