The Life and Music of George Gershwin (Art Ebook)

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GEORGE
GERSHWIN
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A JOURNEY TO GREATNESS
OTHER BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR:

The Encyclopedia
The Home Book
of the
Opera
of Musical
Knowledge
Milton Cross' Encyclopedia of the Great Composers and Their

Music (with Milton Cross)
The Complete Book
of 20th Century
Music
Music for the Millions
Men
of Popular
Music
Dictators of the Baton
Music Comes
From Bach
Mr.
to
America
to Stravinsky
Ewen
has also written a young people's biography of
George Gershwin, The Story of George Gershwin (Holt, 1944).

Other books by Mr. Ewen for the Holt Musical Biography Series
Young People are: The Story of Jerome Kern; Tales from the
Vienna Woods: The Story of the Johann Strausses; Haydn: A
for
Good
nini.
Life;
The Story
of Irving Berlin;
The Story of Arturo Tosca-
DAVID
^t
E Y
Journey
THE LIFE AND
GEORGE
Illustrated with photographs
to Greatness
MUSIC
OF
GERSHWIN
Henry Holt and Company
New
York
Copyright
1956 by David Ewen.
All rights reserved, including the right

to reproduce this
book or portions thereof
in
any form.
In Canada, George J. McLeod, Ltd.

PUBLISHED, FEBRUARY, 1956
SECOND PRINTING, FEBRUARY, 1956
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 56-6192
82625-0716
Printed in the United States of America
To the memory
of
my Mother
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Without the cooperation of George Gershwin's relatives,

friends, and associates in the worlds of the theater and music, this
book could not have been written. With few, and negligible,
exceptions, they have all been unsparing of time and energy in
providing
prepare
me
with
this first
all
the materials at their disposal to help
complete and definitive biography of a
they loved and will never forget. They gave
access to letters,
memas well
and often most personal confidences which have been
documents,
ories
me
me
man
diaries, guest books,
programs
as their
in-
valuable to me.
I
owe
a special debt to Ira Gershwin, with
two extended periods
at his
home
whom
spent
in Beverly Hills. His formi-
dable memory, and his equally formidable archives gathered over
more than three decades, served me well, and are

making this book as complete, authoritative, and
accurate as I could make it. His wife, Leonore, was equally cooperative. Her comments on the manuscript, which she read in
the first draft, were often as penetrating as they were useful.
It would be impossible to list here the more than sixty
people who were interviewed, but I would surely be remiss if I
did not single out at least a handful for special gratitude: George
Pallay, Kay Swift, Henry Botkin, Jules Glaenzer, Alexander Steina period of
responsible for
ert,
sky,
Irving Caesar, Phil Charig, Vinton Freedley, Frances
Edward
Paley,
Kilenyi,
Max Dreyfus, Dr.

I am indebted to
sive materials
and
it
Godow-
Samuel Chotzinoff, Harry Ruby, Emily

Albert Sirmay, and Mrs. Hambitzer Reel.
the office of Robert Breen for the exten-
provided
me
about the foreign tours of Porgy
Bess; to the Congressional Library in Washington, D.C., for
the opportunity of inspecting Gershwin's manuscripts and sketch-
books; to the
Drama and Music
Library for their clipping
many an hour
Divisions of the
files;
the many,
letter,
me Gershwin
to
music, par-
them unknown
to
me;
in all parts of the country
who
my
of
avalanche of inquiries sub-
telephone, and telegram.
For permission to use

Gershwin,
many
many people
were so patient and responsive

mitted by
Mischa Portnoff, who spent
at the piano playing for
ticularly all of the early songs,

finally, to
to
New York Public
lyrics,
am indebted to two
or excerpts from lyrics,
by
Ira
sources to the Gershwin Publish:
Company, New York, for "Love Is Here to Stay" and "Love

Walked In," both copyrighted in 1938; to the New World Music
Corporation, New York, for "Sweet and Low Down," copyrighted
in 1925, "The Babbitt and the Bromide," copyrighted in 1927,
"Soon," copyrighted in 1929; "Bidin' My Time" and "Could You
Use Me," both copyrighted in 1930; "Some Girls Can Bake a Pie,"
ing
copyrighted in 1932; "Mine" and "Union Square/' both copyrighted in 1933.

I
am
grateful to Little,
to use quotations
Brown & Company,
from Vernon Duke's Passport
for permission
to Paris
and
Sir
Osbert Sitwell's Laughter in the Next Room, and Doubleday
Company
for
for
an extract from Ethel Merman's
Who
&
Could Ask
Anything More.
D. E.
Little
Neck, N.Y.
contents
introduction: gershwin today,
1 THE GERSHVINS, 2$
2
3
4
5
S
7
8
9
CHILDHOOD,
15
38
TIN PAN ALLEY,
51
THE APPRENTICE, 67
THE FIRST SONG HIT THE FIRST MUSICAL COMEDY, 79
"he is the beginning of sophisticated jazz," 88
the Rhapsody in Blue, 103
FROM BROADWAY TO PICCADDLLY, 120
THE HOUSE ON IO3RD STREET, 129
10 THE CONCERTO IN F, 140

11 Oh Kay, Funny Face, and the piano preludes, 148
12 AN AMERICAN IN EUROPE, 158
13 An American in Paris, 164
14 THE MAN THEY LOVED, I73
15 THE OTHER GERSHWIN, I94
16 expanding horizonsthe Second Rhapsody, 201
17 broadway triumphs: Girl Crazy and Of Thee I Sing,
18 the Cuban Overture, 229
19 YOUNG MAN WITH A PIANO, 234
20 SOME BROADWAY FAILURESSOME SUCCESS ELSEWHERE,
21
Porgy and Bess,
22
23
beverly hdlls,
288
journey's end,
296
postscript:
216
24O
251
since 1937,
309
appendixes:
i
ft
tit
tV
the plot of Porgy and Bess, 323

CONCERT WORKS OF GEORGE GERSHWIN, 330
STAGE PRODUCTIONS WITH GERSHWIN^ MUSIC, 333
STAGE PRODUCTIONS WITH INTERPOLATED GERSHWIN
SONGS,
V GERSHWIN
Vt
t?ii
tX
347
MOTION PICTURES ADAPTED FROM GERSHWIN MUSICALS (with

Gershwin music), 350
THE GREATEST SONGS OF GEORGE GERSHWIN (and the
who
t?iii
343
SCORES TO MOTION PICTURES,
introduced them),
352
RECOMMENDED RECORDINGS OF GERSHWIN^ MUSIC,

BD3LIOGRAPHY,
index:
371
363
Stars
356
A JOURNEY TO GREATNESS
IS
introduction
GERSHWIN TODAY
In the history of music there are many composers who

were neglected during their lifetime and discovered after
their death. There were others who were first honored, then
forgotten. There are still others who were honored, then ignored, and ultimately rediscovered.
The case of George Gershwin is still more curious. In
1937, when he died suddenly at the age of thirty-eight, he
was, without question, one of the most successful composers
the United States has ever produced. He made a fortune from
his music, he was respected by many serious musicians and
music critics in Europe and America, and he was sung, whis-
16
JOURNEY TO GREATNESS
and played by
Yet not even his staunchest supporters then could have guessed how his artistic stature and
tied,
millions.
were to grow in the years that followed.

his music is heard more often and in more
places than it was two decades ago. A survey conducted by
Musical America among the foremost symphony orchestras
his popularity
Today,
of this country discloses the startling fact that in the period
between 1945 and 1954, he consistently received more performances than did such world-famous personalities as Stravinsky, Bartok, Milhaud, Vaughan Williams, Shostakovich,
Hindemith, Britten, or Honegger. In six of those years he
was performed more often than any other American comwas tied for first place; and in two other
years he held second place.
He is the only American composer, and one of the few
moderns anywhere, whose works continually occupy a complete program. Besides the all-Gershwin concerts that have
become something of a yearly ritual on both coasts to commemorate his death, all-Gershwin programs are frequently
presented by major American symphony orchestras, and just
as frequently these programs become the invitations for soldposer; one year, he
out auditoriums. Before Gershwin's time, only all-Beethoven, or all-Tchaikovsky, or all-Wagner programs had such
Gershwin Concert Orchestra

United States in all-Gershwin
programs. This was the first time in the history of musical
performance that a one-man orchestral program was taken on
box-office appeal. In 1953, the
was organized
tour
by
that, in
to tour the
The
was so successful
1954, the orchestra embarked on a second cross-
a single organization.
country tour, visiting seventy-four
project
cities in a
four-month pe-
riod.
In Europe, too, Gershwin's music has taken a firm hold
17
introduction: gershwin today
on the
living repertory.
None
of his larger works
is
now
novelty in any major European city. Before the intensifica-
was acclaimed in
Moscow in an American music concert given by the Moscow
State Symphony on July 3, 1945. Before the iron curtain was
lowered on Czechoslovakia, this same Rhapsody was performed, and cheered, in Prague, played by Eugene List
and the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leonard Bernstein; the occasion was an international festival held
tion of the cold war, the
there in
May
Rhapsody
1946 to celebrate the
in Blue
fiftieth
anniversary of the
Czech Philharmonic. In Florence, Italy, at the Teatro Communale in 1953, so many disappointed music-lovers were
turned away from an all-Gershwin concert that a Beethoven
program scheduled for a few days later had to be canceled
and the Gershwin concert repeated.
According to Edwin Hughes, director of the National
Music Council in New York, Gershwin's music had by far
more performances in Europe in 1954 than that of any other
American. That year, the Council made its first survey of
American music performed abroad and was able to compile a
partial list of the cities that had heard Gershwin's orchestral
works, either individually or in all-Gershwin programs.
The
(Sweden), Biarritz, Birmingham, Bologna, Cannes, Catania, Edinburgh, Florence, Gavleborg (Sweden), Gothenburg (Sweden), Halle, Kareskoga (Sweden), Lille, London (four major orchestras), Lulea (Sweden), Malmo (Sweden), Milan,
Monte Carlo, Mulhouse, Nancy, Nantes, Naples, Palermo,
Paris (three major orchestras), Rennes, Rome, Strasbourg,
Toulon, Toulouse, Trieste, Turin, Valenciennes, Venice, and
impressive
list is
as follows: Arras (France), Avesta
Vichy.
What
is
particularly interesting about the frequency
18
of all-Gershwin programs both here
and abroad is that Gershwin left only a handful of orchestral works: two rhapsodies,
one piano concerto, one tone poem, one overture, and one set
of variations for piano and orchestra. This limited repertory
has been played and replayed to meet an apparently insatiable demand. Far from becoming bored with this continual
repetition of the same works, audiences everywhere appear
to grow more and more responsive to them with each rehearing, more and more enthusiastic. Repetition has not robbed
this music of its impact.
So great is Gershwin's appeal in Europe that he is the
first American composer about whom books have been published in Austria, Germany, France, Italy, and Holland. Five
of these were biographies written by foreign authors. And in
Holland and Germany not one, but two, such books were
issued.
Gershwin's popular songs have also done well since

the composer's death, this despite the notoriously high mortality rate of
popular music.
mained one
of the
ASCAP:
five
To
this
day Gershwin has
re-
members
of
or six highest-paid
the American Society of Composers, Authors, and
Publishers.
ASCAP
members and
protects the copyright interests of
its
works for performances in public

places, over radio, television, and on records. It is, consequently, an accurate barometer of the frequency with which
the music of any popular composer is performed in this
licenses their
country.
The
ing in
full significance of
ASCAP
strikes us
Gershwin's present-day stand-
when we remember
that other
posers or lyricists in his select group are such

Berlin and Cole Porter, both of
whom
men
com-
as Irving
receive dual ratings as
introduction: GERSHWIN today
19
and Richard Rodgers and Oscar

Each of these men has remained richly productive for the past two decades, a period during which
Gershwin was silenced by death. Despite his death, their continuing activity, and the acknowledged evanescence of popcomposers and
Hammerstein
ular songs,
lyricists,
II.
Gershwin continues
to
be one of the most

a com-
frequently heard composers through popular media
poser represented
by songs written a quarter
of a century
songs such as "The Man I Love,"

Got a Crush on You," and "Love Is Here To Stay" are
more popular today than when they were first released.
Probably nothing points up more vividly the expansion of Gershwin's posthumous importance than the history
of his opera, Porgy and Bess. When first produced, it was a
failure. Only after the composer's death did it, phoenix-like,
rise from the ashes of its initial defeat to soar in triumph. It
was hailed in America as our greatest folk opera, and often
by the very critics who had originally condemned it. Then it
went on to conquer Europe in a way no other American opera
has done. That story the conquest of Europe, the Near East,
South America, Mexico, and the Soviet Union by Porgy and
Bess is a saga without parallel in American music, and is
And some Gershwin
ago.
"I've
told in a later chapter.
One
most impressive and singularly significant

is the way he progressed toward a
single goal from his boyhood on. He sought from the very
first to achieve artistic validity as a composer through popular
music. It is surely significant that he should have sensed,
and become convinced of, the destiny of American popular
music at a time when it was in its unkempt infancy; when it
was regarded by all serious musicians with the distaste of an
facts
of the
about Gershwin
20
impatient adult for an irresponsible child. In discussing ragtime or Irving Berlin's songs with his first important teacher,
Charles Hambitzer, Gershwin said: "This is American muthe way an American should write. This is the kind
want to write." He was only sixteen years old then,
but already he was convinced that a serious composer could
produce important art by bringing to popular music the
harmonic, rhythmic, and contrapuntal resources of serious
This
sic.
is
of music
music.
And he
felt
that the use of large musical forms for
popular idioms could provide a creative
avenue for
artist
with a broad
self-expression.
Later in
life,
when he
already was successful, he
wrote: "J azz * s

usic; it uses the same notes as Bach used.
Jazz is the result of the energy stored in America.
.
Jazz has contributed an enduring value to America in the

sense that it has expressed ourselves. It is an original American achievement that will endure, not as jazz perhaps, but
which will leave its mark on future music in one way or
another/'
And
again: "I regard jazz as an
a very powerful one which
American
folk music,
probably in the blood of the

American people more than any other style of folk music. I
believe that it can be made the basis of serious symphonic
works of lasting value."
His North Star, then, was the mission to write popular
is
songs with the techniques and approaches of serious music,
and
music with the techniques and approaches of

popular music. As an apprentice in Tin Pan Alley, writing
his first popular songs, he also wrote Rialto Ripples (with
Will Donaldson ) a first effort to transfer a jazz style to piano
writing. And as the mature creator of a three-act opera, almost twenty years later, he was still writing popular songs.
serious
21
he kept on writing popular music after becoming

more serious efforts, it was not only for the
money it brought him; on several occasions he proved his
If
celebrated with
when
his
that he turn to ambitious projects.
He
willingness to brush aside a fortune in contracts
conscience
demanded
wrote popular music because it brought him profound artistic

satisfaction. He brought to it all the skill, high principle, and
which he was capable. As he worked on his best

songs, he subjected them to continual revision, refinement,
and editing in his pursuit of the mot juste. The popular song
was one facet of his art, and an important one; the larger
works were another. He needed both media to give complete
artistry of
expression to his artistic personality.
And
his
popular songs revealed genuine mastery of
means. There was much more to them than a caressing

melody, or a kinesthetic rhythm, or a poignant emotion. His
songs abound in subtle details: skillful enharmonic changes,
dexterous setting of one rhythm against another, piquant use
of after-beats and staggered accents, and intriguing changes
of meter.
He had
would suddenly
his
own
inject a
personal mannerisms.
The way he
minor third in the melody, or use
anticipatory harmonies in the bass, or pass from one key to
another without the proper harmonic transitions, or allow the

chordal structure of an accompaniment to follow
its
own
design rather than serve as a prop for the melody, or give
and harmonic inventiveness to his

verses
all this gives his songs an unmistakable Gershwin
identity. His song technique was usually so unorthodox and
complex that considerable familiarity was required before
parts of it could be properly appreciated.
musical
significance
It
may come
as a surprise to
from the point of view of
many
sales figures,
to discover that,
Gershwin's only genu-
22
ine song hit
was the
early,
frequently performed,
such
men
fell
as Irving Berlin
"Swanee." Other songs, though

far short of marks achieved by
and Jerome Kern whose sheet and
record sales consistently hit a million copies. Indeed,
many
of
Gershwin's songs required the passing of several years before
they achieved wide acceptance. This was due not only to his
advanced writing but also to the fact that his harmonic structure
was often
so
germane
to the melodic idea that
popular songs by Berlin, Kern,
or, for
unlike
that matter, virtually
anybody else they lose their appeal if sung without an accompaniment, and thus could not become the kind of tunes
that a nation catches at first hearing and then at once begins
to sing and whistle all the time.
On
the other hand, Gershwin's best songs are heard
more often today, and are better known, than they were when
he was alive. They have become classics, and not exclusively
in popular music. The enthusiasm of one serious music
critic, Henry Pleasants, for Gershwin's songs has even led
him to make the following excessive statement in The Agony
of Modern Music: "Certainly there is nothing in the Rhapsody in Blue or An American in Paris to compare in simple,
spontaneous creative genius with 'The
braceable You.'" Others
may
Man
Love' or 'Em-
not go so far as Pleasants in
placing Gershwin's songs so far above and beyond his serious
works; but there should be no hesitancy in finding for those
songs a rightful place in the repertory of serious American

music.
Gershwin had the sure

derives so
much
of
its
instincts
strength.
from which genius

an inadequate
He had had
training in music, yet a powerful creative intuition
compensated
more than
for his shortcomings as a technician.
No
text-
23
INTRODUCTION: GERSHWIN today
book or teacher would have led him where his own intuition
did many times. The opening measure of the Rhapsody in
Blue is a case in point. When Gershwin conceived the ascending clarinet glissando, he knew precisely the effect for which
he was reaching: a hyperthyroid, hysterical wail, almost the
voice for a hyperthyroid, hysterical era.
He
explained to Paul
Whiteman's clarinetist, Ross Gorman, precisely how he

wanted that passage to sound. At first Gorman insisted that
no clarinetist could produce the effect Gershwin had in mind.
The composer, however, was so intransigent that Gorman had
to keep on experimenting with various reeds and techniques
until, at last, he brought to life Gershwin's music exactly as
Gershwin had heard it with his inner ear.
That opening is surely one of the unforgettable moments in contemporary music; a single bar establishes the
atmosphere and mood of the entire work. In his serious works,
Gershwin was particularly fortunate with his opening passages. He had the showman's instinct for seizing the listener's
attention immediately. And he had the creator's instinct for
bringing to his openings something fresh and original, and
sometimes something altogether unexpected. The Concerto
in F begins with an exciting Charleston rhythm. An American in Paris opens with an insouciant, Parisian walking theme
which, before many measures pass, is punctuated with the
startling sounds of actual taxi horns. The opening theme of
the Second Rhapsody is an incisive, machine-like rivet motive. Porgy and Bess has for its opening aria one of the most
beautiful melodies in the opera, "Summertime."
If Gershwin knew how to begin, he also had an infallible instinct for providing his works with the big, sweeping
idea at every major climactic moment. Gershwin rarely fails
us after an exciting build-up. He may at times fumble and
24
grope while reaching toward the high ground of a composibut once he gets there he invariably is able to produce a
breath-taking vista. There are, as examples, the unforgettable
tion,
slow sections of the Rhapsody in Blue and the Second Rhapsody; the sensual melody that is the core of the second movement of the Concerto; the whirling percussive ending of the
Cuban Overture; and the wake scene, the Kittiwah Island
scene, and the finale of Porgy and Bess.
Gershwin's spotty musical education would have
spelled doom for any composer who was not a genius. Gersh-
win was saved by his instincts and intuition; and also by a

phenomenal capacity to absorb, almost by a kind of subtle
osmosis, musical knowledge wherever and whenever he came
in contact with it, and then to adapt that knowledge for his
own creative purposes. Some of his basic musical knowledge
came from study with various teachers who are discussed in
later chapters. But most of what he knew came autodidactically: from imitation; self -analysis; experimentation; painstaking listening at concerts, which he attended from the time
he was twelve; from studying musical scores which he learned
to dissect with a kind of scientific exactitude; from poring
over texts like Percy Goetschius' Material Used in Musical
Composition, Cecil Forsyth's Orchestration, and Benjamin
Cutter's Harmonic Analysis. He picked up here and there
numerous methods, approaches, and stylistic tricks which
soon become permanently fixed in his own equipment. He
continually hounded his musician-friends with questions
about their
own
work, or sought criticisms of his own. "AnyKay Swift, "he hit with a
thing he wanted to learn," says

terrific sock.
perceptive
He
just tore into it."
He had
such a keen and
mind and memory, and such an insatiable aphe was able, through this
petite for information, that in time
introduction: gershwin today
25
haphazard way, to accumulate an impressive storehouse of

musical knowledge.
He
could not always give the proper textbook defini-
he knew what he
and where he was going. He
tion to a specific method. But, generally,
was doing, why he was doing
it,
consciously used polyrhythms, changing meters, unresolved
ambiguous tonalities, bold modulations always toward a precise artistic effect. No teacher had shown him how;
he had seen them used in works by others and had tried them
out for himself. "Why," he once remarked with the amazement of a Monsieur Jourdain discovering he was talking in
prose, "I wrote a whole thirty-two bar chorus in canon, and if
someone told me it was a canon, I'd laugh in his face."
It was this unquenchable thirst for musical informadiscords,
tion, this restless search for
that
made
tively
and
it
answers to his creative problems,
him to grow the way he did, creaThe advance in know-how and mu-
possible for
technically.
sical articulateness
during the ten-year period separating his
one-act opera, 135th Street, and his grand opera, Porgy
few
modern music.
and
an advance
from fumbling apprenticeship to full mastery. An examination of his serious works reveals a step-by-step development
Bess, has
in technical
faire,
parallels in
skill,
a growing
It is
an increasing self-assurance and savoir-
command
of the materials of his trade.
a structural consideration, the Second Rhapsody

progress over the
Rhapsody
is
From
notable
in Blue in organic unity,
com-
the Rhap-
pactness of form, adroitness of thematic growth;
if
sody in Blue remains the more popular work
because the
basic material
is
more
inspired.
it is
The Cuban Overture
repre-
sents a remarkable step forward in the use of contrapuntal
means,
just as the Variations
on I Got Rhythm reveals a new

And from every possible con-
virtuosity in thematic variation.

