George Gershwin (1 gen 1898 anni – 1 marzo 1937 anni)

Descrizione:

was an American composer and pianist whose compositions spanned both popular and classical genres.

Tin Pan Alley and Musicals
1. Gershwin’s early life resembled Copland’s in several ways: both from Brooklyn, Jewish parents who had immigrated, study with Goldmark, musical careers that began in their
teens.
2. Gershwin found work in his teens as a song-plugger and naturally began writing songs himself.
3. The songs played by song-pluggers belong to Tin Pan Alley, named for an area of music publishing in New York that sprang up in the 1890s.
4. He moved to writing for Broadway soon afterward. Gershwin’s first big hit was Swanee, made popular by Al Jolson’s 1920 recording.
5. Rodgers and Hammerstein were a successful duo who wrote Broadway musicals beginning with Oklahoma! in 1942 and continuing to The Sound of Music in 1959.

Gershwin’s “Experiment in Modern Music”
1. In 1924 Paul Whiteman, a popular bandleader, requested that Gershwin compose a work for piano and dance orchestra, and suggested the term “rhapsody.” The result was
Rhapsody in Blue.
a. The program touted that the Rhapsody in Blue was an “Experiment in Modern
Music” in that it blended “discordant jazz” and the “really melodious music of today.”
b. Rhapsody incorporates five Tin Pan Alley–type tunes with virtuoso passages for the soloist.
2. In 1933 he agreed to write an opera, Porgy and Bess, called an “American folk opera.”
3. Gershwin’s fusion of jazz and classical music was successful and appreciated, whereas that of Copland was not.

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