Maple Leaf Rag (ballet) Maple Leaf Rag (ballet) Maple Leaf Rag is a storyless Martha Graham ballet set to ragtime compositions by Scott Joplin. The work premiered on October 2, 1990 at New York City Center with costumes by Calvin Klein and lighting by David Finley. Chris Landriau arranged the music and played piano at the debut. The dance is a jubilant self-parody and an homage, of sorts, to Graham's mentor and musical director, Louis Horst, who would play the rag for her whenever she fell into a creative slump. Graham was 96 when she created "Maple Leaf Rag"; it is her last completed
Maple Leaf Bar Maple Leaf Rag" (1980), "The Maple Leaf Rag 15th Anniversary Anthology" (1994), and "Maple Leaf Rag III" (2006). The Maple Leaf was closed for several weeks in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Owner Hank Staples remained in New Orleans to guard the bar and his other properties while vowing in interviews with to host the first concert in New Orleans after the storm. On September 30, 2005, Walter "Wolfman" Washington played the Maple Leaf's first post-Katrina show in New Orleans. (Some other local musicians who were playing in the aftermath of the storm dispute the claim that it was the