26
sideration
orchestration,
idiomatic writing, complexity of
means, variety of materials, artistic sureness, and profound

insight
Porgy and Bess dwarfs everything that preceded it.
In time he became a much better informed musician
than he was credited with being. He knew and loved the
chamber music of Mozart and Brahms, and Mozart's operas.
He admired almost everything by Bach, Beethoven, and DeAmong the moderns, his favorites were Schoenberg,
bussy.
Ravel, Hindemith, Stravinsky, and Alban Berg. In the last
he made an intensive study of Schoenand private recordings,

and acquired an intimate knowledge and penetrating understanding of this abstruse music. At a time when many a
sophisticated and well-informed musician knew almost nothing about Alban Berg's music, Gershwin was a passionate
advocate of his, and made a special trip to Philadelphia to
attend the premiere of Wozzeck.
year or so of his
life
berg's string quartets through scores
Gershwin had the courage and stamina of genius to

paths for music, and to make these paths broad
highways upon which many others would follow his lead.
His significance as a pioneer can hardly be overestimated; in
Makers of the Modern World, Louis Untermeyer considers
Gershwin to be one of the four most important composers to
shape musical trends in the past century (the other three
being Wagner, Debussy, and Stravinsky). When Gershwin
started in popular music, a trained musician was a rara avis
in Tin Pan Alley. Men such as Jerome Kern or Victor Herbert, both well equipped by training, were phenomena not
usually encountered in the song industry. But not even Kern
or Herbert brought to their popular writing the wealth of
inventiveness, the imagination, the daring, and the complexcut
new
27
means we find in Gershwin. In an area where entertainment-appeal was the primary, if not the exclusive, goal,
Gershwin bravely introduced artistic considerations. More
than any other single person he made it possible for later
composers like Kurt Weill, Richard Rodgers, Vernon Duke,
and Leonard Bernstein to write the kind of popular music
they did and to find a large audience receptive to it.
It was also Gershwin who convinced serious musicians
throughout the world of the value of using American popular idioms in classical music. He was not the first to do so.
Before the Rhapsody in Blue, Stravinsky had written Ragtime, for piano, and Milhaud La Creation du monde, a ballet
in jazz style; and before them there had been the tentative
efforts of Debussy and Satie to employ American popular
styles. But this music had little or no impact on the musical
thought of our time. It was regarded by the intelligentsia as a
spicy exotic dish to pique the jaded musical appetite. It was
Gershwin who brought full acceptance to our popular styles,
techniques, and materials in the world of serious music. After
the Rhapsody in Blue came the deluge: Kfenek's Jonny
spielt auf, Hindemith's Neues vom Tage, Kurt Weill's Mahagonny and Die Dreigroschenoper, Ravel's "Blues" Sonata
and the Concerto for the Left Hand, Constant Lambert's
Rio Grande, Aaron Copland's Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, and John Alden Carpenter's ballet, Skyscrapers.
One more point: Gershwin helped create and establish an American musical art which no longer aped the speech
of Europe, and which could have been produced nowhere
ity of
but in
this country.
In this tendency, our music has taken a
Many of our gifted

composers are producing music deeply rooted in American
backgrounds, psychology, experiences, and culture; and it is
giant leap forward since the 1920s.
28
above all others, that American music is now

regarded with respect in foreign capitals. Today we are beginning to recognize perhaps for the first time what a role
George Gershwin played in bringing about this development.
for this reason,
29
1
THE GERSHVINS
George Gershwin's life was no rags-to-riches story.

Many writers, drawing a false inference from the fact that
Gershwin lived most of his childhood and youth in New
York's East Side, have described the poverty in which he was
raised. There was never such poverty. One of the things in
Gershwin's screen biography that most upset the composer's
mother was this distorted picture of George's boyhood.
"There was always money for piano lessons," she remarked
sadly. "My husband always made enough money to take care
of the family."
The Gershwin family resided
for so
many years
in the
30
East Side because that was where the father's varied busi-
and he was a man

where he worked. But most
which the family lived were roomy, airy,
ness establishments were usually located,
who had made
it
a practice to live
of the apartments in
comfortable, and at times comparatively expensive.
Since Mrs. Gershwin frequently helped her husband
employed a maid. George's

remember the time when the family
in business, the family usually

sister,
Frances, cannot
was without one.
When
the father did comparatively well,
the mother would invest her savings in diamonds. (The pan-
1893 and 1907 had left among many New Yorkers a

profound distrust in banks.) When bad times came, Ira was
ics of
Loan
some other reputable

loan agency, to pawn one of the diamonds, and on one or two
occasions, it had to be sold outright. But even during the
leaner years, the family never really knew want. The mother
was a level-headed administrator of the family finances,
and when fortunes sank there was still enough around to pay
not only for basic necessities but even for some luxuries.
sent to the Provident
Society, or
Frances recalls that during one of the hardest periods in the
summer camp for two sucremember when the

mother did not dress well; nor can they recall when they
themselves did not have spending money jingling in their
pockets, or the price to pay for a show or an expedition to
Coney Island. They clearly recollect the occasions when their
family history she was sent to a
cessive seasons.
None
of the children can
parents hired a private limousine to go to the races.
Both of Gershwin's parents came from St. Petersburg.

The mother, Rose Bruskin, belonged to a prosperous family,
her father was a successful furrier. The father, Morris Gershovitz, was also well esteemed in the old country since his
father had invented a model gun which was sold to the Tsar.
31
THE GERSHVINS
Rose was
in her early 'teens,
when Morris met and
fell in
and
strikingly beautiful,
love with her.
The Bruskins
migrated to America sometime in or about 1891 and, like so

many other immigrants, took root in New York's East Side.
Morris Gershovitz followed their
the
new world
trail
soon
after, attracted to
much by the opportunities it offered a

man as by Rose's intense eyes and her
not so
young, ambitious
sensitive face.
Once
vin,
in
America, Morris shortened his
and found a well-paying job
pers for women's shoes.
He
name
to Gersh-
as a designer of fancy up-
did not delay in pursuing and
winning Rose. They were married July 21, 1895 in a rathskeller on Houston Street in the East Side; she was nineteen,
he twenty-four. Family hearsay has it that the marriage festivities lasted three days. But Morris long insisted that it was
fact and not hearsay that one of those who stepped into the
rathskeller to drink the health of the young couple was young
Theodore Roosevelt, then president of the Board of Police
Commissioners in New York City.
The Gershvins settled in a small apartment on the
corner of Hester and Eldridge streets, right above Simpson's
pawn and loan shop. There, Ira Gershwin was born, December 6, 1896. The parents always called him Isidore, and
that is the name he retained until early manhood. But his real
name was Israel, a fact not known to him until 1928 when he
applied for a passport.
About a year
after Ira's birth, the family
moved
to the
Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, where the father found a

new job as a leather worker. They acquired roomy quarters
at 252 Snedicker Avenue, a two-story brick house which
rented for $15.00 a month. It was there that George Gershwin
was born, September
26, 1898.
The name which appeared

32
on the birth certificate was Jacob Gershwine. The "Gershwine" is apparently a misspelling for Gershvin, but "Jacob"
was both correct and official. As was the case with Ira, the
parents preferred using another name for him, and the name
they chose from the very beginning was George. Ira cannot
remember any time when he called his brother anything but
George. When George stepped out into the world of music he
changed the spelling of his second name to "Gershwin," and
the other members of the immediate family followed suit.
With the
birth of
two more children the family was
complete. Arthur came on
March
14, 1900.
Later in
life
enjoyed some success as a salesman of motion-picture
and
was
after that as a stockbroker.

in music.
his heart
like
films,
George's
has written over one hundred and
fifty
which are not without some charm. "I am," he

composer of unpublished songs."
George liked one of them well enough to play it on his radio
program. Arthur also wrote the score for a musical comedy,
The Lady Says Yes, which came to Broadway in 1945 and
departed after only eighty-seven performances. After an unhappy marriage, Arthur was separated from his wife, Judy;
they have one son, Mark George.
Frances (or as her brothers call her, "Frankie") was
born on the same birthday as Ira, on December 6, but in 1906.
She appeared on the Broadway musical-comedy stage in
such intimate revues as Merry-Go-Round and the second
Americana. She was also popular at parties as a singer of her
brother George's songs; though she had a small, somewhat
husky voice, George always praised the way she sang his
music, particularly the way she could keep the rhythm moving. In 1930, she married Leopold Godowsky, Jr., son of the
world-famous pianist of the same name, and himself an excelsongs,
some
He
But
he
of
will tell you, "a leading
33
THE GERSHVINS
lent violinist.
The son was
a celebrity in his
the inventor, with Leopold Mannes, of the

ess of color
own
being
right,
Kodachrome proc-
photography. The Godowskys live on an estate
where they have raised four children: one of them, Georgia, is named after her famous uncle.
Leopold's laboratory, built by the Eastman-Kodak Co., where
he continues his experiments, is within a hundred yards or so
of his home.
Since Morris Gershvin was so insistent on living close
to his place of employment, the Gershvins were a nomadic
tribe. The family remained on Snedicker Avenue only eight
months before returning to the East Side of Manhattan.
in Westport, Connecticut,
After that they occupied several different East Side apart-
ments
at
Forsyth Street near Delancey, Second Avenue on
7th Street, Grand Street, Second Avenue and 4th Street) be-
tween periods that brought them either to Coney Island, or to

129th Street in Harlem. Even Ira's retentive memory is incapable of following accurately
all
the
movements
of the
family between 1900 and 1917. He has, however, computed

that up to 1917 the family occupied twenty-eight different
apartments: twenty-five in
New York, and three in Brooklyn.
The mother was the

a proud and self-centered
hand of the family. She was

woman whose driving ambition
strong
and her family made her continually restless. Filled

with energies that found few outlets and frequently aspiring
toward financial and social goals well beyond her reach, she
for herself
was frequently an unhappy woman. She dominated the

household with the imperious authority of an empress.
It has sometimes been said that George "adored" his
mother. He actually did say once that "she is the kind of
woman about whom composers write mammy songs only I
mean them." But this was not strictly the case. Having inher-
34
ited
much
even
of her strength of will
selfishness,
he was often
at
and purpose,
pride,
odds with her. In
his
and
ma-
he became the dutiful son, solicitous, respectful, considerate, and generous. But his letters reveal that if he adored
anybody at all outside of his brother, Ira it was not his
mother but his father. His psychoanalyst, Dr. Gregory Zilboorg, has said that in his opinion, had the situation been
otherwise, had Gershwin adored his mother and only respected his father, he would have become a hopeless psychoneurotic. Gershwin's adjustment to his work and to his
life, says Dr. Zilboorg, was made possible only because his
relations to his mother and father were exactly what they
turity,
were.
The father was a gentle, mild-mannered man, who

had an easygoing nature, and was as soft as velvet. Partly
influenced by his wife, and partly by his own wishes to be a
good provider, he soon came to the conclusion that a salaried
job held no promise for him. He opened a small stationery
store in Brooklyn. Before long, he abandoned it for a restaurant on the East Side, in partnership with his brother-inlaw, Harry Wolpin. After that he passed from one business
venture to another, always in partnership with his brother-
At different periods he owned several restaurants:

one on Forsyth Street, another on downtown Broadway, a
third on upper Broadway near 145th Street, a fourth near the
Hotel McAlpin on 34th Street and Broadway. There was one
period when he ran four restaurants simultaneously. Also at
different times he owned and operated several Turkish and
Russian baths, including the St. Nicholas Baths on Lenox
Avenue and 111th Street, and the Lafayette Baths downtown. He was also at one time or another the proprietor ol
in-law.
35
THE GERSHVINS
and of two rooming houses at or near 42nd

owner of a cigar store which included a pool
parlor on what is now the Grand Central Station; and a bookmaking establishment at the Belmont Race Track. One sumseveral bakeries,
Street; the
mer, in 1904, he operated a
New
summer
hotel in Spring Valley,
York, which
accommodated two hundred guests.

Despite these many and varied adventures in the
world of business, he was not really an ambitious man, and
the accumulation of money meant little to him. When he was
well off, he would have allowed all the money to dribble
through his fingers had not his wife taken charge of the funds.
Usually he provided comfortably for his family. But there
were times when business reverses made things difficult. His
three weeks as a bookmaker, for example, were a major
financial disaster. And so many nonpaying relatives came to
stay at his Spring Valley hotel that he was lucky to break
even.
His highly personal and at times quixotic attitude toward life in general, and his Pickwickian comments, made
him something of a legend. There was a time when intimate
friends of George and Ira talked of gathering anecdotes
about him into a book. In any event, they enjoyed circulating
them by word of mouth.
Papa Gershwin's individual attitudes toward George
and his music were the source for more than one choice
story. When George was writing the Rhapsody in Blue, his
father counseled him: "Make it good, George, it's liable to be
important." When An American in Paris was written, the father proudly told a critic: "It
is
takes twenty minutes to play/'
George was wondering what to
very important music
it
few years later he learned

call his Second Rhapsody, and
36
he advised: "Call it Rhapsody in Blue No.

George. Then you can write Rhapsody in Blue No. 3,
in all seriousness
2,
you know, just like Beethoven."

once told George how much he liked one of the
songs in the then current Scandals, but he could not remember the title. George played for him the hit song of that
production, "Somebody Loves Me." The father shook his
head; this wasn't it. George then played the rest of the score.
No, the song wasn't there, either. "Well," George said at last,
"it must be something from another show, because I played
everything there is." As he spoke his fingers passed over the
piano keys aimlessly and struck a few bars from "Somebody
Loves Me." "That's it, that's it," the father cried excitedly.
Then with undisguised anger he added: "Why didn't you
play it for me in the first place?"
His approaches to subjects other than George's music
No.
4,
and No. 5
He
were equally his own. George once showed his father the
photograph of a famous Renoir painting of two women. When
the father heard that the original was worth about $50,000
he whistled with amazement. "Why," he inquired, looking
more intently at the photograph and pointing to each of the
two figures there, "who is she and who is she?"
Informed that the Einstein theory of relativity, which
had taken twenty-five years to be evolved, required only
three pages, his explanation was brief: "It must have been
very close print." He knew that a certain magazine article on
George was significant because though he could not remember the name of the magazine or the author he remembered
that it cost thirty-five cents. In the early days of radio, he tried
to convince George to buy a set because a friend of the family
had just acquired one. He reported to George the wonder of
the new invention. "Why, they even get Cuba. Not only Cuba
THE GERSHVINS
37
but even England!" "Not England," remarked George skepThe father snapped back: "Cuba guaranteed!"
tically.
He
once asked George to buy him a
"Sure," George replied.
"Go out and
select a
gift of a dog.
dog you
like,
and
check to cover the price." Papa's gratitude was cau"Thanks for the present so far, George."
Papa Gershwin died of leukemia at the Lenox Hill
Hospital in New York City on May 14, 1932, in his sixtyfirst year. Mrs. Gershwin survived not only her husband, but
also her son George. She died of a heart attack at her apartment at 25 Central Park West, New York, on December 16,
here's a
tious:
almost twelve years
1948, in her seventy-second year
after
George. Even George's maternal grandmother outlived him
by
five years.
38
2
CHILDHOOD
George and Ira grew up on the East
Side.
The two
boys were opposites. Ira was the son of his father: eventempered, somewhat withdrawn, malleable to discipline, gen-
by nature. Even as a boy his favorite pastime was reading.

He would devour nickel novels by the dozen, borrowing
them for two cents apiece from a nickel-novel circulating
library located in the back of a laundry on Broome Street. His
first clue to the pleasure to be found in good books came in
1906 when he read Conan Doyle's A Study in Scarlet; from
then on hard-covered volumes displaced the more lurid paperbacks. He also enjoyed doing sketching, and was an artle
39
CHILDHOOD
dent theatergoer. The theaters he went to were neighborhood
Unique Theater, a nickelodeon on Grand Street,

the first movie-house to open on the East Side; the Grand
Street Theater where sensational melodramas of Owen Davis
and others were performed in the flesh; and variety houses at
Union Square. He still recalls vividly his first visit to a burlesque house, the Palace on Third Avenue near 129th Street;
but what remains in his memory is not a provocative blackout, but the way one of the singers did "Wait Till the Sun
ones: the
Shines, Nellie."
from his mother a weekly allowance of

twenty-five cents, but he did not have to rely exclusively on
this stipend for his books and theaters. On most Saturday
evenings, his mother and relatives of the family played poker.
A special kitty was created to pay for the refreshments. It was
Ira's responsibility to get the delicatessen and the drinks for
the players, and he was permitted to keep the change, which
usually amounted to about a dollar.
George was of a stripe different from Ira. He would not
touch a book if he could help it, not even the nickel novels
which were a passion with all the neighborhood kids.
George's pleasures came from the pastimes of the city streets:
games like "cat," street hockey, and punch ball, in all three of
which he was highly proficient. His companions regarded
him as the roller-skating champion of Forsyth Street. In the
brawls of the streets he was capable of taking care of himself.
His temperament was like his mother's. He was headstrong, restless, assertive, dominating, dynamic. He was always getting into trouble. In school, he was often brought to
task for failing to do his homework, misbehaving in class, and
Ira received
getting involved in various peccadilloes. In three or four instances Ira
had
to
go to their school
P.S. 20,
on Rivington
40
and Forsyth streets to straighten out George's difficulties.

