MAX MORATH

Max Morath was born on October 1, 1926 in Colorodo Springs, Colorado. Though himself born after ragtime's decline, Max learned to play it from his mother who had been a professional ragtime pianist. He was a radio and TV-actor, writer, announcer and general entertainer before he devoted his career to ragtime. It was while playing the period music for off-fashioned melodramas in the West that he became fascinated by it, and soon began playing it in cabarets, as well as re searching every facet that he could find. A producer for National Educational Television caught Max Morath, proposed that he turn his knowledge of the time into a series. "The Ragtime Era" show (1960) dealt with the development of the music of the period, and critics across the USA gave wholehearted approval. The success of "The Ragtime Era" led to another NET series, "Turn of the Century", in which Morath turned read more...