Over the years, however, this last claim and its debunking insidiously mixed with American race problems. Of course, jazz had an extremely fluid definition in its early years. Others claimed that Gershwin wrote jazz – also not correct. However, it was the piece which made the greatest impact by far and spurred many composers both in the Americas and in Europe to experiment with incorporating jazz elements into Modern concert music. We had already had pieces by Debussy, Stravinsky, Ives, Milhaud, and others. Some claimed it as the first work to combine jazz and the concert hall ("Gershwin made a lady out of jazz"), when it wasn't, by a long shot. Writers at the time of the premiere hailed the Rhapsody for spurious reasons. Furthermore, Rhapsody in Blue (brilliant title supplied by Ira after seeing an exhibition of paintings by Whistler) has stood as somewhat of an exception in the critical mud flung the composer's way. Though I'm not a big fan of the box populi argument, I nevertheless think that staying power indicates at least some inherent value. After all, Gershwin's concert music has occupied a repertory niche long after more esteemed works of the moment have disappeared. Recently, Gershwin's stock has begun to rise, along with research activity within the academy. His defenders tended to come from the theater, rather than from the conservatory, although many major composers, including Schoenberg and Ravel, admired his music. Incidentally, the Berlin tone poem never materialized.įor a long time, critics loved to dump on Gershwin or condescend to him as naïve and untutored. It has been arranged to a fare-thee-well and received well over 200 recordings, and its big broad tune toward the end has been used for such things as ring tones and commercials. In a program that up to that point had been pretty much of a yawn, the Rhapsody became the unqualified hit it has remained to our own day. These sections he improvised, nodding to Whiteman to give the next downbeat at the appropriate time. Still, he was handing pages to the orchestrator days before the concert and hadn't completed all of the solo part by the time of the performance. With roughly five weeks left before the concert, brother Ira read a newspaper article promoting the Whiteman venture with the promise of a "Berlin syncopated tone poem," a Victor Herbert suite, and a "Gershwin concerto." Ira promptly informed George, then in the middle of tryouts for a new musical. Gershwin agreed and then, in the rush of his career, forgot about it. According to the often-told story, having seen George Gershwin's mini-opera Blue Monday, bandleader Paul Whiteman asked the composer for an extended work to perform at a special concert to be given at the Aeolian Hall in New York.
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