Things went somewhat more smoothly for George when he
went on to P.S. 25, on First Avenue and Second Street. But
there, as earlier, he was no scholar. His marks were just
passable. When he was graduated from the school, in 1912,
his mother sent him to the High School of Commerce for
commercial training for a career in accounting.
Ira, of course, did much better in public school. He was
graduated from P.S. 20 in 1910 with an average high
enough to enable him to enter Townsend Harris Hall, a
high school which demanded the highest scholastic ratings
from
its
students. His
mother wanted Ira
to
become a
school-
teacher.
By the mores of the city streets, anybody who studied

music was a "sissy" or "Maggie." George accepted the values
of his comrades. In his early childhood music meant little to
him, for there was not much of it at home. Several generations of Bruskins and Gershovitzes had failed to produce a
single musician, and the Gershwin parents were themselves
not particularly musical. The father sang fairly well and
sometimes went to the opera. When he wanted to make
music it was not by any traditional method but by blowing
through a comb which had tissue paper entwined through
the teeth, or by vibrating a clothes pin in his mouth, or by
giving a vocal imitation of a cornet. George sang the popular
tunes of the day; one of these, "Put Your Arms Around Me,
Honey," was a favorite. At school he learned such semiclassics as "Loch Lomond," "Annie Laurie," and "The Lost
Chord."
In spite of his assumed superiority to all kids of the
neighborhood who were forced to take music lessons, and
despite his seeming indifference toward all music except
41
CHILDHOOD
popular songs, George responded with an instinctive sympathy to music whenever he came into contact with it. He was
about six years old when, strolling along 125th Street, he
stopped outside a penny arcade and heard Anton Rubinstein's
Melody in F on an automatic piano. "The peculiar jumps in
the music held me rooted," he later recalled. "To this very
day, I can't hear the tune without picturing myself outside
that arcade
drinking
it
all
standing there barefoot and in overalls,
in avidly."
One
riod, while roller-skating in
day, during the
same pe-
Harlem, he heard jazz music
outside the Baron Wilkins Club where Jim Europe and his
band performed
tunes
them.
regularly.
The
exciting rhythms
made such an impression on him that he never forgot

From then on he often skated up to the club and sat
down on
the sidewalk outside to listen to the music.
told a friend that his lifelong fascination for

blues,
and raucous
and
spirituals
undoubtedly began
He
Negro
later
rags,
at this time; that
Jim Europe's music was partially responsible for his writing

works like 135th Street and parts of Porgy and Bess.
There were other musical associations. When he was
about seven or eight he attended two free concerts at the
Educational Alliance on East Broadway. A year later he was
the victim of a puppy-love affair with a little girl of the
neighborhood; what attracted him to her was the way she
sang. There were excursions to the local penny arcades
where, at the drop of a penny, automatic machines would
disgorge recorded music through rubber ear tubings.
However, the most significant of George's musical ad-
came in his tenth year. He was playing ball outsider

when,
through the open window, he heard the
25
strains of Dvorak's Humoresq ue played on a violin. The
performer was one of his fellow students, an eight-year-old
ventures
P.S.
42
prodigy by the name of Maxie Rosenzweig, who was appearing at a school entertainment. (Beginning with 1916,
Maxie Rosenzweig now called Max Rosen enjoyed a meteoric success on the concert stages of the world. ) Many years
later Gershwin described his reactions to this music: "It
was, to me, a flashing revelation of beauty. I made up my
mind to get acquainted with this fellow, and I waited outside
from three to four-thirty that afternoon, in the hopes of greeting him. It was pouring cats and dogs, and I got soaked to
the skin. No luck. I returned to the school building. Rosen
had long since gone; he must have left by the teachers' entrance. I found out where he lived, and dripping wet as I was,
trekked to his house, unceremoniously presenting myself as
an admirer. Maxie by this time had left. His family were so

amused, however, that they arranged a meeting. From the
moment we became the closest of friends. We chummed

we lavished childish affection upon each
other in true Jean Christophe fashion; we exchanged letters
even when only a week and some hundred blocks lay befirst
about arm-in-arm;
tween
us."
Maxie was the one who opened the world of good

music to George. He played for George, talked to him about
the great composers, explained to
him what made up the
elements of a musical composition. Gershwin's curiosity
now
aroused, he began experimenting at the keyboard at a friend's
house on 7th Street. He started by trying to reproduce the

tunes he knew with the right hand while inventing some
kind of harmonic background with the left. Then he tried
making up melodies of his own. One of these he brought to
the attention of Maxie
who
"You haven't got it in you

word for it. I know."
to
told him firmly and candidly:

be a musician, George. Take my
43
CHILDHOOD
In 1910 a piano was brought into the Gershwin household on Second Avenue and 7th Street. Rose Gershwin's sis-
had recently acquired one and Rose was instantly fired

with the ambition of having one in her own home. Actually
she was thinking more of Ira than of George when she
ter
planned some musical training for her family, for Ira had
been taking lessons with his aunt, Kate Wolpin, on and off
since 1908. As soon as the upright was put in place in the
living-room, George attacked it, amazing the family by playing some of the tunes he had already picked up on his
friend's piano. But the mother still intended the piano for Ira.
Kate Wolpin says that Ira was above average in musical
intelligence and receptivity. But his progress through Beyer's
exercise book was sluggish. Suspecting that the fault lay in
the fact that a doting aunt did not make for good instruction,
she decided to step aside for another teacher. It was at this
point and not long after the appearance of a piano in the
Gershwin home that Ira called it a day, having completed
From then
on, the piano
was
teacher was a Miss Green who, for
fifty
only thirty-two pages in Beyer's.

George's.
George's
first
him rigidly through Beyer's. From the

beginning George brought to the piano an intensity he had
cents a lesson, led
shown for little
else.
He was now continually at the keyboard:
sometimes practicing, most often improvising and inventing.

Instinctively he sensed that Miss Green's formal and unimaginative instruction was not what he was looking for in his
determination to uncover for himself the hidden mysteries in
music. He changed teachers three times without finding an
answer to his needs. Two of them, like Miss Green, were
American. The third was a Hungarian named Mr. Goldfarb
who was so highly regarded in the neighborhood that he
44
command $1.50 a lesson. Mr. Goldfarb had a flowing

mustache and a lordly air. His approach to piano instruction
was unique, avoiding scales, exercises, or even the simpler
works of the masters, and concentrating exclusively on potpourris from the operas which he himself devised. It was this
diet that he fed George.
With music rapidly relegating all other interests and
diversions to insignificance, George now sought out friends
able to satisfy his hunger for musical knowledge. One of those
was a young pianist, Jack Miller, who played in the Beethoven Symphony, an amateur orchestra then giving concerts in New York. Impressed by George's enthusiasm, Miller
brought him, one day in 1912, to the studio of Charles
Hambitzer, a composer-pianist whom he regarded highly.
George played for Hambitzer the William Tell Overture the
way Goldfarb had taught him with exaggerated dynamics,
rubati, and uneven tempi. "Listen," Hambitzer told Gershwin, "let's hunt out the guy who taught you to play this way
and shoot him and not with an apple on his head, either."
Hambitzer later said that what attracted him immediately to Gershwin was the boy's deadly seriousness. Hambitzer offered to teach the boy, refusing to accept any
payment for lessons. He became the most important single
could
influence in Gershwin's musical development, probably the

decisive influence.
come to New York in 1908

father owned a music store. He
Charles Hambitzer had
from Milwaukee where his

had been born seventy miles from Milwaukee, in Beloit, on
September 12, 1878. In Milwaukee he received a comprehensive musical training from Julius Albert Jahn, one of
45
CHILDHOOD
Hugo Kaun, a
taught him harmony,
the finest piano teachers of the midwest, and

visiting
musician from Germany
who
counterpoint, theory, and orchestration. Hambitzer absorbed
musical knowledge
piano, violin, and cello,
knew when
or
As a child he could play the

though none of his immediate family
effortlessly.
how he
acquired this training. In short order
he mastered musical theory, and became a virtuoso of the

piano. As a young man he taught music at the Wisconsin
Conservatory and later directed the Arthur Friend Stock
Company orchestra at the Pabst Theater.

Kaun prevailed on Hambitzer to leave Milwaukee
New
for
and opened a piano studio in

the Morningside Park district where he became so popular
that within a brief period he had seventy pupils. He also
became a member of a thirty-two piece orchestra, conducted
by Joseph Knecht, which gave concerts seven days a week,
two to four hours a day, at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. These
were by no means merely salon concerts devoted to popular
and semiclassical favorites, but presented excellent symphonic music; the New York Times often listed these concerts
among the major musical events of the city. Hambitzer was
soloist in important piano concertos, and one of the violinists
in the orchestra remembers his appearing also as a violin and
cello soloist. However, a search among old Waldorf-Astoria
Orchestra programs has failed to substantiate this.
Hambitzer was one of those rare musicians to whom
musical expression of every kind comes as naturally as
breathing. He could give a competent account of himself on
about half a dozen orchestral instruments, besides the piano,
violin, and cello. He could read fluently at the piano a complicated piano score, and his sight-reading was phenomenal.
York. Hambitzer did so
46
He had
a fantastic
memory and
A keen
America to
a fabulous ear.
student of modern music, he was one of the
first
in
perform publicly Schoenberg's piano pieces.

He was a composer of both classical works and popular music. In a serious vein he wrote several orchestral tone
poems, and a suite for Twelfth Night which was used for a
Sothern and Marlowe production. Some of his music was
played by the Waldorf-Astoria Orchestra, while the suite was
given by the Beethoven Symphony. In the year Gershwin
came to study with him, Hambitzer completed an operetta
score,
The Love Wager, which
starred Fritzi Scheff
and
toured the country for a year. Later he wrote a second

operetta which
was never performed, and
also
some popular
songs.
Hambitzer made
little effort to
get any of his works
published: partly because he was impractical, partly because
he seemed devoid of any ambition for financial success or

personal glory, and mostly out of a stifling sense of creative
inadequacy. As soon as he finished a composition he would
toss his manuscript aside, forget about it, and start something else. About the only works of his that were performed
were those that had been commissioned. Everything else
collected dust in closets and on shelves without any attempt
on his part to get them recognition. After his death, most of
his manuscripts
disappeared mysteriously;
it
is
more than
probable that he had destroyed them.
He was
man dogged by
tragedy as well as
artistic
marriage in Milwaukee when he was twentytwo proved unhappy and divorce followed four years later.
In 1905 he married a girl from Waukesha with whom he
frustration.
had fallen madly

became a victim
in love. After they
came
to
New
York she
day in
of tuberculosis and, returning one
47
CHILDHOOD
1914 to his studio, he found her dead in bed of a lung hemorwas adopted by the mother's family
in Waukesha where she lives today, the wife of a surgeon,
and the mother of three children. The death of his beloved
rhage. Their child, Mitzi,
wife sent Hambitzer to feverish work and long hours as an
escape from memories.
He
pursued teaching, composition,
and performance with an almost fanatic intensity. He now

disregarded his health completely. Always delicate of constitution, this self-neglect did
much
to hasten his death.
He
died of tuberculosis in 1918, four years after his wife; he was

thirty-seven.
Hambitzer was the right man at the right time in

life. He gave the boy direction and purpose, background and training. He stimulated and inspired him. Gershwin's piano technique was strengthened through a rigorous
application to exercises and scales; he was initiated into the
Gershwin's
by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin,

and even such modern composers as Debussy and ( remarkable when the year is considered, 1913) Ravel. Hambitzer was primarily concerned with teaching Gershwin the
piano, but he did not fail to make the boy conscious of
harmony, theory, and instrumentation. "I was crazy about
that man," Gershwin later confessed. He scouted his neighborhood to recruit more pupils for him and found ten candidates. As a successful composer, Gershwin never failed to
acknowledge his indebtedness to Hambitzer.
Hambitzer appears to have been conscious of Gershwin's latent ability from the beginning. He wrote to one sister: "I have a new pupil who will make his mark in music if
anybody will. The boy is a genius, without a doubt; he's
crazy about music and can't wait until it's time to take his
great literature for the piano
Liszt,
48
No watching the
clock for this boy." To another sister

wrote about Gershwin: "The kid has talent, and I
believe I can make something of him."
The teacher inflamed the boy with his own passion for
music. Gershwin acquired a gray bookkeeper's ledger into
which he neatly pasted pictures of great composers and performers which he found in current newspapers and magazines. He also carefully attached programs of the concerts he
attended, for by now George was a devoted concertgoer. "I
listened not only with my ears, but with my nerves, my mind,
my heart. I listened so earnestly that I became saturated with
lessons.
he
later
music.
Then
went home and
listened in
memory.
I sat at
the
piano and repeated the motives." Between 1912 and 1913

he heard performances of the New York Philharmonic
Orchestra, the
New
York Symphony Society, the Beethoven

Symphony Orchestra, and virtuosos
Orchestra, the Russian
Leo Ornstein (then the enfant terrible of modern music),

Leopold Godowsky, and his friend Maxie Rosenzweig. He
like
also attended various concerts at
such local auditoriums as

those at Wanamaker's and Cooper Union. Of course, he also
attended performances at the Waldorf-Astoria whenever
Hambitzer was
a program for April 13, 1913 presented his teacher in the Rubinstein
Minor Concerto.
soloist;
Gershwin was soon appearing publicly as a pianist.

At the High School of Commerce, which he entered in 1912,
he played at the school assembly. In the summer of 1913 he
found a job as a pianist for $5.00 a week at a New York State
resort in the Catskill Mountains.
He was
also
composing
mostly popular music. Some-
time in 1913 he wrote his first song, "Since I Found You,"

which was never published; years later he remarked with
considerable
amusement how, midway
in
that song, his
49
CHILDHOOD
course was arrested by his inability to progress from
ma-
His second composition, while never published, was

publicly performed. Early in 1914, the Finley Club, a literary
society to which Ira belonged, held its annual entertainment
jor to F.
at the Christadora
House on Avenue B. Since
Ira
was on
the arrangement committee, he put George on the musical
program
for the third and fifth numbers. In the fifth, George

appeared as piano accompanist for several vocal selections,
but in the third he gave a piano solo. Neither the composition
nor its author are identified the program merely reads "piano solo by George Gershvin" but the piece was a tango for
the piano, and the author was Gershwin himself hiding modestly behind anonymity.
This concern for popular rather than classical idioms
in his first creative efforts is not without significance. It reveals that even at this early stage Gershwin's future direction
was clear to him. Not even Hambitzer's determination to put
him on a strict classical diet could keep George from those
succulent dishes which were his favorite food. In the letter in
which Hambitzer described George to his sister as a "genius"

he also makes the following observation: "He wants to go in
for this modern stuff, jazz and what not. But I'm not going to
let him for a while. I'll see that he gets a firm foundation in
the standard music
first."
The formal lessons might be devoted
exclusively to the
masters, but George's private hours of creation belonged to
he was a passionate admirer

Ragtime Band" which was then a rage. Again and again he tried
convincing his teacher that there was musical significance to
good popular music, that an American composer should use
such native materials. Hambitzer was not convinced, and
Tin Pan Alley. Already,
in 1913,
of Irving Berlin's, particularly of Berlin's "Alexander's
50
said so.
But then,
as later,
Gershwin knew
his
mind; nobody,
not even the teacher he admired, could shake him.
One
now became
mind: to get a job

in Tin Pan Alley. This meant he would have to leave school,
and his mother was far from sympathetic. Though by now
she had become convinced that George was not suited for a
career as an accountant, she had vague ideas of setting him
up
idea
in the fur business.
One
fixed in his
thing she said firmly: she would
never tolerate hex son becoming a popular pianist, a profession which, she said, promised only uncertainty, if not out-
But George was uncompromising. After heated

words had been exchanged, the mother had to yield her
ground. The father, from the beginning, shrugged his shoulders with indifference at George's ambitions, since he always
wanted his children to decide their own future for themright disaster.
selves.
Through Ben Bloom, a friend of the family, George

was introduced to Mose Gumble, who held a managerial post
in
an up-and-coming song-publishing house called Remick's.
Gumble liked the way George played the piano and offered
him a job as a song plugger and staff pianist at a salary of
$15.00 a week. In his own way Gershwin was already making
modest history in popular music. He was the youngest song
plugger in Tin Pan Alley ( fifteen years old ) and the first inexperience'] employee hired by Remick's for that job.
,
51
3
TIN PAN ALLEY
The
troit
firm of
Jerome K. Remick had originated
in
De-
where, as the Whitney-Warner Publishing Company,
it
was swept to success on the crest of hits like "Creole Belles"

and "Hiawatha." In 1902, the establishment moved to New
York City,
to join there several other reputable or
up-and-
coming publishers, including Broder and Schlam (recently

from San Francisco), Joseph W. Stern, Charles K. Harris,
Witmark, Leo Feist, Shapiro and Bernstein, and Harry von
Tilzer. By 1914, the year in which Gershwin came to work for
Remick, it was one of the most powerful publishing houses
in Tin Pan Alley, by virtue of an impressive succession of
52
song hits: "In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree," "Chinatown, My Chinatown," "Shine on, Harvest Moon," "By the
Light of the
Moon," "Put on Your Old Gray
Silvery
Bonnet," "Oh, You Beautiful Doll," and, in 1914, "Rebecca

of
Sunnybrook Farm."
Gershwin was engaged
as a pianist; actually he was a

song plugger. The song plugger was the catalytic agent between the publisher who issued a song and the performers
who made
it
popular with the public. Selling songs was a
highly skilled and specialized science in Tin Pan Alley; the
plugger was the most important single element in making a

song a hit. It was the plugger's job to get his firm's songs represented, sung, or played wherever there
was an audience:
dance halls, saloons, music shops.

charm, his contacts, and his talent as
in theaters, restaurants,
Upon
his personal
salesman rested the success with which he sold his songs to
comedy and burlesque,

and restaurant orchestras, theater
managers, singing waiters, and proprietors of stores selling
vaudevillians, performers in musical
leaders of dance bands
sheet music.
The most
through
direct
way
stars of the theater,
of getting a song performed
many of whom were
was
given hand-
some bribes to include specific songs in their acts and shows.

But Tin Pan Alley had evolved other effective means of
reaching the public's ear in an age before radio, television,
talking pictures, extensive recordings, juke boxes, and disk
1903 a Brooklyn electrician created the motionwould introduce these slides as part
of the program of local motion-picture theaters, then plant a
singer in the audience to perform the song while the screen
jockies. In
picture slide. Pluggers
flashed the lyrics
gers
would
also
and appropriate illustrations. Song plugbe planted in variety theaters. When an
53
TIN PAN ALLEY
actor performed his song, the plugger
would
rise in his seat
in the auditorium and sing the chorus several times until it

was impressed on the consciousness and memory of the audi-
ence.
Gershwin's boss at Remick's was one of the ace song

all time, Mose Gumble. His career in popular
music began at seventeen, when he started to play popular
songs on the piano in a Cincinnati song shop. In the 1890s,
Gumble came to New York, where he found a post as staff
pianist for Shapiro, Bernstein and Company. He soon became the liaison between his firm and such theatrical stars
as George M. Cohan, Weber and Fields, and Nora Bayes. In
1903 he scored his first major coup by lifting "Bedelia" to
nationwide popularity and a million-copy sale. Subsequently
he was engaged by Remick's where he was personally responsible for the success of "In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree"
and "Oh, You Beautiful Doll," among other songs. Many
years later, as representative of the Music Publishers Holding Corporation, Gumble's job was still to sell old-time song
favorites, but this time to movie producers and radio per-
pluggers of
formers.
As head of the song-plugging division of Remick's,

Gumble had under his wing a string of pianists, of whom
Gershwin was one. Each pianist occupied his own cubicle.
From eight to ten hours a day, Gershwin was a prisoner to
the keyboard, pounding out the current Remick song releases for visiting performers in search of
ored people used to come in and get
Send You Back

breathe
to
down my
like dirt.
Me'
in seven keys.
back.
Some
new numbers.
me
to play
"Col-
them 'God
Chorus ladies used to
of the customers treated
Others were charming."
me
54
Among
the most charming was Fred As tail e, then
touring vaudeville with his sister Adele in a song and dance
"Wouldn't it be wonderful," Gershwin once asked

some day I could write a show and you and Adele
would star in it?" Remembering that incident, Gershwin
commented years later: "We just laughed then but it came
routine.
Astaire, "if
true."
Another visitor to the cubicle was a newspaperman

working for The Clipper, a voice of the theater world. He
was Max Abramson, who was so taken with the quality of
Gershwin's piano playing that he consistently referred to
him as "the genius" and did everything in his power to further the young man's career. Still another visitor was a young
lyricist named Irving Caesar. Caesar haunted the halls of
Remick's to try to sell his lyrics or to convince some of the
firm's staff composers to set his words to music. But, before
long, he found himself drawn to Remick's just to hear Gershwin play. "His rhythms had the impact of a sledge hammer. His harmonies were years ahead of the time. I had
never before heard such playing of popular music."
There were times when Gumble sent Gershwin out
of Remick's
to cafes, restaurants, or music stores to play
Remick songs or accompany singers in them. One such mis-
sion took
him
to Atlantic City,
New
Jersey: to the sheet-
music department of the local five-and-ten-cent store. At

night, when the store was closed, Gershwin would have to
make
the rounds of nickelodeons, saloons, and smaller res-
Remick songs and play them. ( The swankier places were the domain of only first-string pluggers.
It was in Atlantic City that Gershwin first met Harry
Ruby, in later days a highly successful popular-song composer and one of Gershwin's lifelong friends. Like Gersh-
taurants to place
TIN PAN ALLEY
55
Ruby was at that time a humble song plugger, working

Harry von Tilzer; and like Gershwin, Ruby had come to
win,
for
Atlantic City to plug songs in a five-and-ten-cent store during
the day, and in nickelodeons and saloons at night.
When work was
over, long past midnight, all the song
pluggers gathered at Child's Restaurant on the boardwalk

to talk shop. "I
still
recall George's eagerness, his intense
enthusiasm for his work, his passionate interest in every
phase of the popular-music business," Harry Ruby relates.

