From the first time I sat down at the piano with a Nazareth tango, I was struck by how much it sounded like an American rag. Nazareth’s first “tango brazileiro,” Brejeiro, was written in 1893, six years before Scott Joplin’s first big ragtime hit, the Maple Leaf. What an amazing coincidence that two young pianist/composers, writing at the same

From the first time I sat down at the piano with a Nazareth tango, I was struck by how much it sounded like an American rag. Nazareth’s first “tango brazileiro,” Brejeiro, was written in 1893, six years before Scott Joplin’s first big ragtime hit, the Maple Leaf. What an amazing coincidence that two young pianist/composers, writing at the same time in places as far apart geographically and culturally as Rio de Janeiro and Saint Louis, would write music so much alike. Or was it coincidence?