Folk Ragtime (1897-1905) refers to rags written by rural itinerant pianists who learned the music informally through their peers. Folk rags were mostly written by white composers since most African American composers sought larger audiences in urban areas. They were often based on folk strains, or imitations of folk strains, and thus sound more spontaneous but less polished that other styles of ragtime, such as Joplin-style “classic rags.” Although they predate the classic rag in their simple concepts, most were published contemporarily with the classic rags. Jasen and Tichenor wrote that they were direct expressions of the “richly varied, frequently unorthodox ragtime playing styles that abounded in the Mississippi Valley as ragtime blossomed.”

Inevitably, a few of these rags were influenced by the big hits (such as Maple Leaf Rag); however, as a general rule they were indigenous to their rural American locales. The important publishers of folk ragtime sheet music were initially located in the American Midwest and South, in cities such as Nashville, Memphis, Kansas City, St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, and New Orleans. Eventually, Tin Pan Alley — the New York City publishing houses that held a monopoly on the music industry from approximately 1890 to 1930 — made ragtime sheet music, including folk rags, a staple of their publishing, thus dominating the smaller publishers.