"Sometimes when he spoke of the artistic mission of popular
music, we thought he was going highfalutin'. The height of
achievement to us was a pop' song that sold lots of

and we just didn't understand what he was talking
about." But what impressed Ruby most, just as it had impressed Caesar, was Gershwin's piano playing. "It was far
and beyond better than the piano playing of any of us. As I
look back upon it I can say it was a completely different
musical world from ours, and we did not completely understand it at the time, though we all reacted to it instinctively.
I am also sure we were all jealous of him, too."
Day by day, hour by hour, Gershwin played the routine songs which Tin Pan Alley manufactured on an assembly belt. If he did not lose faith in the potentialities of
American popular music it was because two Tin Pan Alley
composers demonstrated even then that a popular song did
not have to be derived from a matrix to be successful. The
two composers were Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern.
Irving Berlin was already a giant figure in the Alley.
As a boy he had been a busker in the Bowery, a song plugger
for Harry von Tilzer at Tony Pastor's Music Hall in Union
Square, and a singing waiter in Bowery saloons. His songwriting career was initiated in 1906 when, as a singing
artistic
copies,
56
waiter for Pelham's Cafe, he wrote and published his
first
"Marie from Sunny Italy," to music by the cafe

Nick Michaelson. He kept on producing lyrics, and
three years later had a two-hundred-thousand-copy song in
"Sadie Salome Go Home." Then, as a salaried employee for
the publishing house of Ted Snyder, he began writing music
to his lyrics. In spite of the limitations then imposed upon
composers by Tin Pan Alley, he was able, in 1911, to write
a dynamic tune like "Alexander's Ragtime Band," which
evoked a nationwide craze for ragtime music and for social
dancing. Other rag tunes (notably "That Mysterious Rag,"
"Everybody's Doin' It," and "Everybody Step" ) made Berlin
the "king of ragtime," as he was billed when he appeared at
the Hippodrome Theatre in London in 1913. Meanwhile, in
1912, he had tapped for himself a new creative vein. The
song
lyric,
pianist,
death of his young wife of typhoid fever, contracted during

their
the
Cuba, inspired "When I Lost You,"

of the Irving Berlin ballads. It added immeasurably
honeymoon
first
in
to his popularity, for in short order
it
sold over a million
Then, in 1914, Berlin further extended his horizon

by writing his first complete score for the Broadway stage,
Watch Your Step, starring Vernon and Irene Castle.
The year of 1914 also saw the emergence of Jerome
Kern as a major musical figure on Broadway. This was the
copies.
first stage triumph, The Girl from Utah. Its prin"They Didn't Believe Me" accumulated the formidable sale of two million copies.
Kern was only fifteen years old when, in 1900, he
walked into the publishing house of Harms and asked to
see its head, Max Dreyfus. He had written a song he wanted
Dreyfus to publish. Dreyfus did not accept it, but he saw
enough value to it to offer Kern a salesman's job. Dreyfus' idea
year of his
cipal song
57
TIN PAN ALLEY
Kern to learn something of the way Tin Pan Alley

operated from the inside; he also wanted to keep a vigilant
eye on the boy. Before long, Dreyfus published some of
Kern's songs and used his far-reaching influence to further
Kern's songs by getting him various commissions from
singers and producers. In 1905, Kern supplied a few songs
for The Earl and the Girl; six years later came his first complete stage score, for La Belle Faree, with which the Winter
Garden was opened.
Gershwin had known and played "Alexander's Ragtime Band" as a boy, and had used it as testimony to demonstrate to Hambitzer the positive values of popular music. In
Tin Pan Alley Gershwin came to know other Berlin ragtime
melodies as well as his first ballad, and his admiration for
the older man deepened. Many years later he wrote: "Irving
Berlin is the greatest American song composer
America's Franz Schubert." But he already felt that way in 1914.
As for Kern, Gershwin first was attracted to his music
at the wedding of his aunt, Kate, at the Grand Central Hotel
in 1914. The band played a tune so exciting in its melodic
and harmonic construction that George rushed to the bandstand to inquire after its title and composer. It was Kern's
"You're Here and I'm Here" from The Girl from Utah.
Then the band followed with "They Didn't Believe Me," and
Gershwin knew he had found a model and an inspiration.
"I followed Kern's work and studied each song he composed.
I paid him the tribute of frank imitation, and many things
I wrote at this period sounded as though Kern had written
them himself."
Gershwin was already writing popular songs. Some
appeared later in musical productions, but at the time he
Wrote them, while still a hired hand at Remick's, they failed
was
for
58
to interest publishers. Among these efforts was "Drifting

Along with the Tide," which turned up in the Scandals of
ig2i and "Some Rain Must Fall" and "Dancing Shoes" which
found a haven in A Dangerous Maid in 1921. The first
was pleasing for its neat structural balance, with the symmetrical rise and ebb of the melodic line; the second had
interesting chromatic harmonies; the third was rhythmically
alive. When Gershwin showed these songs to Mose Gumble,
the latter dismissed them. "You're paid to play the piano
not to write songs," he said. "We've plenty of song writers
under contract."
Gershwin
brought these songs to Irving Berlin,

who was now a publisher, a member of the house of Waterson, Berlin and Snyder. Berlin liked the songs, praised them,
and foresaw a successful future for Gershwin, but made no
move to take any of them for his firm. Louis Muir, who
had written the ragtime classic "Waiting for the Robert E.
Lee," was also generous in praise.
But in 1916 the name of George Gershwin finally apalso
peared on a copy of sheet music. The song was "When You

Want 'Em You Can't Get 'Em," with lyrics by Murray Roth,
a young man Gershwin had met in Tin Pan Alley and who
subsequently became a motion-picture executive. Sophie
Tucker heard the song, liked the graceful arch of the mel-
ody with its occasional excursion into humor and colloquialism, and recommended it to Harry von Tilzer, who published it. Roth sold his lyrics outright for $15.00. George preferred gambling on royalties, and his total earnings were the
$5.00 he had received as an advance. One of the now-rare
printed copies
The
first
is
first
in Ira's possession.
published song was shortly followed by the
of Gershwin's songs to reach the musical-comedy stage.
59
TIN PAX ALLEY
Gershwin and Roth wrote "The Runaway Girl" a number

they felt was suitable for a Winter Garden production. They
played it for a Mr. Simmons of the Shubert office, who, in
turn, sent them to Sigmund Romberg, then the official staff
composer for Shubert. Romberg's career as one of the most
successful composers of operetta in America was still in the
future; but by 1916 (and within a period of onlv two vears)
he had completed scores for ten Shubert musicals, including
two Passing Shows, and six Winter Garden productions. He
was, then, already a person of some consequence in the theater.
Gershwin played for Romberg "The Runaway

together with several other songs.
of them, but
he was
sufficiently
Girl,"
Romberg accepted none
impressed with Gershwin's
talent to suggest the possibility of their collaborating
on
some new Winter Garden production. Exhilarated by such a

prospect, Gershwin kept bringing songs to Romberg, until
one, "The Making of a Girl," was selected and used in The
Show
Harold Atteridge, who wrote the lyrics

for most of Romberg's musicals, prepared the lyric. The
Passing Show opened at the Winter Garden on June 22,
1916. Gershwin's song was in a score that included fourteen
Romberg numbers, and passed unnoticed. His debut in the
theater netted him about $7.00.
There was still another "first" for Gershwin in 1916.
In collaboration with Will Donaldson, he wrote his first instrumental number in a popular style, a piano rag called
Rialto Ripples, which Remick published in 1917. With its
formal procedures, stilted syncopations, and a stilted melody
marked by rippling triplets, Rialto Ripples marked no revolution in American popular music. It was not even much of
a novelty. Piano rags had previously been written with outPassing
of igi6.
60
many
standing success by
the composer of "The
composers, including Scott Joplin,

of the principal
Maple Leaf Rag." One
syncopated music for the piano

time was Felix Arndt, composer of "Nola," which
figures in the writing of such

at this
Vincent Lopez has used so effectively as his personal theme

song. Arndt's influence on Gershwin has never been properly
stressed.
Gershwin often
visited
Arndt
at his studio in the
Aeolian Building on 42nd Street and was a great admirer
which the composer played to him by

the hour. It is this contact with Arndt that possibly stimulated Gershwin to write Rialto Ripples. In any event, Arndt's
ragtime writing for the piano, which Gershwin learned and
assimilated, was by no means a negligible influence in shapof his piano music,
ing Gershwin's
It
was
make piano
own
style of writing for the piano.
also
through Arndt that Gershwin came to
for Perfection and

Gershwin originally received a fee of $25.00 for six rolls, and afterwards somewhat
more than that. During 1916 he recorded about thirty popular numbers of the day, sometimes using his own name, and
sometimes hiding under such pseudonyms as Bert Wynn,
Fred Murtha, and James Baker.
later the
rolls in
January 1916,
same year
for Universal.
first
Gershwin's attitude toward the songs of Berlin and

Kern, and the piano music of Arndt, was characteristic.
It
enormous yearning to learn through imitation

and assimilation. He knew that to become an important
composer of popular music he had to acquire experiences
other than those he could accumulate in Tin Pan Alley.
Consequently, he went searching in other areas. The story
is told that in his cubicle at Remiek's, one day, he started
reflected the
TIN PAN ALLEY
61
practicing one of the Preludes
and Fugues from Bach's
Well-Tempered Clavier. A fellow song plugger asked: "Are

you studying to be a concert pianist, George?" Gershwin
answered: "No, I'm studying to be a great popular-song composer."
He
kept going to concerts, always trying to uncover in
the music of the masters harmonic, melodic, and rhythmic
approaches that he could use advantageously. And he kept on

with his music study. The piano lessons with Hambitzer continued until that teacher's death in 1918. And these were
combined with the study of harmony, theory, and orchestration with
Edward
Kilenyi.
was a Hungarian-born musician who had

studied with Pietro Mascagni in Rome and at the Cologne
Conservatory. He came to the United States when he was
twenty-two and attended Columbia University where he did
graduate work on a Mosenthal Fellowship. While attending Columbia, Kilenyi supported himself by playing the violin in the Waldorf-Astoria Orchestra, of which Hambitzer
was the pianist. Many years later, Kilenyi became famous
Kilenyi
as director of motion-picture theater orchestras in
and
New
York,
composer and musical director for various motionpicture studios in Hollywood, where he is now employed. His
son, also named Edward Kilenyi, has achieved world-wide
as a
recognition as a concert pianist.
One
and
urged him to accept Gershwin as a pupil in harmony and
theory. "The boy is not only talented," Hambitzer said, "but
is uncommonly serious in his love for music and in his search
for knowledge. The modesty with which he comes to his
piano lessons, the respect and gratitude with which he acday, in 1915, Hambitzer approached Kilenyi
62
cepts instruction
all this
wants to study harmony
has impressed and touched me.

seriously,
and
He
thought of you in
this connection."
became the second of Gershwin's two most

important teachers. There would be others, and they were
helpful. But Gershwin himself always looked upon Hambitzer and Kilenyi as the ones who played the most vital role
in shaping his musical development; and to the end of his
Kilenyi
Gershwin acknowledged his indebtedness to both men.

Gershwin studied with Kilenyi, on and off, for about five
years, but even after that he intermittently sought out his
life,
teacher for advice.
For the first eight months, Gershwin took two lessons

a week. Kilenyi clearly recalls his first impression. He saw
before him an earnest, soft-spoken young man, somewhat
diffident, with a kind of melancholy expression on his face.
Gershwin knew little about theory, and Kilenyi set out to
teach
him the fundamentals. After
writing,
transposition,
Three years
come
later,
that
modulation,
came
and
lessons in part-
instrumentation.
Kilenyi engaged orchestral performers to
to the lessons
and play
portant instruments of the
for
Gershwin each of the im-
symphony
orchestra.
The
follow-
ing year Kilenyi led Gershwin through an analytical dissection of
works
like
Beethoven's Eighth
Spring Sonata to point up
how
Symphony and
the
a great composer worked, the
devices he used and why, his harmonic techniques, and so

forth. In this
into
way, Gershwin acquired an intimate insight

to Debussy and
many famous musical works from Haydn
Richard Strauss.
Gershwin's exercise books
still exist.
They
meticulous he was in being accurate and correct,
reveal how
how fastidi-
63
TIN PAN ALLEY
ous he was about neatness.
They
also betray the fact that
once he learned basic rules Gershwin often tried to work out

his personal ideas in direct opposition to established practice.
In this he was encouraged by his teacher. While Kilenyi insisted that
he was
Gershwin must
lenient
when
first
learn the established styles,
his pupil tried to violate
them.
Kilenyi was also sympathetic to Gershwin's career in

Tin Pan Alley. This was in direct opposition to many later
musicians and teachers who felt he should devote himself
only to serious creation. In fact, Kilenyi felt strongly (and
said so in 1919) that Gershwin's popular music might easily
be a short cut by which the young man might gain a sympa-
more
serious endeavors. "You will face

Americans do trying to have their
works performed," Kilenyi told him and this at a time
when Americans were rarely performed. "It will bring you
nearer your goal if you become a big success as a popular
composer, for then conductors will come to you to ask for
thetic hearing for his
the same difficulty
all
serious works."
After the
first
eight months, the lessons
became
less
commitments, in and out of New

York, made a fixed schedule impossible between teacher and
pupil. But once an assignment was completed, Gershwin
always returned for more lessons. Sometimes he would bring
Kilenyi numbers from a recently completed musical comedy
for criticism and analysis. Sometimes he would come with the
regular. Gershwin's varied
orchestrations others
made
of his scores in order to study
them with his teacher and see if they could be improved.

"He had an extraordinary faculty or genius," says Kilenyi,
"to absorb everything, and to apply what he learned to his
own music."
64
While George was working
in
Tin Pan Alley, his
brother Ira was proceeding with his academic education in

preparation for a teaching career.
He
attended Townsend
Harris Hall, which was affiliated with the College of the
City of New York. Of all the city high schools, this made the
most exacting demands on students since it compressed
the regular four year course in three. While at Townsend
Harris, Ira edited, wrote, illustrated, and issued a one-page
newspaper, The Leaf, which he diligently brought out once
a week for twenty-six weeks for a single subscriber, his older
second cousin. (George imitated his brother by starting a
one-man periodical of his own, The Merry Musician. But he
lost interest in it after one issue. ) Ira soon found a wider audi-
ence for his talent by doing the illustrations for the school
magazine.
Despite his passion for reading and his
perament, Ira was no shining light at school.
an extra term
at
Townsend
Harris to
artistic
He had
make up two
before going on to the College of the City of
which he
finally
tem-
to stay
subjects
New
York,
entered in February 1914. Here he did

still taking first-
hardly better. In his second year he was
year mathematics. "The only possible way, seemingly, of getting a diploma/' he explained, "was to remain long
enough
one by squatter's rights." He stayed at

college only two years. In that time he wrote a regular column with Erwin Harburg (later "Yip" Harburg, the cele-
in college to earn
brated
lyricist,
and a
The Campus, and

The Mercury, both col-
close friend) for
contributed sketches and verses to

lege publications.
After transferring from day to night college, Ira

worked during the day as a cashier in a Turkish bath partly
owned by his father. But by now Ira had discarded all ideas
George Gershwin (1926). (Portrait by Steich en
"Portrait of a Concert Hall," a painting
Gershwin concert
ber
1,
1932.
at the Metropolitan
by Siqueiros. The George

Opera House on Novem-
V'*X
heft to right, front row:
Siqueiros,
Mabel Schirmer, Leopold
Godowskv, Jr., Mrs. Godowskv (Frances Gershwin), Dr. Zilboorg,

Leonore Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, and Leopold Godowskv. Sr.
Right to
left,
front row: Bill Daly,
Kay
Swift,
Lou and Emily
Palev,
Arthur Gershwin, Rose and Morris Gershwin. Second row: Oscar
Levant and Henrv Botkin
(left);
Max Drevfus
{right).
George Gershwin (1936)
George Gershwin (1933).

(Portrait by Carl Van Vechten
&
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George Gershwin, rehearsing the Los Angeles Philharmonic

(^j)- (Photo by Otto Rothschild)
George Gershwin
in Seattle for concert
appearance (1936).
George and
(1930).
Ira
Gershwin
George and
Ira
Gershwin collaborating
in Beverly Hills
Right, top:
Ira
Gershwin (1938). (Photo by ASCAP)
Right, bottom:
Ira
Gershwin today. (Photo
hi)
Tommy Amer)
(1937)
Morris and Rose Gershwin (in the 1890's).
Morris Gershwin
Rose Gershwin ( 1936) A camera

by George Gershwin.
.
portrait
1893
George Gershwin
at the
age of
ten.
Ira
Gershwin
at the
age of
six.
George Gershwin's principal teachers: above: Edward Kilenyi

(a drawing by Willy Pogany ) below: Charles Hambitzer ( photo
courtesy of Mrs. Hambitzer Reel).
;
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George Gershwin's student

lation;
exercises: above,
below, this passage shows
orchestration.
how
l_lti:
an exercise
in
modu-
systematically he studied
Top, the comment, "devilish hard, you say," is Kilenyi's. George

had expressed the opinion to his teacher that the use of chords
other than those he was studying
was a
on
his
harmony
"devilishly hard" proce-
how
dure. Bottom, this passage demonstrates
A-u^--
rt
....
li
r^ s
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worked
carefully he
exercises.
lilt
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The Gershwin
Among
Circle at the Atlantic Hotel, Belmar, N.
J.,
in 1926.
those in the group are George, Ira, and Leonore Gershwin;
Lou and Emily Paley;

Mischa
Levitzki;
and
Mrs.
Bela
Howard Dietz; Phil
Mr.
Blau;
S.
N. Behrman; Milton and Celia Ager;
Charig.
65
of
TIN PAN ALLEY
becoming a teacher, and for a time thought of studying
medicine. As a preliminary, he went to Columbia University
when he
term he
knew he would have to seek out his destiny away from the
Extension. But
failed chemistry in his
first
classroom.
The Lafayette Baths,

which were owned jointly by his father and uncle. Above the
baths there were three floors of hotel rooms. One of the hotel residents was Paul Potter, who had worked for the theatrical producer, Charles Frohman, and who had dramatized
Trilby for the Broadway stage. One day, Ira Gershwin
showed Potter one of his literary efforts, a brief sketch entiIn 1917 he worked as a cashier at
"The Shrine." Potter liked it, and suggested that he

it to the magazine the Smart Set, then edited by H. L.
Mencken and George Jean Nathan. It was accepted, and in
the issue of February 1918 it appeared under the pseudonym
tled
send
of "Bruskin Gershwin." It reads as follows:
Fascinated,
The Shrine
he would sit before
such times a sublime, shivery sensation

prehensive wonder at the beauty of
it,
he
felt
it all.
glorifying at
it,
.
and incom-
Reverent before
invigorated with the spirit of eternal youth and
happiness. Such soul-absorbing devotion to the embodi-
ment
was unprecedented.
And one day it lay shattered to a thousand sharp,
of an ideal
jagged fragments.
Panic-stricken, ashen-lined,
he was scarcely able
to
mutter, "Gawd! Seven years bad luck."
For
this Ira received the
payment
of $1.00.
Sylva, already a successful lyricist at the time, told
Bud De
Gershwin
GO
that he
would have preferred getting a
dollar check
from
Mencken and Nathan than several thousands from Remick's.

