Tin Pan Alley Rage: Irving Berlin Plagiarist?
Old-Time Broadway Story Lives
BROADWAY MAGAZINE—The new offering from Roundabout Theatre is Mark Saltzman’s Tin Pan Alley Rag, featuring the music and characters of Irving Berlin and Scott Joplin. The two men are unquestionably saints in the cannon of American popular music. However, there is more than a little suggestion that Mr. Berlin may have also been a bit of a sinner too. In Charles Hamm’s book, Irving Berlin Songs Of The Melting Pot: The Formative Years, it is put forward that Irving Berlin was accused of plagiarizing “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” from Scott Joplin’s opera Treemonisha. Quoting Joplin’s widow from Hamm’s book: “after Scott had finished writing [Treemonisha], and while he was showing it around, hoping to get it published, someone stole the theme, and made it into a popular song. The number was quite a hit, too, but that didn’t do Scott any good.”
Added to this was the observation of a descendent of John Stark, Joplin’s publisher, that “the publication of Alexander’s Ragtime Band brought Joplin to tears because it was his [own] composition.” Hamm cites other sources as well.
The suggestion that Berlin plagiarized Alexander’s Ragtime Band is not a new one. In Edward Berlin’s book King of Ragtime: Scott Joplin and His Era, it is pointed out that as early as 1911, there were reports that Joplin was angry with Irving Berlin. By 1916, Berlin came out publically and addressed rumors around the song, though he didn’t address the Joplin connection directly. Hmmm. Come on and steal, come on and steal Alexander’s Ragtime Band?! Photo from Roundabout’s Tin Pan Alley Rag by Joan Marcus.
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Tags: Irving Berlin, plagarism, Roundabout, Scott Joplin, Tin Pan Alley Rag
July 13th, 2009 at 7:48 am
Whether Berlin copied from Joplin or not, Tin Pan Alley Rag is a stellar production. An ingenius playwright has created a story that made us laugh heartily as well as shed tears. The singing is beautiful. The choreography, setting and costumes help transport the audience to the appropriate time period. The music, performed by outstanding musicians, is by Scott Joplin and Irving Berlin; nothing more needs to be said about that. This is a show worth seeing.