Axel Waldemar Christensen (March 23, 1881 – August 17, 1955) was an American composer, arranger, publisher, pianist and music instructor. He was the founder of the Christensen School of Popular Music, under which he published various instruction books about the playing of

syncopated In music, syncopation is a variety of rhythms played together to make a piece of music, making part or all of a tune or piece of music off-beat (music), off-beat. More simply, syncopation is "a disturbance or interruption of the regular flow of ...

music. The school enrolled upwards of 500,000 students in its numerous branches across the United States, making it one of the first and most successful examples of standardizing the instruction of popular music. The school also published the music magazine 'Christensen Ragtime Review'. His formal attire and preference for grand pianos gave him the

vaudeville Vaudeville (; ) is a theatrical genre of variety entertainment which began in France in the middle of the 19th century. A ''vaudeville'' was originally a comedy without psychological or moral intentions, based on a comical situation: a drama ...

title 'Czar of Ragtime'.

Life and career

Axel Christensen was born in 1881 in

Chicago, Illinois Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

to Danish parents Charles and Mary Christensen. Playing classical music from an early age, he would first delve into the popular

ragtime Ragtime, also spelled rag-time or rag time, is a musical style that had its peak from the 1890s to 1910s. Its cardinal trait is its Syncopation, syncopated or "ragged" rhythm. Ragtime was popularized during the early 20th century by composers ...

music in his teenage years. He would marry Reine Annette Swanson in 1903, a marriage that would last until his death. They had one child, Carle Christensen, in 1909. In 1902, Christensen made his first publication, a ragtime arrangement of Felix Mendelssohn's ''Wedding March''. The following year, he opened the Christensen School of Popular Music, one of the earliest and foremost academies of its kind, advertising 'Ragtime Taught in Ten Lessons'. In a 1949 interview with Rudi Blesh and Harriet Janis'','' he described the genesis of the company: His first instruction book, ''Christensen's Ragtime Instruction Book Number 1'', was published in 1906. The first branch of his company outside of Chicago opened up in San Francisco in 1909. Christensen became one of the first pianists to record hand-played piano rolls for QRS Music Technologies, Inc. in 1912. Ragtime_Review

In 1914, the first issue of the Christensen Ragtime Review magazine released; it would run until late 1918. John S. Stark, the foremost publisher of ragtime, contributed some of his firm's publications in this magazine. It also contained articles offering playing advice and anecdotes, as well as collections of self-composed music cues for silent films. It was merged with Walter Jacobs' Melody magazine in 1918. In the 1920s, Christensen shifted the focus of his instructional material to the now-popular jazz and

novelty Novelty (derived from Latin word ''novus'' for "new") is the quality of being new, or following from that, of being striking, original or unusual. Novelty may be the shared experience of a new cultural phenomenon or the subjective perception of an ...

styles. He also recorded for the labels

Okeh OKeh Records () is an American record label founded by the Otto Heinemann Phonograph Corporation, a phonograph supplier established in 1916, which branched out into phonograph records in 1918. The name originally was spelled "OkeH" from the init ...

and

Paramount Paramount (from the word ''paramount'' meaning "above all others") may refer to: Entertainment and music companies * Paramount Global, also known simply as Paramount, an American mass media company formerly known as ViacomCBS. **Paramount Picture ...

. This decade would see him touring across the country to play in vaudeville theaters. The outbreak of the

Great Depression The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...

caused him to downscale his business, closing many of the branches of his school across the nation. In 1945, the last of his instructional books, Axel Christensen's Instruction Book for Modern Swing Music''' released. In 1951, Christensen performed on the television show, '''You're Never Too Old. He died on August 17, 1955, in

Long Beach, California Long Beach is a coastal city in southeastern Los Angeles County, California, United States. It is the list of United States cities by population, 44th-most populous city in the United States, with a population of 451,307 as of 2022. A charter ci ...

Selected Compositions

* Ragtime Wedding March (1902) * Irmena Rag (1908) * Cauldron Rag (1909) * Star and Garter (1910) * In My Mercer Racing Car (1913) * The Minnesota Rag (1913) * Pathetic Rag (1913) * Webster Grove Rag (1915) * That Potato Bug Rag (1916) * Nobody's Business (1923) * Teasing the Klassics (1923) * Axel Grease (1924) * Walking Blues (1924)

Instruction Books

* Christensen's Ragtime Instruction Book No. 1 (6 editions, 1906–1919) * Christensen's Ragtime Instruction Book No. 2 (2 editions, 1922–1924) * Instruction Book for Vaudeville Playing Book 1 (1912) * Instruction Book for Vaudeville Playing Book 2 (1912) * Instruction Book for Vaudeville Playing Book 3 (1912) * Instruction Book for Vaudeville Playing Book 4 (1912) * Instruction Book for Vaudeville Playing Book 5 (1912) * Axel Christensen's New Instruction Book for Rag and Jazz Piano Playing (2 editions, 1920–1925) * Christensen's Instruction Book for Playing Rag, Jazz and Popular Music on the Tenor Banjo (1922) * Axel Christensen's New Instruction Book for Rag, Jazz and Popular Music (1922) * Axel Christensen's Instruction Book for Jazz and Novelty Piano Playing (2 editions, 1924–1927) * Axel Christensen's Instruction Book for Modern Music (1931) * Axel Christensen's Instruction Book for Modern Swing Music (2 editions, 1936–1945)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Christensen, Axel 1881 births 1955 deaths American composers