"This was very charming of him/' Ira remarks wryly, "but
the fact remains he left several millions/'
er
4
THE APPRENTICE
After spending more than two years at Remick's,
Gershwin had had enough of Tin Pan Alley. The cubicle was
smothering him. Now that one of his songs had appeared in
a Broadway revue he was thinking more and more in terms
of writing for the stage.
He
felt that
the theater provided a
young composer with a wider scope for his talent than did
Tin Pan Alley. Just as he had once sought out Tin Pan
Alley as the logical school in which to learn the song-writing
technique, so now he looked eagerly to the Broadway theater
as the university in which to develop a personal style.
He told Mose Gumble he was through with Remick's
early in 1917, then set out to find a
new
job.
One
of his
68
Negro arranger, Will Vodery, found him a place
friends, a
as pianist at Fox's City Theater in 14th Street, for $25.00 a
week. The City Theater was a vaudeville house with continuous performances. During the so-called "supper period,"
when
the orchestra went out for the evening meal, a pianist
took over the accompaniment for the
acts.
This was Gersh-
and his immediate predecessor at it had been

Chico Marx. For the first few acts he did well, particularly
since some of the numbers came from Remick's. But the headline act had original music which Gershwin was required to
read at sight from manuscript. He missed a few cues and
became flustered. Suddenly he discovered he was playing one
song while the chorus was singing another. The comedian
win's job,
exploited this
dilemma
for laughs,
making acidulous
asides
about the quality of the piano playing, guffawing, provoking

laughs from the players on the stage and the people in the
audience. Gershwin's humiliation was so intense that he
could no longer play a note. The act continued without music. Gershwin fled from the piano and told the cashier he was
quitting; he did not even bother to ask for his day's pay.
"The whole experience left a scar on my memory," he said.
His next job brought him for the first time into everyday contact with Jerome Kern. Kern and Victor Herbert had
collaborated on the score for a musical, Miss 1917, for which
P. G.
Wodehouse and Guy Bolton wrote
Ziegfeld
and Dillingham decided
was hired
to
the book, and which
produce.
Gershwin
week. His duties

consisted of coaching the chorus and ensemble numbers, and
rehearsing the principals. When he was not working, he
as rehearsal pianist for $35.00 a
members of the company,

recitals. Everybody was deeply affected by
Harry Askin, the company manager, became so
entertained the cast and other
with improvised
his playing.
S9
THE APPRENTICE
convinced of Gershwin's talent after hearing him that he

would soon be instrumental in bringing him to the attention
of the most powerful publisher in Tin Pan Alley, Max Drey-
George White, one of the dancers in the cast, remembered Gershwin's musicianship when, three years later, he
was looking for a new composer for his Scandals. Jerome
Kern once said that it was during this period that he knew
that "this was a young man who was going to go places." He
urged Gershwin, however, to be sure to get plenty of experience working in the theater before trying to write music for
fus.
it.
Miss igiy overflowed with theatrical riches. Besides

Dillingham, Kern, Herbert, Wodehouse, Bolton,
and Wayburn each already a person of some consequence
on Broadway the collaborators included: Joseph Urban as
Ziegfeld,
designer of sets and Adolph

star-filled cast
Bohm, choreographer. The

Van and Schenck,
included Vivienne Segal,
Lilyan Tashman,
Lew
Fields, Irene Castle,
Ann
Pennington,
George White, Marion Davies, and Peggy Hopkins. Yet Miss

lgij was a failure, surviving only a little more than a
month. The crowning paradox is that, despite the glittering
array of names to crowd that production, Miss lgij is today
remembered only for its rehearsal pianist.

Every Sunday evening leading members
of the Miss
lgiy cast appeared in concerts at the Century Theater.

Gershwin drew the assignment of accompanying. At one of
these concerts, Vivienne Segal sang two Gershwin songs, "You
oo Just You" and "There's More to the Kiss than X-X-X."
This concert was attended by a representative from Remick's
who accepted "You oo Just You" for publication. Thus a
Gershwin song, with Vivienne Segal's picture on the cover,
finally
reached Remick's
lists
in 1918.
70
This publication linked for the

of George Gershwin as composer
cist.
Caesar,
who was
first
time the names
and Irving Caesar
as lyri-
three years older than Gershwin, re-
ceived his academic education in the city public schools and
New York. He came to know

Henry Ford who, in 1915, made him the official stenographer of the Henry Ford Peace Ship which floated to Europe with the somewhat impractical intention of bringing
World War I to an end. When the war did come to an end,
through the more normal procedure of Germany's defeat on
the battlefield, Ford prevailed on Caesar to work as a mechanic in his automobile plant so that the young man might
acquire enough of the know-how of automobiles to be able
to run a branch of his export division. Caesar's job was a
at the College of the City of
menial one: he filled the grease in the rear axles on the

conveyor belt. But already his hopes for the future lay in the
song business. He spent his free time roaming around Tin
Pan Alley and
trying to market his lyrics.
Caesar first met Gershwin during his visits to Remwhere he soon returned habitually not to sell lyrics
but to hear Gershwin play the piano. They soon became
collaborators. Their first published song, "You
00 Just
You," was sung by Adele Rowland in Hitchy-Koo of 1918.
ick's,
Two
other songs, both published in 1918, appeared in musi-
cals a year later: "There's More to the Kiss than X-X-X" in

both Good Morning Judge and La, La Lucille, and "I Was
So Young, You Were So Beautiful" in Good Morning Judge.
One day Gershwin visited Caesar at the Ford plant,
and as Caesar worked at the conveyor belt, they talked about
song ideas. Ten rear axles passed Caesar by without his applying the necessary grease, and they all later burned out.
The foreman decided to shift Caesar to a clerk's desk where
71
THE APPRENTICE
he could do
less
damage. Not until he wrote
his first
major
success with Gershwin did Caesar find the confidence to leave
Ford's factory and concentrate on lyric writing.
Besides being collaborators, they became intimate

friends.
On Sunday
club which
met
evenings they would often go to a social
on 16th Street and Fifth

Avenue. There Gershwin would play the piano and Caesar
would sing and do improvisations for the enjoyment of their
friends. Gershwin and Caesar often went to the theater together ( mostly to Kern's musicals ) or would sneak into concerts at Carnegie Hall through the back entrance on 56th
in a restaurant
Street, or play billiards in
Broadway poolrooms.
Other close friends of Gershwin's during this period

were Herman and Lou Paley, cousins of Max Abramson.
Herman had studied with both of Gershwin's teachers,
Hambitzer and Kilenyi, and by the time Gershwin came to
know him well had already become a famous song composer
through such hits as "Billy" and "I Can Hear the Ukeleles
Calling Me." Herman Paley and Max Abramson, convinced
of Gershwin's extraordinary talent, would often bring him to
the Paley house. There George met Herman's brother, Lou,
a schoolteacher who lived in the world of books and whose
literary and cultural background George admired; also, Lou's
girl friend, Emily Strunsky. After Lou and Emily got married, George was a frequent visitor to their home on Saturday evenings to participate with Buddy De Sylva, Howard
Dietz, Morrie Ryskind, Joe Meyer, Irving Caesar, Groucho
Marx, and others in the discussion of books and the theater
that took place there regularly over steaming teacups, and
in playing games of charades which usually followed the
discussions. Once in a while, George would bring along Ira.
Ira met and became attracted to Emily's dynamic and highly
72
attractive sister, Leonore,
who
in the
middle 1920s became
his wife.
Gershwin remained singularly attached to both Lou

and Emily Paley throughout his life; he sometimes said that
Emily was the kind of woman he would have liked to
marry. Another lifetime friendship for George began in
the Paley household, with George Pallay, brother of Max
Abramson, and Lou Paley's cousin. Pallay, who was two
years younger than Gershwin, was a stockbroker who in
1918 had parlayed a $25.oo-a-week job as clerk for a stock investment house into several hundreds of thousands of dollars
of stock securities. He had a lust for living which the young
and still inexperienced Gershwin admired and envied. They
were drawn to each other and spent many an evening, late
in 1918, making the rounds of night clubs, entertaining
chorus girls, and spending money with a prodigal hand. In
time their friendship deepened. Pallay eventually became
one of the few friends to whom Gershwin entrusted his
most personal confidences.
Already Gershwin had the zest for parties, night life,
and beautiful women which remained with him permanently. But then, as later, his music came first. One of his
friends recalls that once at a party Gershwin had a beautiful
girl on his lap. When someone suddenly asked him to play
the piano he completely forgot the girl and got up so fast to
reach the piano that she fell on the floor. He was just as
impatient and just as eager in advancing his career as a composer. His single passion was to get ahead, to become as
good as Berlin or Kern. "He had such a drive," a colleague of
his says, "and he tried to move so fast, that he left the rest of
us far behind. We wouldn't, or couldn't, keep up with him."
He was playing his music to whoever would listen to

73
it.
THE APPRENTICE
Thus
it
was
Sigmund Spaeth,
that in 1918 he played for
then the music editor of the
New York Evening
Mail. Spaeth
recalled the event a quarter of a century later in the Herald
Tribune:
The boy
down
at the piano, on one of those oldand played

with good technique and a nice musical feeling. But with almost daily
sat
fashioned fringed
stools,
virtuoso performances vivid in
my
ears, I
did not repair to
the street for dancing.
Then Gershwin played a few serious pieces he had written

some novelettes and a toccata that were weak distillations
of Schumann and Liszt. Once again Spaeth felt that there was
nothing to shout about. Finally, Gershwin performed some
of his
own popular
The
want
my
tunes. Spaeth continues:
critic sat
up and paid
attention.
...
"If
you
advice, I'd suggest sticking to popular music for
a while and saving your serious work until some time

later."
Gershwin was continually on the alert for a position

him further ahead as a composer. One day
Irving Berlin came to him with an attractive offer. Gershwin
had recently impressed him with the quiet competence with
which he had put down on paper, from dictation, one of
Berlin's ragtime melodies. (The manuscript today is one of
Berlin's proud possessions.) Then Gershwin had played the
tune. "I'll never forget his playing," Berlin says. "It sounded
that could bring
like a different song."
Berlin needed an arranger and musical secretary and
74
was ready
pay well for the right man. "The job is yours,"

"if you want it. But I hope you don't take it.
talented
are
too
to be an arranger and secretary. If you
You
worked for me you might start writing the way I do, and your
own style might become cramped. You are meant for big
to
Berlin told him,
things."
Gershwin recognized the wisdom of Berlin's advice

and had the courage to turn down the offer. He would wait
for something more suitable to turn up. It did. While he
was working as an accompanist for Louise Dresser then
touring the Keith vaudeville circuit Harry Askin brought his
name
to the attention of
Max
Dreyfus.
Dreyfus was a power in the music industry. He was

head of the publishing house of T. B. Harms where his keen
musicianship and discernment were responsible for uncovering much latent talent and producing many a song hit. Dreyfus had worked his way up in Tin Pan Alley from the depths,
having begun as an errand boy for the firm of Howley and
Haviland. By gradual stages he progressed to the posts of
shipping clerk, song plugger, arranger, and minor executive.
His first major achievement as publisher was with Paul
Dresser's ballad, "J ust Tell Them That You Saw Me," which
he accepted for Howley and Haviland in 1895; it sold a
million copies and introduced into everyday conversation the
title phrase. In the early 1900s he joined up with Tom and
Alec Harms, first as arranger, then as song plugger, after that
as composer, and finally as executive. Dreyfus was responsible for taking an obscure composer of piano pieces and
overnight making him one of America's most successful
operetta composers for it was his decision that gave Rudolf
Friml the assignment to write the music for The Firefly in
1911.
He
also
helped discover Kern.
75
THE APPRENTICE
After Gershwin returned to New York from his tour

with Louise Dresser he met Dreyfus for the first time. Dreyfus
has said that when Gershwin came into the office he knew
nothing about the composer other than what Askin had told
him; Dreyfus, at the time, had not seen any of the songs
Gershwin had published. But that first interview impressed
him with the young man's earnestness, particularly when he
tried to explain the kind of songs he wanted to write. "He
was the kind of man I like to gamble on," Dreyfus said, "and
I decided to gamble/' He offered Gershwin a drawing account of $35.00 a week. There were to be no set duties or
hours. All Gershwin had to do was to keep on writing songs
and submitting them to Dreyfus. Under this novel arrangement, Gershwin began an association with the house of
Harms that yielded lavish financial rewards to all concerned.
For the next decade, beginning with "Some Wonderful Sort
of Someone" in 1918, Harms was Gershwin's exclusive publisher.
Dreyfus today firmly denies that he "discovered"

to advance Gershwin's career than to publish his songs. "A man with Gershwin's talent did not need anybody to push him ahead. His
Gershwin or that he did anything more
talent did all the pushing."
But Dreyfus' modesty and conon himself is well known.
sistent refusal to focus attention
There can be little question but that in that quiet, unassuming, and frequently inscrutable way of his, Dreyfus began pulling the strings for Gershwin from the moment he
hired him.
One day
came
to Dreyfus
producer by the name of Perkins

with the idea for a revue starring Joe Cook,
in 1918 a
and including a bicycle act, a twenty-five piece colored band

headed by Jim Europe, and sundry other attractions. Dreyfus
76
felt
the production had some merit, gave the producer an
pay for all orchestrations.

When Perkins further explained he needed five more musical numbers, Dreyfus instantly suggested the name of George
advance together with an
offer to
Gershwin.
That revue, Half-Past Eight, proved to be a comedy of

and mishaps. It opened, and closed, in Syracuse, New
York. Since Perkins could not pay for the advertised bevy of
chorus girls, he had to resort to the use of his male performers
wearing Chinese pajamas, their faces covered by large
umbrellas; in the finale he tried to pass them off as the
chorus-girl line. On opening night the deception might have
worked but for the unfortunate development that three of
errors
the umbrellas failed to function properly, mercilessly betray-
ing the sex of the chorus. "Half-Past Eight," remarked the

local
war
paper the following morning,
"isn't
worth even the
tax/'
By Wednesday matinee one of the principal

ing imminent disaster, precipitously
left
acts, sens-
the cast, leaving
behind a yawning gap in the production. How to fill the

hole? The producer urged Gershwin to go out on the stage
and play the piano. Diffidently, hesitantly, Gershwin went
out and played some of his own songs. This was one of the
rare occasions when his piano playing failed to make an impression. Since
the audience,
none
its
was known to anybody

was both frigid and silent.
of his songs
reaction
in
performance that Friday evening. Then it expired unlamented. Gershwin never

received the money promised him for his share in the collaboration ( about fifteen hundred dollars )
Another stage venture in which Gershwin was involved in 1918 did not turn out much happier. Nora Bayes,
Half-Past Eight played
its last
77
THE APPRENTICE
the dynamic singing star of vaudeville, the Ziegfeld Follies,
and musical comedy, came upon Gershwin's "Some Wonderful Sort of Someone" and decided to include it in Ladies
First, in which she was then starring. Midway in the show
all action stopped dead as Bayes monopolized the limelight
and went through a program of her specialties. For this
part of the show she required the services of a piano accompanist, and when Ladies First went on a six-week tour she
hired Gershwin. During the tour other Gershwin numbers
were interpolated into parts of the show, among them "The
Real American Folk Song."
When Ladies First came to Pittsburgh, one of those
who saw it was Oscar Levant, then still only a boy. Levant,
of course, had never before heard the name of Gershwin. His
ear, consequently, was at first fixed on the dynamic singing
star. Soon he found the piano accompaniment seizing his ear
and attention. He wrote in A Smattering of Ignorance: "I
had never before heard such a brisk, unstudied, completely
free and inventive playing, all within a consistent framework."
While on
from Cleveland:
this tour
Gershwin wrote Max Abramson
Baldwin Sloane
composer of Ladies
First ) told
me
he received $400 royalty from Trenton and Pittsburgh.

Zowie! Why didn't I write the show and let him interpo-
He gets 3% of the gross. ... I think Miss Bayes is

having my name put on the program as a writer of interpolated songs. If she does, shell be doing me a justice that I
late?
sorely need to get into the select circle of composers in
York.
spite of
Seriously, I
what
J.
am
New
thinking of writing a show. In
K. [Jerome Kern] told me.
am
getting
78
confidence and encouragement from this show, and B.
Sloane and his royalties. I'm going to
when
reach
make an attempt
New York.
Gershwin and Nora Bayes did not get along
well.
Gershwin's creative approach to accompaniment upset her,

particularly his
sudden impromptu interpolations
trapuntal countertheme, his
new
phrase, or his sudden leap into a
of a con-
treatments of a rhythmic
new
key. Singer
and
ac-
companist parted when Gershwin stoutly refused to alter one

of his songs at her suggestion. When informed by the proud
lady that even Berlin and Kern changed their songs for her
when she asked them, Gershwin answered: "I like the song
the
way
it is."
79
5
THE FIRST SONG HIT
THE FIRST MUSICAL
COMEDY
If 1918 had brought mostly frustration and defeat,
1919 was to be the first of Gershwin's banner years. Old songs
found a haven in various Broadway productions, including

Look Who's Here, The Lady in Red, and Good Morning
Judge. New songs supplemented the old, sprouting out in
Morris Gest's Midnight Whirl, Sinbad, and the stage show of
the Capitol Theater.
Much more
important to Gershwin than any individ-
was the writing

Broadway musical.
ual song
of his
first
complete score for a
In 1919, Alex A. Aarons, a young
bow
as a producer,
man making
commissioned Gershwin to write
all
his
the
80
music for La, La
Lucille.
At
this time,
nine, the proprietor of Finchley's, a
Aarons was twentyYork clothing es-
New
tablishment since grown famous. His father, Alfred E. Aarons,

was general manager of Klaw and Erlanger, and successful
composer. Alex was born and raised in Philadelphia where
he received some musical training and acquired a sensitive

discrimination and acute discernment. He was ever partial to
music with original approaches, new viewpoints, experimental techniques. The changing tonalities and chromatic harmonies in a song like Gershwin's "Some Wonderful Sort of
Someone"; the new attitude toward the popular-song form in
"Something About Love," in which the chorus ended in a
protracted sequence; the surprise chromaticisms in the verse
More
extended meSo Beautiful,"

where the melody of the chorus sweeps across twenty-four
bars instead of the more usual sixteen all this was the kind
of iconoclasm that delighted young Aarons. When, therefore,
Aarons decided to give up the clothing business for the theater, and made plans to produce La, La Lucille in 1919, he
of "There's
lodic line in "I
to the Kiss than X-X-X"; the
Was So Young, You Were
and unknown Gershwin

for the music. His father had more practical ideas, he preferred Victor Herbert. But the younger Aarons was stubborn
and Gershwin was hired.
The book by Fred Jackson, described as a "farce with
music," concentrated on the bedroom. John Smith, a dentist,
is left two millions by his aunt, but only on the condition that
he divorce his wife, Lucille, whom he had picked up on the
chorus line. An astute lawyer suggests to John that he divorce his wife, pick up the inheritance, and then remarry her.
Most of the action takes place in a bridal suite of a Philadelphia hotel to which John Smith comes to be compromised by
wanted the
relatively inexperienced
THE FIRST MUSICAL COMEDY
81
a corespondent who, carefully selected by Lucille, is the hotel scrubwoman. Since the hotel has no less than thirty-eight
John Smiths on the register, and since the adjoining bridal

suite is occupied by a newly married Mr. and Mrs. John
Smith, complications ensue to the embarrassment and, at
times, dismay of all concerned, mcluding many innocent and
soon outraged visitors.
With John E. Hazard as the dentist and Janet Velie as
Lucille the musical tried out in Atlantic City and Boston. On
May 26,
1919,
it
became the
first
musical to play the recently
opened Henry Miller Theater. All things considered, La. La

Lucille did well. It suryiyed the summer heat and the Actors
Equity strike to achieve a run of over one hundred performances.
The Gershwin score had a dozen numbers. Two of

them were lifted out of the composer's trunk: 'The Ten
Commandments of Love," which he had written for HalfPast Eight, and "There's More to the Kiss Than X-X-X," in
which he had collaborated with Irving Caesar. All the others
to lyrics by .Arthur Jackson and B. G. De Syl\ a
were new,
and six were published by Harms. The entire score is functional and articulate, but not even the best songs reveal much
more than professional slickness. The principal song was "Nobody but You/' which had an insâtiating Jerome Kern-ish
charm; a secondary hit, 'Tee-Oodle-Um-Bum-Bo," had a vi-
tal
rhythmic impulse.
On
October 24, 1919, a new motion-picture palace

in New York City on Broadway and 51st Street, the
Capitol Theater. For the opening week, Xed Wavburn prepared a sumptuous stas;e show prefacing the feature pictiue,
and he used two new Gershwin songs including "Come to
opened
82
the
Moon"
(lyrics
by Lou Paley and Ned Wayburn) and
"Swanee."
The idea for "Swanee" was born during a lunch at

