celebrating 100 years of Gershwin’s groundbreaking classical-jazz masterpiece

George Gershwin’s 1924 composition Rhapsody in Blue is so timeless that it appears scarcely attainable that he composed it 100 years in the past. Its centenary affords us a particular alternative to rejoice this iconic work that defies time and place.

Because the director of College of Plymouth’s Musica Viva live performance sequence, I organised a particular celebration live performance on January 27, that includes the London Gershwin Gamers performed by the fantastic Mark Forkgen. It was an all-Gershwin programme that additionally included the overture to the musical Woman Loopy, A Porgy and Bess Fantasy and An American in Paris.

However slightly than performing essentially the most regularly heard 1942 symphonic orchestration of Rhapsody in Blue, we carried out the unique Paul Whiteman Band model – the incisive, dynamic and splendidly playful and jazzier orchestration of Gershwin’s 1924 authentic.

Setting the stage

Gershwin (1898-1937) first composed hit songs for Broadway musical theatre. Uniquely, he blended jazz and classical parts in various levels in his longer compositions. He had a extremely authentic melodic reward, and his many songs and different compositions introduced pleasure and optimism to his audiences.

Gershwin’s musical training began with publicity to classical and widespread compositions he heard at college in New York. His dad and mom, Russian Jewish immigrants, purchased a second-hand upright piano when he was 11. In his early teenagers, Gershwin broadened his musical training by learning composition with main members of the American musical neighborhood, together with composers and pianists Henry Cowell and Wallingford Riegger.

After leaving college at 15, Gershwin earned an earnings by taking part in in New York nightclubs. He additionally demonstrated sheet music by taking part in it dwell for the Remick music publishing firm; this launched him to a variety of widespread songs and jazz.

Gershwin’s first printed music (1916) was When You Need ’Em You Can’t Get ’Em (When You’ve Bought ’Em You Don’t Need ’Em). Three years later, entertainer Al Jolson carried out the Gershwin music Swanee within the musical Sinbad, which turned an infinite success.

Within the early Nineteen Twenties, Gershwin wrote songs for varied Broadway exhibits and revues, together with (I’ll Construct a) Stairway to Paradise and Anyone Loves Me. His older brother Ira was the lyricist for each one of these songs. Ira’s witty lyrics, usually punctuated with wordplay and puns, acquired virtually as a lot acclaim as George’s compositions and have been basic to their success.

Melding classical music with jazz

All through his profession, Gershwin additionally targeted on orchestral compositions, usually melding musical types in ways in which introduced particular freshness and enduring grace to his works. His bigger works involving orchestra embody the opera Porgy and Bess, Rhapsody in Blue, a Piano Concerto, Cuban Overture and Second Rhapsody.

Gershwin was gregarious, with a genuinely magnetic character and was all the time desirous to be taught from others. He liked his work and approached each project with enthusiasm, by no means affected by composer’s block.

He was all in favour of many types of music and composition and requested classes from Ravel and even Schoenberg, each of whom declined to show him as they didn’t need to intrude or affect his distinctive private voice and elegance. (Nonetheless, Gershwin and Schoenberg did interact in weekly video games of tennis.)

Paul Whiteman, a preferred bandleader who had performed the pit orchestra for the favored musical Scandals (1922), was impressed by Gershwin’s songs in that work. He and Gershwin shared the notion of integrating parts of jazz and classical types, and in late 1923, Whiteman requested Gershwin to compose a piece for a live performance he was planning known as An Experiment in Trendy Music, which was to happen at New York’s Aeolian Live performance Corridor, a classical venue.

Apparently, Gershwin forgot in regards to the request till early January 1924 when his brother Ira noticed a newspaper article saying George’s new work within the upcoming live performance. Gershwin started working shortly after, composing Rhapsody in Blue in simply three weeks, an astonishing feat given its musical complexity. This preliminary model was orchestrated by Ferde Grofé particularly for Paul Whiteman’s band. It’s this authentic model that we carried out not too long ago within the Musica Viva sequence.

Gershwin integrated into the Rhapsody hallmarks of jazz together with expressive blue notes (flatted, or lowered, notes) lengthy passages of syncopated rhythms, and onomatopoeic musical results. He subsequently mirrored:

There had been a lot chatter in regards to the limitations of jazz, to not converse of the manifest misunderstandings of its operate. Jazz, they stated, needed to be in strict time. It needed to cling to bounce rhythms. I resolved, if attainable, to kill that false impression with one sturdy blow … No set plan was in my thoughts, no construction to which my music would conform. The Rhapsody, you see, started as a goal, not a plan.

The premiere efficiency, with Gershwin taking part in the solo piano half, was attended by musical luminaries together with Igor Stravinsky, Fritz Kreisler and Leopold Stokowski. Rhapsody in Blue was a right away public success and introduced Gershwin worldwide acclaim.

Owing to its recognition, Grofé subsequently made an association for a big orchestra in 1942 which has develop into the extra regularly carried out model. I’ve performed this later model many occasions with varied orchestras, however have lengthy needed to carry out the unique 1924 model for the 23-member Whiteman band. I imagine it’s tighter, edgier, extra incisive and but extra intimate, embodying Gershwin’s concept of mixing classical and jazz musical parts.

So beloved was Gershwin all through not solely America but additionally throughout Europe, that when he died at 38 of a mind tumour, the novelist John O’Hara summed up widespread sentiment: “George Gershwin died on July 11, 1937, however I don’t should imagine it if I don’t need to.”