Gershwin: "Rhapsody in blue"

In the mid-1960s, long before reggaeton, in Santiago de Chile the piano sheet music was purchased at La Casa Amarilla (The Yellow House), a music publishing house and musical instruments salesroom. If you were struck by a piece that you did not know, you had only to hand the score to the house's pianist and he would turn it into music instantly, so making easy your decision. La Casa Amarilla still exists but the pianist no longer.

Quite further north of Santiago, in New York, and several years before, in 1914, the pianist and composer George Gershwin, at the age of sixteen, would play that same role in one of the many music establishments in a New York neighbourhood specialized in light music. But since New York is not Santiago, Gershwin was also in charge of giving small private recitals of fashionable music in the establishment halls.

A son of Russian immigrants and self-taught until he was twelve, George soon understood that he was also able to compose and in 1916 he published his first song. In 1923, the future composer of the opera Porgy and Bess and the symphonic work An American in Paris, offered a "hybrid" concert: classical music and jazz, following a tendency from those years searching for a somewhat diffuse concept: the symphonic jazz. The concert was attended by a famous band director of the time who, firmly believing that the young Gershwin could become the creator of American music of the "future", a combination of African-American colour and the reputable classical music, encouraged him to compose a Concerto.

George Gershwin (1898 - 1937)

George accepted, but aware of his limitations in terms of musical forms, chose for the free form of a rhapsody. In February of the following year, at the end of a concert that included music by Elgar and Schönberg, he ventured to perform the solo part of his Rhapsody in blue for piano and jazz band. It was a huge success, although there were criticisms of some serious critics who considered it naive and superficial. Others, less serious, found it funny, spontaneous, melodious and sensual.
Various transcriptions have been made of this music, for solo piano, for two pianos, and for piano and symphony orchestra.

We are offering here a version for piano and orchestra, by the New York Philharmonic with Leonard Berstein conducting from the piano, in a 1976 recording. From minute 10:41 the slow and suggestive melody is heard – " Tchaikovskian ", according to some –, that has made the work famous and the closest thing to the blues of the whole piece. The glissando in charge of the clarinet that initiates the piece arose as a joke in a rehearsal. Gershwin incorporated it later in the score.

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