Dinty Moore's. Irving Caesar and Gershwin had met to discuss new ideas for songs. Caesar suggested that they write a
one-step in the style of "Hindustan," then in vogue. "Let's
use an American locale," Caesar suggested. And Gershwin
added: "Just like Stephen Foster did in 'Swanee River/"
It did not take them long to agree on the subject of Swanee
River. They kept on discussing the idea and allowing it to
acquire a definite shape, as they rode atop a bus to Gershwin's apartment then located at 520 West 144th Street
in the Washington Heights section of New York. By the time
they reached there, much of the song was clear in the minds
of both composer and lyricist. They went to the piano in the
living-room to work out the details.
At the moment, in the adjoining dining-room which

was separated by drawn portieres, a poker game was in progress. At first the poker players were annoyed at the disturbance caused by George's playing and Caesar's singing as they
worked on their song. One of the card players called out:
"Can't you two work some other time?" But as the song began assuming a recognizable form and personality and the
process had taken less than half an hour and after Gershwin
had played it through several times, the card players became interested. The game was momentarily stopped. Papa
Gershwin improvised an obbligato for the melody by whistling through tissue paper in the teeth of a comb.
"Swanee" was one of the songs Gershwin brought to
Ned Wayburn for the Capitol Theater show, and Wayburn
took it without hesitation. How well he thought of it can be
guessed by the impressive setting he provided. After the song
S3
was introduced, sixty chorus girls, with electric lights glowing

on their slippers, danced to its rhythms on an otherwise darkened stage. Since the orchestra then performing at the theater
was the famous band of Arthur Pryor, "Swanee" was given
in a band arrangement.
The audience reaction was, at best, only lukewarm.
Gershwin and Caesar loitered outside the theater to see how
the sheet music was moving in the lobby and were mortified
to see how few buyers there were. The sale was just as poor
in the shops. Max Dreyfus tried to console Gershwin by telling him that even if the song were not commercial, it was
good, and a credit to both the composer and the publisher.
Caesar was so discouraged that, one day, he offered to sell
all his rights to the lyrics for $200.00, but was dissuaded by
Gershwin from doing so.
The history of "Swanee" might have ended at this
point but for the fact that one of the most magnetic stars of
the Broadway stage became interested in it Al Jolson. Jolson
had recently met Gershwin in Atlantic City, New Jersey,
when La, La Lucille tried out there; they were introduced
by Charles Previn, the conductor of the Gershwin show.
When Jolson ran an elaborate party in New York City sometime later he did not forget to invite Gershwin, who had made
a good impression on him. Gershwin played some of his songs.
When he came to "Swanee," Jolson seized it, saying he
wanted it for one of his Winter Garden shows. Jolson made
the difference. When he introduced it at a Sunday night concert at the Winter Garden he brought down the house. This
reception encouraged him to interpolate it in Sinbad. The
song
now caught on,
spreading through the country like con-
it sold over two million records and

one million copies of sheet music. Each of the two collabo-
tagion. In a year's time
84
rators earned approximately $10,000 in royalties during the

first
year, a
sum
that then represented to each something of a
fortune.
mous
The song also became popular in Europe, made faLondon by Laddy Cliff and in Paris by Harry Pilcer.
in
even reached Constantinople where, in 1920, a Russian

musician named Vladimir Dukelsky but subsequently famous as Vernon Duke bought a copy of the sheet music and
into ecstasies. The bold sweep of the tune,
was "sent
its rhythmic freshness and, especially, its syncopated gait, hit
me hard and I became an 'early-jazz* fiend." * And a dedicated Gershwin fan.
It
More than a quarter of a century after it was introduced, "Swanee" was still popular enough to deserve flattering treatment by the talking screen: first by Al Jolson in The
Jolson Story and later by Judy Garland in A Star Is Born.
"Swanee" is very much like many another Southland
song emanating from Tin Pan Alley a lilting thirty-two bar
sentimental melody with bounce. But there were important
differences. There was pleasing contrast in mood from the F
minor of the verse to the F major of the chorus, and the use
of D-natural instead of D-flat in the ninth and twenty-five
bars of the verse contributed novelty to the melodic line. Besides this, the unorthodox addition of a sixteen-bar "trio"
after the chorus was an attempt to break through the constricting boundaries of the popular-song form.
Two other Gershwin items belong to the year 1919.
One was a national anthem, "O Land of Mine," lyrics by
Michael E. Rourke (better known as "Herbert Reynolds,"
the name he used writing lyrics for Jerome Kern), sub-
* Passport to Paris, by Vernon Duke. Boston:

pany, 1955.
Little,
Brown and Com-
85
mitted in a contest sponsored by the
New York American for
was published anonyAmerican

on
March
mously
2, 1919. The judges
including John Philip Sousa, John McCormack, Irving Berlin, Joseph Stransky, and John Golden
gave Gershwin's anthem the lowest cash prize: $50.00.
In 1919, Gershwin also wrote a string quartet, entitled "Lullaby," which was never published or performed.
The quartet provides evidence that Gershwin was already
making notable progress in part writing, in tasteful harmonization, and in grateful writing for the four strings. The principal melody, which appears at once in the first violins, is a
dolorous theme in the blues style which Gershwin later used
for "Has Anybody Seen My Joe" in 135th Street.
This quartet was the source for a familiar Gershwin
anecdote. In 1923, he studied harmony for several months
with Rubin Goldmark. It was not a rewarding experience since
Goldmark's formal and traditional approach to harmony ran
counter to Gershwin's own tendency toward deviation. One
day, Gershwin showed his teacher the "Lullaby" which he
had written four years earlier. Goldmark told him: "Good,
very good. I see that you are already beginning to profit from
a
first
prize of $5,000. Gershwin's entry

in the
your harmony lessons here."
Undoubtedly
it
was George's preoccupation with pop-
ular music that finally gave shape to Ira's nebulous literary
and made him concentrate on the song lyric.

initial sale to the Smart Set, Ira Gershwin kept on writing little humorous pieces and epigrams, two
of which were marketable: a humorous questionnaire for
song writers for which the New York Sun paid him $3.00, and
a verse published in Life which brought him $12.00. The idea
aspirations
After making his
80
him sometime in 1918. If

George was making headway in popular music, why not try
his hand in the same field, but with words? Thus he began
writing his first lyrics, for which he assumed the name of
Arthur Francis (expropriated from the first names of his
brother and sister) so that he might not be suspected of capitalizing on his brother's budding reputation. While doing
this, he earned his living holding down different jobs: a cashier for the Col. Lagg Empire Show, a traveling circus; a reviewer of vaudeville for The Clipper; an assistant in a
photographer's dark room; an employee in the receiving
department of Altman's department store.
George set one of Ira's lyrics to music, "The Real
American Folk Song," which Nora Bayes interpolated in Ladies First. This was the first song which George and Ira
Gershwin wrote together, and it was Ira's first lyric to receive public performance. It was never published.
of writing song lyrics occurred to
The Real American Folk Song

Near Barcelona the peasant croons
The old traditional Spanish tunes;

The Neapolitan Street Song sighs
You think of Italian skies.
Each nation has a creative vein
Originating a native strain.
With
folk songs plaintive
In their
own
American
and others gay,
peculiar way.
folk songs, I feel
Have a much
stronger appeal.
CHORUS
The
real
American
mental jag
folk
song
is
a rag
87
A rhythmic
The
tonic for the chronic blues.
critics called it
a joke song,
But now
They've changed their tune and they
like it
Somehow.
For
it's
With
inoculated
a syncopated
Sort of meter,
Sweeter
Than
a classic strain;
Boy! you can't remain

Still
For
and quiet
it's
riot!
The real American folk song is

You taste, and it elates you
And
like a
Fountain of Youth;
then invigorates you.
The real American folk song
A master stroke song

Is a rag!
The
began with this

and with
equally slick music which, in the chorus, makes a daring
and characteristically Gershwinian excursion from D major
to B-flat major (on the words, "but now they've changed
collaboration of the Gershwins
brisk, at times skillful,
and quite
professional, verse,
their tune").
For the time being the brothers worked together only

and starts. Not until 1924, when Ira became successful in his own right, and without the benefit of George's
music, did the partnership become permanent.
by
fits
88
6
'he is the beginning
OF SOPHISTICATED jazz
as a
For over a decade, George White had been appearing

dancer in leading musical comedies and revues, includ-
Show of 1914 and the Ziegfeld Follies of

he decided to turn to producing, planning a
revue that would out-Ziegfeld the Follies and out-folly Ziegfeld in lavish displays for the eye in sets, costuming, and
ing the Passing
1915. In 1919
beautiful
girls.
On
June 2, he presented the Scandals of 1919, whose

cast included himself, Ann Pennington, Lou Holtz, Yvette
Rugel, and Ona Munson. Except for the dancing of Ann
Pennington, the "shimmie queen," the first Scandals did not
have much distinction. The book and lyrics by Arthur Jack-
89
BEGINNING OF SOPHISTICATED JAZZ
son and George White, and the music by Richard Whiting,

were so routine that Arthur Hornblow complained in the Theater Magazine: "When there was so much money to be spent,
Mr. White might have set aside a few dollars for a good scenario writer."
But Ziegfeld apparently saw in the Scandals a serious

competitor. Soon after its opening he wired White a serious
offer of $3,000 a week for him and Ann Pennington to appear
in the Follies. White countered by offering $7,000 a week
for Ziegfeld and his wife, Billie Burke, to appear in the Scandals.
In succeeding editions, White did manage to become
The sinuous stairways down which beaudescended in stately procession, the living curtains
draped with nude females, the orgy of colors in sets and cosa rival to Ziegfeld.
tiful girls
tuming, the breath-taking stage effects
were
all this
in the Scan-
grand Ziegfeld manner.

Unlike Ziegfeld, who preferred buying stars and topflight collaborators rather than developing them, George
White gambled on lesser-known personalities when he had
faith in their ability. For his second edition, in 1920, he asked
George Gershwin to write all the music, even though up to
this time Gershwin had produced only one song hit and had
written only one complete Broadway score. White had never
forgotten the way Gershwin played the piano when both of
them worked in Miss 2917.
It was not a lucrative assignment for the composer.
All White paid Gershwin was $50.00 a week. In later editions,
Gershwin's salary went up to $75.00, then $125.00 supplemented, of course, by the royalties he received from publication. But the Scandals was an attractive showcase for any
composer, and Gershwin accepted the offer eagerly.
dals
in the
Gershwin provided the music
for five editions,
up
to
and including the Scandals of 1924. In the first two editions

was Arthur Jackson; in the last three, E. Ray Goetz,
Bud De Sylva, and Ballard McDonald. Many of the fortyfour songs Gershwin contributed to the five Scandals are
his lyricist
hardly indicative of his creative potential.

ten,
and deservedly
so.
Some
are forgot-
Others are sometimes revived; but
machine-made to appeal to tastes

discriminating by Gershwin's best music. Still others
these are too obviously
made
so
are interesting only in passing details, noteworthy in that they
betray the occasional restlessness of the composer to search
new ways of saying old things. But two songs are truly
Gershwinian in their freshness and originality: "I'll Build
a Stairway to Paradise," a production number in the 1922
edition which Carl van Vechten at the time said represented
"the most perfect piece of jazz yet written"; and "Somebody
Loves Me," which was unforgettably interpreted by Winnie
Lightner in 1924.
The first had its source in a lyric which Ira Gershwin
had previously written and called "New Step Everyday." Ira
showed this lyric to Bud De Sylva, who liked one line parout
ticularly
"I'll
build a stairway to paradise."
new
De
Sylva sug-
be written using that line as a title,

and he helped Ira write it; George provided the music. Since
both De Sylva and George Gershwin were then planning the
songs and lyrics for the 1922 Scandals, the song went into
the score. White gave it a lavish background: a gleaming
white stairway dominated the stage, and dancers in black
cavorted up and down the stairway as the song was sung. The
song itself had an intriguing melody characterized by a five7
hat gave the melody
step ascent and a five-step descent.
particular interest was the unexpected intrusion of flatted
gested that a
lyric
91
thirds

and sevenths, the subtle enharmonic changes, and the
daring accentuation.
The appeal
lodic, for in this
of
"Somebody Loves Me"
song Gershwin tapped the
lyricism that henceforth
would
is
primarily
me-
rich, full-blooded
identify his best-loved songs.
Gershwin s way of suddenly interpolating a flatted third in

the melody once again personalized his writing. The nebulous harmony was also a part of the song's charm.
"Somebody Loves Me" was one of Gershwin's greatest hits since "Swanee." It became a rage in Paris where it was
introduced at the Moulin Rouge by Loulou Hegobourn. But
Gershwin's most ambitious number for the Scandals was not
a song
hit,
but a
little
one-act opera.
Though a dismal
failure,
paved the way to his future artistic achievements.

For some time Bud De Sylva had discussed with Gershwin the possibility of writing a Negro opera. When White
proved surprisingly receptive to the idea of using a twentyfive minute work in his Scandals, the collaborators went to
work with a will. They completed their opera in five feverish
days. When it was tried out at De Sylva's apartment, it made
a profound impression on all those present. Ferde Grofe
said: "The work struck me as highly original, and representing a new departure in American music." Paul Whiteman,
who that year conducted his orchestra in the pit of the
Scandals and consequently was the opera's conductor, was
it
mounted after the Scandals

where a local critic wrote, "This
opera will be imitated in a hundred years."
The opera was called Blue Monday; for Gershwin it
represented a goal toward which he had been groping for
several years, his most ambitious effort thus far to enlarge his
artistic scope and to extend his musical horizon. The tensions
also excited. This enthusiasm
tried out in
New Haven
92
of rehearsals
were
grueling, since
it
was
difficult to get sing-
without operatic training to render his music with the

exactitude he demanded. An even greater ordeal was to
ers
await the verdict of press and public. Before the opening

night Gershwin began to suffer from constipation; this malady
was
to
become
chronic,
and since physicians were unable to
put their finger on the source of his trouble, he always referred to it as his "composer's stomach."
Orchestrated by Will Vodery, and with Richard Bold,
Lester Allen, Jack
McGowan, and
Coletta
Ryan
in the cast,
Blue Monday was introduced at the Globe Theater on August 29, 1922, the opening night of the Scandals of 1Q22. As
the prologue explained, the libretto was about a "woman's
intuition gone wrong." In a basement cafe on Lenox Avenue
near 135th Street, Joe and Tom are rivals for Vi's love. Joe
decides to visit his mother, and since he is ashamed of such
a sentimental gesture, he invents the fiction that he has been
called out of
town on
business.
Tom
arouses and feeds Vi's
having a rendezvous with another

woman. In a rage, she shoots Joe, and only then learns the
suspicions that Joe
is
truth.
It
tain of
was not an impressive
De
libretto. If
one were not cermight
Sylva's seriousness of purpose, a suspicion
he was ribbing opera librettos in general. And

Gershwin's music was not strong enough to carry the load of a
feeble book. Inexperienced as he was in dramatic writing, he
produced not an integrated opera but a series of popular
songs connected by jazzlike recitatives. Some of the songs are
appealing: the "Blue Monday Blues"; the aria, "Has Anybody Seen My Joe"; and the spiritual, "I'm Going To See My
Mother." There was a successful attempt at using jazz for
arise that
93
humorous
effects, as in
the saloon. But
all this
the entrance of the customers into
material
the dramatic context, and
it
was not well integrated
into
appears to have been no more
than grafted upon the score to provide
interest.
The music
lacked atmospheric or dramatic interest, while the recitatives
were
stilted
and
Many
stiffly
contrived.
But George
from the program after the first
night because the work's somber theme and drab setting
in the audience liked the opera.
White decided
to
remove
it
cast a pall over the audience,
making
it
unreceptive for the
and gayer numbers that followed. Still a third consideration was a review like that of Charles Darnton's in the
World, who described it as "the most dismal, stupid and incredible black-face sketch that has probably ever been perpetrated." Most of the other drama critics did not even mention it ( no music critic attended ) The most positive reaction
came from Charles Pike Sawyer on the New York Post who
said: "It was a little bit of La Boheme with the "Liebestod"
of Tristan to close, burlesqued almost beyond recognition,
but it was remarkably well sung and acted."
Since that single-night performance at the Scandals,
Blue Monday has been revived on several occasions. Renamed 135th Street (the name by which it is now known),
it was staged at Carnegie Hall at a concert of Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra on December 29, 1925. The cast
included Charles Hart, Blossom Seeley, Jack McGowan, and
lighter
Whiteman revived it again in Carnegie Hall

Blossom Seeley and Benny Fields, and with a
new orchestration by Ferde Grofe. An extract of 135th Street
was also interpolated into the Gershwin screen biography,
Rhapsody in Blue, and on March 29, 1953, it was performed
Benny
Fields.
in 1936 with
94
over television on the "Omnibus" program, staged by Valerie

Bettis,
and with Raun Spearman and Elta Warren
in the prin-
cipal roles.
It
cannot be said that rehearings have brought a
perspective. In 1953, as in 1922, 135th Street

an apprentice.
new
was a work
of
Between 1920 and 1923, Gershwin was involved in

numerous other musical productions besides the Scandals. Individual Gershwin songs were heard in Ed Wynns Carnival,
The Sweetheart Shop with Helen Ford, Dere Mabel, and the
Broadway Brevities, all in 1920; in 1921, The Perfect Fool,
with Ed Wynn, and A Dangerous Maid, a "play with songs"
which expired in Philadelphia after a five-weeks out-of-town
tryout; in 1922, in For Goodness Sake, Spice of 1Q22, Our
Nell, The French Doll with Irene Bordoni, and The Dancing
Girl for which Sigmund Romberg wrote the bulk of the
score.
Most
of the songs in these varied musicals are but the
from a highly productive mill. A few deserve attention.

"We're Pals," which Louis Bennison sang to his dog, was a
sentimental bonbon which helped to make Dere Mabel the
success it was. "Innocent Ingenue Baby" in Our Nell and "Do
It Again," to which Irene Bordoni contributed piquant
French sauce in The French Doll, showed a new virtuosity in
staggered accentuation and in rhythmic technique. "No One
Else" in The Perfect Fool had striking modulations. "Dancing Shoes" in A Dangerous Maid was notable for intriguing
after-beat accents; and "Some Rain Must Fall," from the same
grist
show, for surprising chromaticisms.

There were, then, in scattered Gershwin songs of that
period a search for new effects and an adroitness of technique
95
them sharply apart from most of the other products

of Tin Pan Alley. Already in 1922 and 1923 there were
some serious musicians and writers who recognized that
something new and significant in popular music was emerg-
which
set
ing with Gershwin.
member
Beryl Rubinstein, a concert pianist and
of
the faculty of the Cleveland Institute of Music, startled a
newspaper interviewer by referring to Gershwin as "a great

composer." As quoted in the newspapers on September 6,
1922, Rubinstein said:
This young fellow has the spark of musical genius
which is definite in his serious moods.

This young
American composer has the fire of originality.
With
Gershwin's style and seriousness he is not definitely from
.
the popular-music school, but one of the really outstanding

figures in the country's musical efforts.
lieve that
his talent
America
.
will at
no
distant date
...
I really
be-
honor [him] for
and that when we speak of American comname will be prominent on our
posers George Gershwin's

list.
When
interviewed Beryl Rubinstein in 1939 for a
book on living musicians I was then preparing, I reminded

him of his estimate of Gershwin at a time when the young
composer had not written a single serious work. His reply
was:
When
said
what
suspect
how
far
did about Gershwin in 1922
he would
go. All I
did not
knew then was
that, in
comparison with other popular music of that day, Gershwin's songs represented a unique attempt to bring sound
96
musical values and rich inventiveness to our popular songs.
Gershwin's songs then stuck out from the

riod so prominently that
you were
you couldn't
muck
fail to
of that pe-
notice
in the least interested in our music.
them if
I'd be
But
the last to say that I had even a vague idea or hope that the
composer of 'Do It Again' would some day write a work
like Porgy and Bess.
Beryl Rubinstein was not the only one to take notice of

Gershwin. In the esoteric literary magazine, The Dial, Gilbert Seldes, apostle of the seven lively arts, wrote in the issue
August 1923: "Delicacy, even dreaminess, is a quality he

[Gershwin] alone brings into jazz music. And his sense of
variation in rhythm, of an oddly placed accent, of emphasis
and color, is impeccable."
of
Nor was recognition confined exclusively to the press.

