Noctave
Born in Texas, Scott Joplin was an African American pianist and composer. He was living in Sedalia, Missouri, when the publisher John Stark brought out the Maple Leaf Rag in 1899; he later moved to St. Louis and finally to New York, where he died in 1917. He wrote dozens of rags, as well as marches, waltzes and an opera, Treemonisha.
The easy version of The Entertainer keeps the introduction and the first theme, with the melody in the right hand: it lets you hear the syncopation before anything else. In the original, the left hand alternates a low bass note and a chord, with more than a hundred and fifty quick leaps, while the right hand often plays in octaves. Practise that left hand alone until it lands without looking. The Maple Leaf Rag comes next: the same idea, with even more octaves and repeats that follow one another for three minutes.