The Cake Walk is, just like the Quickstep, the Schottisch, the 'Rag and the Quadrille, a popular American dance from the second half of the last century. Both the rhythmic and the melodic structure of the Cake Walk display a clear relationship with ragtime and jazz and even a composer like Claude Debussy has availed himself of these influences in his music (Le petit Nègre and Golliwogg's Cake Walk).