On November 1, 1923, the concert singer Eva Gauthier gave
a recital at Aeolian Hall made up of six groups of songs. Five
groups were devoted to such composers as Bellini, Purcell,
Byrd, Schoenberg, Bliss, Milhaud, Bartok, and Hindemith.
One group, the third, endowed her concert with a permanent
place in the history of American music, for with the incomparable courage and independence of a true pioneer she devoted it entirely to American popular songs. In this group
were Berlin's "Alexander's Ragtime Band," Kern's "The Siren's Song," Walter Donaldsons "Carolina in the Morning,"
and three songs by Gershwin 'Til Build a Stairway to Paradise," "Innocent Ingenue Baby" and "Swanee." For this
jazz
group,
Gauthiers
regular
accompanist,
Max
Jaffe,
yielded his stool to Gershwin. "The singer reappeared,
lowed by a
tall,
black-haired young
man who was
far
fol-
from
97
whom playing on the

an old story," reported Deems
Taylor in the World. "He bore under his arm a small bundle
of sheet music with lurid black and yellow covers. The audience began to show signs of relaxation; this promised to
Young Mr. Gershwin began to do mysteribe amusing.
ous and fascinating rhythmic and contrapuntal stunts with
the accompaniment." At one point he made the audience
purr with delight at the sly way in which he suddenly introduced a phrase from Rimsky-Korsakov's Scheherazade
possessing the icy aplomb of those to
platform of Aeolian Hall
is
into the "Stairway to Paradise."
Mr. Taylor was impressed by the high musical quality

of the songs. "They stood up amazingly well, not only as entertainment but as music.
What they did possess was
melodic interest and continuity, harmonic appropriateness,
well-balanced almost classically severe form, and subtle fascinating rhythms in short the qualities that any sincere and
interesting music possesses." The songs received such an ovation that an encore was required. "Do It Again" was sung,
and it inspired such a thunderous acclaim that it had to be
.
repeated.
Thus on the evening
of
November
1,
Gershwin made
appearance in a major concert hall both as a pianist

and as a composer. "I consider this one of the very most important events in American musical history," wrote Carl van
Vechten to a friend about the Gauthier recital; but he might
well have been speaking of Gershwin's admission to the concert stage. Then Van Vechten ventured a prophecy "The
Philharmonic will be doing it in two years." It must have
his first
given him no small satisfaction when, two years later almost

to the day,
he witnessed the premiere of Gershwin's Piano
98
Concerto at Carnegie Hall not by the Philharmonic, it

was true, but by the Philharmonic's rival, the New York Symphony Society under Walter Damrosch.
The Gauthier recital was repeated in Boston toward
the end of January. H. T. Parker wrote of his delight in Gershwin's piano playing in the Evening Transcript. "He diversified them with cross-rhythms; wove them into a pliant and
outspringing counterpoint; set in pauses and accents; sustained cadences; gave character to the measures wherein the
singer's voice was still.
He is the beginning of the age
.
of sophisticated jazz."
After the
Eva Gauthier concert
in
New
York, a party
was given to honor Gershwin and Gauthier by Mary Opdycke (now Mrs. John DeWitt Peltz, editor of Opera News).
This was only one of many instances in which Gershwin now
moved among the celebrities of the social world in fashionable homes along Fifth and Park avenues, particularly those
of Jules Glaenzer, Mary Hoyt Wiborg, and her sister, Mrs.
Sidney Fish.
He first invaded the social world in 1921 when Dorothy Clark, pianist at the Ziegfeld Roof, brought him and Vincent Youmans to Glaenzer's home at 417 Park Avenue.
Glaenzer, vice-president of Cartier's on Fifth Avenue, over a
period of many years gave fabulous Sunday evening parties,
where the great of the world of entertainment met and befriended the social
When
elite.
Gershwin
first
appeared
at Glaenzer's,
(in the description of his host) "as naive
and
he was
as lacking in
social graces as you are likely to find in anybody. Why, I

had to take him aside and tell him to get the cigar out of his
mouth when I introduced him to a young lady. But George
99
learned quickly. In a short time he was as well-poised and as
completely at ease on Park Avenue as he was on Broadway."
Gershwin and Glaenzer became good friends, and

Gershwin was a frequent visitor to these Sunday evening parties. There he met and came to know Mistinguette, Maurice
Chevalier, Georges Carpentier, Charles Chaplin, Lord and
Lady Louis Mountbatten, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, Beatrice Lillie, Jascha Heifetz, and many others of
Broadway and Hollywood, Paris and London, together with
brokers and bankers. It was at Glaenzer's, in 1922, that he
played a new song, "Do It Again," and had Irene Bordoni
come to him with the request that she be allowed to introduce
it in her next show. ("I muss haf dat dam song," was how
she phrased her request! ) At Glaenzer s, in 1924, at a party
honoring the cast of Chariot's Revue of London, which was
then appearing on Broadway, he first met Gertrude Lawrence.
Once again he was at the piano playing some of his songs
when Gertrude Lawrence recognized one of the numbers as
a song she had recently performed in London. "Some day, I'd
love to meet the man who wrote that," she told Glaenzer, and
only then discovered that he was the young man at the piano.
Even as his social sphere was expanding so was the
circle of intimate friends. There was Bill Daly
William Merrigan Daly, more formally. A shy man with short-cropped
hair, large and bewildered eyes behind spectacles, and an
academic manner, Daly was a man to command respect. As
a boy he had appeared as a piano prodigy and had received
a comprehensive musical training. Suddenly he decided to
abandon music completely. He then entered Harvard, from
which he received his baccalaureate in 1908. After that he
worked on Everybody's Magazine where, as managing editor, he helped to discover and encourage a young writer
100
named Edna
Ferber. In 1914 he conducted a choral concert

honoring Paderewski, and made such a good impression that
Paderewski urged him to return to music professionally. Paderewski went even further, he recommended Daly to the
Chicago Opera for a conductorial post. Unfortunately, the opera company temporarily suspended operations that season
before Daly could take on his new job. Instead of working in
an opera house, Daly accepted a post as conductor of a
Broadway musical comedy, Hands Up, in 1915. From then
on he conducted many musical comedies ( including several
by Gershwin ) becoming one of the highest paid and one of
the most venerated theater conductors of his day.
Daly had first been introduced to Gershwin by
Charles Dillingham while Gershwin was still working at
Remick's. They did not become friends until a few years later,
after working together on the score for Our Nell in 1922.
From then on, Gershwin often leaned on Daly's friendship
,
and musicianship. Daly had a remarkable musical mentality

and an astute musical judgment; he became Gershwin's favorite critic, guide, and advisor through the writing of the
first major orchestral works and many of the principal
musical-comedy scores. He was Gershwin's favorite orchestrator, and when Gershwin needed a conductor, it was Daly
whom he favored for his Broadway scores. In time, Gershwin
came to love the man as much as he admired him; in a letter
dated August 15, 1931, he described Daly as "the best
friend I have."
Among
the new faces in the Gershwin circle in the

was S. N. Behrman "Berrie" to his friends who,
in 1923, was writing for the New York Times Book Review
and various magazines. Behrman had been initiated into the
theater in his youth when he appeared in a vaudeville sketch
early 1920s
101
of his

own writing. But
it
was not
until 1927 that
he emerged
as a leading playwright of social comedy when

Guild produced The Second Man. Thus Behrman and Gershwin who were introduced to each other by Samuel Chotz-
the Theatre
became friends before either was famous. As each pro-
inoff
gressed from one triumph to another, he
still
remained close
to the other.
Gershwin's friends in this period also included Phil
whom he had first become acquainted through

Arthur when the family was still living in Washington Heights. Charig appeared in vaudeville as pianist for
Louise Dresser and several others, and in 1920 he started to
write songs. He remained close to the Gershwins until
Charig, with
his brother
about 1929. In that time he wrote some successful songs to

Ira Gershwin's lyrics and served as rehearsal pianist for
four Gershwin musicals.
Paul Whiteman, the orchestra leader, and his pianist-
moved within the Gershwin orbit.

music education of Denver's public
schools, Paul Whiteman had been trained as a serious musician. He played first violin with various symphony orchestras, including the Denver S\mrphony. During World War I
he was a bandleader in the Navy, and after the war he led
popular orchestras, experimenting in playing jazz with artistic discipline and through carefully prepared orchestrations. His first success came at the Alexandria Hotel in Los
Angeles, where he and his brother appeared for a year. In
1919 Grofe was engaged as the orchestra's pianist and arranger. Like Whiteman, Grofe had come to jazz by way of
symphonic music, having been violist of the Los Angeles
arranger, Ferde Grofe, also
The son
of the director of
Symphony
for over a decade.
One
of the
first
orchestrations
he made for Whiteman, "Whispering," sold a million-and-a-
102
From then on until 1924, every number played

Whiteman
was orchestrated by Grofe. To his task, Grofe
by
brought a consummate technique at instrumentation, an inhalf records.
tuitive feeling for jazz colors,
and a daring
in the use of
unusual timbres.
Paul Whiteman and his Orchestra
orchestrations
the
brought new dignity
Whiteman
on records,
abetted by Grofe's
to jazz. In doing this,
orchestra passed from one triumph to another:
after signing a two-year contract
with Victor; in
vaudeville and hotels; at the Ziegfeld Follies and the Scandals;

in the night club at the Palais Royal;
an extensive tour of the major

the spring of 1923. Paul
even
capitals
in
Europe where
was undertaken
Whiteman was crowned by
in
the press
"the king of jazz."
Gershwin's Blue Monday, which Whiteman had conducted for one night at the Scandals, had struck a responsive
chord with him, for it clarified his own mission in popular
music. Like Gershwin, Whiteman had faith in its significance
and artistic future. To convince Americans of that significance, he planned an ambitious jazz concert in a serious
concert auditorium in which he would present a panorama
of America's best popular music. Gershwin's one-act opera
had given him an exciting idea for his concert, and his thought
was for that composer to write a new piece in a jazz idiom.
103
7
the
Rhapsody
in Blue
At first Gershwin was not receptive to Whiteman's sugnew work in a jazz idiom. He was
busy. His latest musical, Sweet Little Devil, was about to try
out in Boston, and the problems of whipping a show into
shape for New York left him little time or thought for anything else. Besides he did not feel that as yet he had the necessary technique to write a major work for orchestra. He put
Whiteman off by telling him he would give the matter some
thought, but he would give no definite promise.
While he really had no intention of writing anything
for the Whiteman concert, he could not help thinking about
gestion that he write a
104
the project. Musical ideas began to leap into his mind. At a
he suddenly thought
up the core of the broad and flowing melody which he instantly realized could become the spine of the work; that
melody was destined to become the basis of the famous slow
section of the Rhapsody in Blue. Other significant ideas came
to him while en route to Boston for the opening of Sweet
Little Devil
ideas stimulated by the rhythms of the moving
train. But these materials remained only fragments, and his
plan for a composition amorphous. He pushed the project
from his mind.
But one day he read a brief announcement in the New
York Herald Tribune that he was working on a "symphony"
for the Whiteman concert, scheduled for February 12th.
That announcement, and the imminence of the concert, galvanized him into action. For the first time he thought separty, while improvising at the piano,
down to work. His first plan was to write a

symphonic "blues," but this he rejected because he wanted
a more ambitious and spacious mold in which to work. If he
were to write anything, the composition would have to be
sufficiently ample in form and style to give jazz artistic status. Here is the way he put it: "There had been so much
riously of getting
chatter about the limitations of jazz, not to speak of the manifest
be
misunderstandings of
in strict time. It
solved,
if
had
its
function. Jazz, they said,
blow. Inspired by this aim,
He
to
to cling to dance rhythms. I re-
possible, to kill that misconception with
unwonted
had
I set to
one sturdy
work composing with
rapidity."
chose the form of the rhapsody because its

form allowed him freedom in working out his materials. It was Ira who christened the work Rhapsody in Blue,
at a social evening at the Lou Paleys. After George played
elastic
finally
the
105
Rhapsody
in Blue
parts of his new work for his friends, he was asked what he
planned to call it. George replied he was thinking of American Rhapsody. As it happened, Ira had that afternoon been
looking at Whistler paintings, "Nocturne in Blue and Green/'
and "Harmony in Gray and Green," and when George suggested American Rhapsody as a possible title, Ira, thinking in
terms of color and mood, suddenly asked, "Why not call it
Rhapsody in Blue?"
It was also Ira who urged George
to use a broad meand actually picked

out from George's notebook the theme that George subse-
lodious middle section for the rhapsody
quently used.
Gershwin completed the Rhapsody in a two-piano

version on January 7, 1924. During its composition, Ferde
Grofe practically took a lease on Gershwin's apartment at
110th Street and Amsterdam Avenue where the Gershwin
family had moved in 1919. It was Grofe s job, as Whiteman's
arranger, to orchestrate the work. Since time was running
short, the orchestration was done a sheet at a time. As the
finished copy of one page left Gershwin, Grofe took it over
and went to work. The manuscript of the two-piano copy
contains notations in Grofe's
hand
as to suggested instru-
mentations, with the names of Whiteman's key performers
scrawled in so that Grofe might bear in mind their specific

techniques and
jazz
styles. Grofe's orchestration for
band was completed on February
made
new
4.
Two
adaptation, this time for piano
piano and
years later he
and symphony
orchestra.
The
complete rehearsal of the Rhapsody in Blue

took place without any further delay at the Palais Royal
night club at noontime. About thirty guests were invited, including Walter Damrosch, W. J. Henderson (the music
first
10G
Edwin Hughes (pianist and teacher), Victor Herbert,

Leonard Liebling (editor of the Musical Courier), Pitts Sanborn (the music critic), and H. O. Osgood (editor of Musical America ) Whiteman, in shirt sleeves, brought Gershwin
to the guests and introduced him. Liebling and Sanborn had
never before heard of Gershwin and had to be told by Osgood who he was and what he had done.
The reaction to this first run of the Rhapsody in Blue
was varied. Osgood and Hughes were the most enthusiastic.
To Hughes "it opened up a new era for American music."
Victor Herbert was also deeply impressed and offered Gershwin a valuable suggestion (which was accepted) on how
to make the middle melody more effective by preceding it
with an extended rising passage ending in a fermata. Others
were much less excited. Liebling confessed, "I was frankly
uncertain whether I liked it or not." And Sanborn said, "I
was not enamored of the themes or the workmanship, but the
thing certainly had zip and punch."
Whiteman was not discouraged. He was certain that
the Rhapsody would be, as he put it, "a knockout success,"
and his conviction that it was a masterwork could not be
shaken by the lukewarm reaction of two venerable music
critics. When the rehearsal ended he took some of his guests
out to lunch at The Tavern, a restaurant and bar near the
Palais Royal, to discuss details of his concert. Liebling and
Sanborn helped him draw up a list of critics and notable musicians to be invited.
There was another important run-through of the
Rhapsody, but this time without the orchestra. Ernest Hutcheson, the celebrated pianist and teacher, arranged for a select group of musicians to hear Gershwin play the score.
This time the praise was unqualified.
critic),
107
the
Rhapsody in Blue
Whiteman's concert took place
at Aeolian Hall
on Feb-
ruary 12, 1924. Since the day fell on Lincoln's birthday,

the event has since been often described as "the emancipa-
Whiteman $11,000 to give

Though every seat was occupied and the
standing room was more than overcrowded, the deficit was
$7,000 and all of it came out of Whiteman's pocket, for no
expense had been spared to give the concert in style. The
orchestra, which then numbered twenty-three, had been enlarged by nine players, including eight violins, three saxotion proclamation of jazz." It cost
that performance.
phones; two each of trumpets, trombones, French horns, dou-
and pianos; a banjo, and a drum. Since most of

the players doubled on other instruments, the orchestra included the following: D-flat and bass clarinets; E-flat soprano, B-flat soprano, E-flat alto, and E-flat baritone saxo-
blebasses,
phones, E-flat flugelhorn, bass tuba, accordion, celesta,
flute,
oboe, bass oboe, basset horn, and octavion.
handsome twelve-page program, its covers

orative purple and gold, had annotations by Gilbert
The choicest seats in the house had been allocated
leading musicians in or near
New York. Among
in dec-
Seldes.
for the
those present
were: John Philip Sousa, Walter Damrosch, Leopold Godowsky, Jascha Heifetz, Fritz Kreisler, John McCormack,
Sergei Rachmaninoff, Leopold Stokowski, Moriz Rosenthal,
Mischa Elman, and Igor Stravinsky. They rubbed elbows

with song writers, song pluggers, vaudevillians,
stars of
mu-
comedy, and the rank and file of jazz devotees in what

was surely the most polyglot audience to attend a concert at
sical
Aeolian Hall.
On
the day of the concert, Jules Glaenzer
had Gersh-
win, Whiteman, Zez Confrey, and several others for lunch.
Then
all
of
them
strolled over to the concert.
Gershwin was
108
cool and collected.

nerves.
He
Whiteman, on the other hand, was
could not eat a thing, and on the
way
all
to Aeolian
Hall kept muttering that he was sick and that he hoped his
doctor would be backstage to take care of him.

In his book, Jazz*
Whiteman
recalled:
Fifteen minutes before the concert was to begin, I
what was
and putting an overcoat over my conslipped around to the entrance of Aeolian
yielded to a nervous longing to see for myself
happening out
cert clothes, I
Hall.
There
front,
gazed upon a picture that should have im-
new vigor to my willing confidence. It was snowing,

but men and women were fighting to get into the door,
parted
pulling
and mauling each other
as they
sometimes do at a
was
wondered if I had
come to the right entrance. And then I saw Victor Herbert going in. It was the right entrance, sure enough, and
the next day the ticket office people said they could have
sold out the house ten times over. I went backstage again,
more scared than ever. Black fear simply possessed me. I
paced the floor, gnawed my thumbs and vowed I'd give
$5,000 if we could stop right then and there. Now that the
audience had come, perhaps I really had nothing to offer
them at all. I even made excuses to keep the curtain from
rising on schedule. But finally there was no longer any way
of postponing the evil moment. The curtain went up and
before I could dash forth, as I was tempted to do, and announce that there wouldn't be any concert, we were in the
baseball game, or a prize fight, or in the subway. Such
my
state of
midst of
* Jazz,
Sears
&
mind by
this
time that
it.
by Paul Whiteman and Margaret McBride.
Co., 1926.
New
York:
J.
H.

109
the
Rhapsody
in Blue
The program included

present jazz in
several sections calculated to
varied facets. As
all its
Hugh
C. Ernst ex-
plained in an introductory address to the audience:
The experiment is to be purely educational. Mr.

