Rhapsody in Blue: by George Gershwin

1. Rhapsody in Blue: by George Gershwin

2. Title and date of composition • Rhapsody in Blue is a 1924 musical composition by American composer George Gershwin for solo piano and jazz band, which combines elements of classical music with jazz-influenced effects.

3. Biography • George was born September 26, 1898. Born in Brooklyn in 1898 to Jewish immigrant parents from Odessa, Ukraine. Gershwin studied piano under Charles Hambitzer and composition with Rubin Goldmark and Henry Cowell. He began his career as a song plugger, but soon started composing Broadway theatre works with his brother Ira Gershwin and Buddy DeSylva. He moved to Paris to study with Nadia Boulanger, where he began to compose An American in Paris. After returning to New York City, he wrote Porgy and Bess with Ira and the author DuBose Heyward. Initially a commercial failure, Porgy and Bess is now considered one of the most important American operas of the twentieth century.

4. Biography part 2 • The childhood home of George Gershwin and his brother Ira was in the center of the Yiddish Theater District, on the second floor at 91 Second Avenue, between East 5th Street and East 6th Street. They frequented the local Yiddish theaters, with George running errands for members and appearing onstage as an extra. George Gershwin was the second of four children. • Gershwin tried various piano teachers for two years, before being introduced to Charles Hambitzer by Jack Miller, the pianist in the Beethoven Symphony Orchestra. Until Hambitzer's death in 1918, he acted as Gershwin's mentor. Hambitzer taught Gershwin conventional piano technique, introduced him to music of the European classical tradition, and encouraged him to attend orchestra concerts.[13] At home, following such concerts, young Gershwin would try to play at the piano the music that he had heard. He later studied with the classical composer Rubin Goldmark and avant-garde composer-theorist Henry Cowell

5. History of the song • Since there were only five weeks left, Gershwin hastily set about composing a piece, and on the train journey to Boston, the ideas of Rhapsody in Blue came to his mind. He told his first biographer Isaac Goldberg in 1931 “It was on the train, with its steely rhythms, its rattle-ty bang, that is so often so stimulating to a composer – I frequently hear music in the very heart of the noise... And there I suddenly heard, and even saw on paper – the complete construction of the Rhapsody, from beginning to end. No new themes came to me, but I worked on the thematic material already in my mind and tried to conceive the composition as a whole. I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our metropolitan madness. By the time I reached Boston I had a definite plot of the piece, as distinguished from its actual substance”.

6. History of the song part 2 • Rhapsody in Blue premiered in an afternoon concert on February 12, 1924, held by Paul Whiteman and his band PalaisRoyal Orchestra, entitled An Experiment in Modern Music, which took place in Aeolian Hall in New York City.[10] Many important and influential composers of the time such as John Phillip Sousa and Sergei Rachmaninoff were present. The event has since become historic specifically because of its premiere of the Rhapsody. • http://vimeo.com/49764745 12:00 to 12:45

7. 5 adjectives • Slow • Swing • Positive • Inclining • Body moving

8. Work cited • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Gershwin • http://www.biography.com/people/george-gershwin-9309643 • http://www.google.com/search?q=george+gershwin&um=1&hl=en&biw=1430&bih=742&safe=active&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&ei=X2h5UdEnx-rQAZWhgMgL