Whiteman intends to point out, with the assistance of his
orchestra and associates, the tremendous strides which
have been made
in
popular music from the day of discord-
ant Jazz, which sprang into existence about ten years ago
from nowhere
of today.
ment
of
in particular, to the really
The
American music has been the
Whiteman's orchestra was the

cially score
first
each selection and play
Since then practically every
arranger or
melodious music
greatest single factor in the improve-
modern
staff of arrangers.
art of scoring.
Paul
organization to espeit
according to score.
orchestra has
its
Eventually they
own
may
evolve an American school which will equal those of foreign origin or which will at least provide a stepping stone
which
will
make
it
very simple for the masses to under-
stand and therefore enjoy
symphony and
opera. That
is
the true purpose of the experiment. If after the concert
you decide that the music of today is worthless and

harmful, it is your duty to stamp it down. If it is not,
then we welcome anyone eager to assist in its development.
The complete program, which included the world

premiere of Victor Herbert's A Suite of Serenades as well as
Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue, follows:
I.
True Form of Jazz
ago "Livery Stable Blues"
Ten years
(b) With modern embellishment
(a)
"Mama Loves Papa"
Baer
110
Comedy
II.
(a) Origin of "Yes,
Selections
We Have No
(b) Instrumental comedy
Bananas"
"So This
Venice"
Is
Silver
Thomas
(adapted from The Carnival of Venice)
Legitimate Scoring
Selection in true form "Whispering"

III.
(a)
Contrast
vs.
Jazzing
...
Schoenberg
(b) Same selection in Jazz Treatment
IV.
Recent Compositions with Modern Score
Braham
(a) "Limehouse Blues"

(
b)
(c
"I Love You"

"Raggedy Ann"
V.
Archer
Kern
Zez Confrey (piano)
Medley Popular Airs

"Kitten on the Keys"
"Ice Cream and Art"
Confrey
(d) "Nickel in the Slot"
Confrey
(a)
(
(accompanied by the orchestra)
VI.
Flavoring a Selection with Borrowed
Themes
Grofe
"Russian Rose"
(based on "The Volga Boat Song")
VII. Semi-Symphonic Arrangements of Popular Melodies
(a) "Alexander's Ragtime
(b) "A Pretty Girl

(
is
Band"
Like a Melody"
"Orange Blossoms
in California"
Berlin
Berlin
Berlin
Ill
the
Rhapsody
VIII.
in Blue
Suite of Serenades,
by Victor Herbert
(a) Spanish
(b) Chinese
(c)
Cuban
(d) Oriental
IX.
Adaptation of Standard Selections to Dance Rhythm
(a) "Pale
Logan
MacDowell
Moon"
(b) "To a Wild Rose"

(
Friml
"Chansonette"
X.
Rhapsody
in Blue,
(George Gershwin
by George Gershwin
at the piano
accompanied by
the orchestra)
XI.
"Pomp and
In the Field of the Classics

Elgar
Circumstance'*
Up to the Rhapsody in Blue, the respective numbers

were accorded only a mild reception. Not even the many
"flappers" and "cake-eaters" to whom Whitman was high
priest, and jazz a religion
could generate much heat. As the
program
progressed,
there
long
were even visible signs of
growing restlessness and impatience; the sad truth was that
the similarity in style and coloring of the various pieces was
proving to be a sore trial to the ear.
Even though it came when fatigue and boredom had
set in for many in the audience, the Rhapsody in Blue
changed the climate dramatically. Ross Gorman's opening
wail in the clarinet seized the attention of the audience.
then on, the music held
its
the final explosive coda.
"Somewhere
hearers tightly in
in the
its
From
grip until
middle of the
112
score I began crying,"

to myself I
Whiteman
confessed.
was eleven pages along, and
"When
until this
came
day
can-
you how I conducted that far."

There was a spontaneous ovation at the end which
lasted several minutes. There was no question about the reaction of the audience. As for the more formal jury the music critics
the best that can be said is that there was a split
decision. Some were ecstatic. H. O. Osgood called it "greater
than Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring." Henry T. Finck considered it "far superior to Schoenberg, Milhaud, and the rest
of the futuristic fellows." Gilbert W. Gabriel wrote: "The
beginning and the ending of it were stunning; the beginning
particularly, with a fluttering tongued drunken whoop of an
introduction which had the audience rocking. With all its
lag, diffuseness, and syncopated reiterations, here was the
day's most pressing contribution. Mr. Gershwin has an irrepressible pack of talents, and there is an element of inevitability about his piece." William
Henderson described it
J.
not
tell
manner
and furnishing an orchestral
as "a highly ingenious work, treating the piano in a

calling for
much
background
technical
which the
in
skill
characteristic antics of the saxo-
phones, trombones, and clarinets were merged in a really

skillful
piece of orchestration."
Deems Taylor
reported that
the Rhapsody "displayed a latent ability on the part of this
young composer
to say something of considerable interest in

had all the faults
chosen idiom.
His Rhapsody
one might expect from an experimental work; but it also revealed a genuine melodic gift and a piquant and individual
harmonic sense to lend significance to its rhythmic ingenuity.
Moreover it is genuine jazz music, not only in its scoring but
his
in
its
idiom.
Mr. Gershwin will bear watching; he
yet bring jazz out of the kitchen."
To Olin Downes,
the
may
work
the
113
Rhapsody
in Blue
talent, just as it also shows a young

composer with aims that go far beyond those of his ilk, struggling with a form of which he is far from being a master.
Often Mr. Gershwin's purpose is defeated by technical
immaturity, but in spite of that ... he has expressed himself in a significant and on the whole highly original man-
showed "extraordinary
ner.
Sanborn and Lawrence Gilman were outright

Sanborn felt that the music "runs off into empty passage work and meaningless repetition." Gilman was even
more vigorous in his denunciation. "How trite and feeble and
conventional the tunes are, how sentimental and vapid the
harmonic treatment, under its guise of fussy and futile counterpoint.
Weep over the lifelessness of its melody and
harmony, so derivative, so static, so inexpressive. And then
recall, for contrast, the rich inventiveness of the rhythm, the
saliency and vividness of the orchestra color."
There were those who before February 12 had
spoken mockingly of the concert as "Whiteman's Folly."
There were others who said of Gershwin's attempt to write a
serious rhapsody that "he is breaking his neck trying to starve
to death." They were silenced after the echoes of the concert
died down. The success of Whiteman's performance was far
and beyond anything even Whiteman had dared to hope for.
The most serious musicians and critics were discussing it with
the discrimination and analytical discernment they brought
to all major musical events.
And it was the Rhapsody in Blue that gave the concert
its significance. It transformed the Whiteman experiment
from an idle curiosity to an artistic event of the first magnitude. As Carl van Vechten wrote Gershwin immediately after
the premiere "The concert, quite as a matter of course, was
Pitts
hostile.
114
you crowned
riot;
with what ... I am forced to regard

by an American composer."
The Rhapsody in Blue first became known to the
it
as the foremost serious effort
world through the blue label recording which Whiteman and

made for Victor. A million copies were sold.
But this was just a trickle compared to the ultimate circulation of the music through various media. On stage, on screen,
on records, over the radio, in the concert hall, in the ballet
theater, the Rhapsody has achieved a popularity equaled by
few serious works of music before or since.
In the concert hall it has outstripped any other single
contemporary work for frequency of performance. It has entered the repertory of every major American symphony orchestra and has been directed by the foremost conductors of
this generation. In Europe it was introduced as early as 1925,
at the Salle de Centaure in Brussels by John Ouwerx. It first
came to France in February 1926 in a two-piano version,
at a concert of the renowned Societe Nationale de Musique in
Paris, performed by Giuseppe Benvenuti and Leon Kartum;
it arrived in Central Europe in November 1932 at a concert
of the Vienna Symphony; and it was introduced in Germany
on February 17, 1946, at a symphony concert at the Nuremberg Opera.
The Rhapsody in Blue has been heard not only in its
original version for piano and orchestra but also in various
transcriptions for piano solo, two pianos, two pianos and orchestra, eight pianos, solo harmonica, an orchestra of harmonicas, a mandolin orchestra, an a capella chorus, and
violin and orchestra. It was adapted for the dance: into a
Grecian ballet at the Hotel Metropole in London in 1926,
into a modernistic ballet two years later by the Ballet Russe
of Monte Carlo, and into a tap dance by Jack Donahue.
his orchestra
115
the
Rhapsody
in Blue
The Roxy Theater in New York paid Gershwin $10,000 to appear for two weeks in May 1930 at its stage show,
with Paul Whiteman and his orchestra, in the Rhapsody. In
the same year the Rhapsody appeared in a motion-picture
revue starring Paul Whiteman, The King of Jazz; the sum
paid, $50,000, was without parallel for a musical work for the
screen. In 1946 the Rhapsody title was used for Gershwin's
screen biography.
The
royalties
and other subsidiary
from the
more than a quarter of

The Rhapsody made Gershwin
rights gathered
a million dollars in a decade.
And
sale of sheet music, records,
spread his fame around the globe. It

also lifted Paul Whiteman to altogether new heights as king
of jazz in the theater, on the screen, in night clubs, and over
a wealthy man.
it
the radio. For a long time the question was debated as to
who made whom: whether

Whiteman
or vice versa.
Gershwin's success was due to
The argument
is
as fruitful as the
one involving the chicken and the egg. Simple decency and
a sense of justice dictate the admission that each owed a profound debt to the other. However, in view of the unwavering
line of Gershwin's musical development, it need not be questioned that he would have arrived at the Rhapsody in Blue,
or its equivalent, without the impetus of a Whiteman concert.
Still another controversy deserves comment, the one
involving Grofe's share in the Rhapsody's success. For some
years after the premiere there was a tendency among some
writers to overestimate Grofe's contribution to the point of insisting that
rels
it
was
to Grofe
belonged. While
it is
and not
true that
to Gershwin that the lausome of the impact of the
music came from Grofe's colorful jazz orchestration, it should

always be remembered that an orchestration is but the dress
that adds to a lady's charm. The lady, in this case being the
116
music, is enticing without ornamental attire. Take the Rhapsody in its varied arrangements, and it remains music of
enormous appeal.
Nor should it be assumed, as some have done, that
because Grofe did the orchestration that Gershwin was incapable of doing it himself. He had already had some training in instrumentation from Kilenyi; his student books provide testimony that he had acquired enough skill in handling
orchestral instruments before 1924 to orchestrate a
like the
work
Rhapsody. But the Rhapsody was written under such
pressure to meet the deadline of the concert that the
chanics of the orchestration
like
me-
those of orchestrating
were assigned to somewas Whiteman's arranger, who

knew the Whiteman orchestra intimately; even if there had
been time for Gershwin to do his own orchestration, it was
wise to assign the job to Grofe. That Gershwin knew how to
write for the orchestra was definitely proved only a year and
a half later when he wrote his Concerto in F for which as
Gershwin's musical-comedy scores
body
else.
Besides, Grofe
for all subsequent serious
works
he did
his
own
orchestra-
tion.
The Rhapsody has
inspired not only controversies but
In his autobiography, Bad Boy of Music y

George Antheil reveals that the celebrated publishing house
of G. Schirmer in New York turned down the Rhapsody because it was "not commercially feasible," thus perpetrating
what Antheil described as "the greatest boner in musicalso tall tales.
publishing history."
The simple
fact puncturing this story
is
Gershwin could not have submitted the Rhapsody to

was bound by an exclusive contract to
Harms.
Another story sometimes repeated by writers on
that
Schirmer's since he

117
the
Rhapsody
in Blue
Gershwin concerns the first complete rehearsal at the Palais

Royal. During the beautiful slow section so goes the tale
Whiteman suddenly stopped conducting and listened to the
music in rapt attention. "Goddammit," he is supposed to have
said, bearing in mind the numerous revisions to which the
composer had subjected his music, "did he think he could
improve on that?" A pretty story, to be sure but it never
happened.
Perhaps the strangest yarn of all was one reported by
Walter Winchell on January 25, 1955. He wrote saying that
Gershwin had written an operatic version of Uncle Toms
Cabin which was turned down by the Metropolitan Opera.
Gershwin then used the overture for the Paul Whiteman concert, calling it Rhapsody in Blue.
Dismissing for the moment the incontestable fact that a work like the Rhapsody, by
its very structure and content, could never have been an overture to an opera or anything else for that matter, the item
ignores several salient facts: (1) Gershwin never wrote an
opera on Uncle Tom's Cabin, sl fact that Mr. Winchell could
easily have verified if he had taken the trouble; (2) Gershwin
never submitted any opera to the Metropolitan that was
turned down; and (3) the dates clearly marked in Gershwin's hand on the sketches and the completed manuscript
of the Rhapsody, reposing in the Library of Congress, in
Washington, D. C., prove beyond a doubt that he wrote the
work
for the Paul
Whiteman
concert.
The form of the Rhapsody in Blue came from the Hunmain slow section was derived from the
Russian Tchaikovsky; and the harmony sometimes suggests
garian Liszt; the
the French Debussy or the Polish Chopin. Yet, like the melt-
ing pot that
is
America, the Rhapsody fused the various for-
118
The RhapAmerican music in its youth, brashness, restlessness,

optimism. It is also Gershwin in the freshness of its rhythmic
and melodic ideas, in its vitality and muscular energy, and
eign elements into a personality wholly American.
sody
in
its
is
unerring instinct for effect.
The opening measures

effect
the yawp of the
reveal Gershwin's instinct for
clarinet. After a
low
trill,
the clarinet
begins a seventeen-note ascent; halfway up there
is
a pause,
and then the clarinet resumes its upward flight with a portamento. Then it reaches out for the first theme. This opening
theme
establishes the
mood
for the entire work. It
is
the
mu-
sical voice of the turbulent 1920s, an era of iconoclasm,

hedonism, defiance of convention, frenetic pursuit of pleasure; an era of flappers and cake-eaters, hip flasks and
speakeasies, companionate marriage, and Dorothy Parker
wisecracks. It speaks in music for an epoch as vividly as an
Offenbach cancan does for the Second French Empire and a
Johann Strauss waltz for the Austria of the Hapsburgs.
Once stated, the jaunty opening theme yields immediately to a transition section in the winds which carries a
suggestion of the second main theme. This brisk second
theme finally stated in the piano further conveys the feel-
ing of reckless abandon thus far established.
Some pundits
have tried to find a similarity between this melodic idea and

the one opening Beethoven's Fourth Piano Concerto, but the
association is remote. This second theme appears and reappears in the orchestra and is the basis of an extended coda for
the piano. The piano then leads with a few ascending chords
toward the principal section of the work: the rhapsodic slow
movement for strings which has become one of the most frequently quoted and best-known excerpts in serious American music. Whiteman has used it as his permanent signature
the
1 19
Rhapsody
in Blue
over the radio and elsewhere; words have been written to it, a
version first introduced by Frances Williams; George Gersh-
win played
sister,
it
on the piano for the wedding ceremony of
Frances, and Leopold
Godowsky
Jr. at
his
Ira Gershwin's
apartment in 1930 and it was performed on the organ at

Gershwin's funeral services at Temple Emanu-El.
The full orchestra takes up the song. Then a quick
recollection of its opening phrase in fast tempo invokes the
final section. After a climactic pronouncement of the opening
clarinet theme by full orchestra, the piano wistfully recalls
the second theme. The Rhapsody ends abruptly with a brief
and dramatic coda.
The Rhapsody in Blue is by no means a consistent or
integrated masterwork. Some of the things its severest critics have condemned in it are its weak spots. The form is
diffuse; the thematic subjects are at times developed awkwardly and without inventiveness; there are lapses in inspira;
tion
where
repetitions of familiar ideas or ineffectual transi-
and chord passages try to fill the gap; there is

some naivete and some amateurishness in the harmonic construction. But the basic melodic and rhythmic material is so
fresh and good, and is presented with such verve and spontaneity, that the work as a whole never loses its ability to
tions of scales
excite the listener.
120
8
FROM BROADWAY
TO PICCADILLY
When
the Rhapsody in Blue was introduced in Aeo-
Gershwin musical Sweet Little Devil was occupying the nearby Astor Theater. The duality of Gershwin's
lian Hall, the
was thus pointed up for the first time.

death he would always keep one foot in the concert
creative personality
Until his
and another in the popular theater.

Sweet Little Devil had opened in Boston as The Perfect
Lady toward the end of 1923 and had come to New York
under its new title on January 21, 1924. Its strong suit was
neither the book (by Frank Mandel and Laurence Schwab),
nor Gershwin's music (which lacked a single winning num-
hall
121
FROM BROADWAY TO PICCADILLY
Constance Binney. As
Constance Binney brought to
the stage and to her role a personal magnetism and an engaging manner that won the audience completely. Unfortunately the slim story of her rivalry with a Ziegfeld Follies girl
for the heart and hand of Tom Nesbitt, a South American
engineer, and her ultimate victory, had much less vitality and
ber), but the performance of
the simple
home
its star,
girl Virginia,
freshness.
When Sweet Little Devil left Broadway after a run of

little less
than four months, Gershwin was represented on
the Great White
Way by his last assignment for the Scandals,
the 1924 edition.
Gershwin
left
the Scandals because the
made upon him, from the planning stage
demands
it
through
rehearsals and first performance, left him little time to devote
to musical comedies. He asked George White for an increase
over the $125.00 a week he was then receiving. When it was
denied as he hoped it would be he cut his five-year tie
with the producer. (That tie was briefly and temporarily
renewed in 1927 when White used the Rhapsody in Blue for
the first-act finale of the Scandals as the climax for "The Birth
of the Blues" by De Sylva, Brown, and Henderson. Graciously,
Gershwin refused any payment for the use of his music.
Gershwin did not have to wait long for a new association. It came with the new producing firm of Aarons and
Freedley, for whom he was to write some of his greatest
musical-comedy successes. Alex A. Aarons, of course, was no
stranger to Gershwin, having produced La, La Lucille in
1919, after which he had become one of Gershwin's most
ardent admirers and friends. Neither was Vinton Freedley.
Freedley had played a principal role in Dere Mabel, in 1920,
when Gershwin came to rehearsals to play his song, "We re
of the revue
122
Pals,"
which was incorporated
into that production.
Freedley played the lead in the

Maid, which never came to Broadway.
later
It
dame,
was
still
another play
ill-fated
One year
Dangerous
Victor Herbert's
Oui Ma-
that brought Aarons and Freedley together
in 1920
was the producer, and FreedDuring the run, the younger

Aarons and Freedley became friends and met often to talk
about the theater. They dreamed of putting Fred and Adele
Astaire then playing the Winter Garden into a musical
built just for them. It was Alex Aarons who brought this
dream to reality in 1922 by producing For Goodness Sake
(music by Paul Lannin and Will Daly), which starred the
Astaires. Two years later Aarons transferred the show to
London (still with the Astaires), renamed it Stop Flirting,
and achieved with it one of the greatest successes of the
London season. Incidentally, Stop Flirting had a few songs
by Gershwin.
Freedley had a small investment in For Goodness
Sake, and after that he became a full-fledged partner with
Aarons in the production of Cosmo Hamilton's The New Poor.
Aarons and Freedley now planned a smart new Broadway
for the first time. Aarons' father
ley played a principal role.
musical for the Astaires, after the completion of their ex-
tended run in London. Guy Bolton and Fred Thompson

provided them with a suitable book, Lady Be Good. Gershwin was engaged to write the music. Today Freedley freely
confesses that at the time he did not like the choice of Gershwin since he felt that Gershwin's music was too sophisticated
for popular appeal. But Aarons was completely sold on the
composer, agreeing wholeheartedly with Bolton when the
latter said that "he was beginning to look uncommonly like a
genhb.*"
123

One
of the reasons
why Aarons was
insistent
on using
Gershwin was that he had already heard one of the songs that
would go into the new show. In 1923 Gershwin sketched
the first eight bars of an intricate rhythmic number which he
played for Aarons in London. The producer, with his natural
bent for unusual musical treatments, was enthusiastic to the
point where he insisted that Gershwin save it for some future
Aarons musical. Gershwin completed his song a few weeks
later in New York and put it aside for the time when he could
use
it
new
an Aarons production. Thus, before he wrote a single

note for Lady Be Good, Gershwin had "Fascinating
in
Rhythm" ready.
In Lady Be Good, Fred and Adele Astaire were cast
Dick and Susie Trevors
as a brother-and-sister dancing team
who had come upon unhappy days. Unable to pay their
rent, they are unceremoniously ejected into the street. The
opening scene was one of the best. Out on the sidewalk with
their furniture, the Trevors try to make the best of a miserable
situation. Susie
is
meticulous about the arrangement of her
upon which she hangs

Our Home."
furniture around the corner lamppost,
the framed legend,
There
rich girl
is
"God
Bless
way
out of their troubles, however, for a

in love with Dick. Indeed, it is she who, having
is
been spurned, was responsible for their eviction from their

home. To save her brother from marrying a girl he does not
love, Susie is induced by an unscrupulous lawyer (Walter
Catlett) to impersonate a Mexican widow and thus put her
hands on an inheritance. The inheritance is as much of a
phony as Susie's Mexican act. The difficulties of the Trevors
are, nonetheless,
1924,
happily resolved before the
final curtain.
Lady Be Good opened in New York on December 1,

and became Gershwin's first major musical-comedy
124
success.
critic
on the Sun spoke of
it
as a
"gem" and
singled out Gershwin's score for special praise as "brisk, inventive, gay, nervous, delightful." Alan Dale thought that
it
was only Gershwin's music that "redeemed a quite typical

musical comedy." One can understand why these and other
critics were taken with Gershwin's score. Never before had he
brought such a wealth of original invention to his stage music.
The kinesthetic effect of the changing meters in "Fascinating
Rhythm," the irresistible appeal of the repeated triplets in
cut time in the title song, and the melodic significance accorded to the verses of both songs all this represented a new
sophistication in popular music. Other songs were notable for
their personalized lyricism, particularly "So Am I" and
"We're Here Because."
But the best song Gershwin wrote for Lady Be Good
was not in the show when it opened in New York. As "The
Man I Love" it has since become one of the Gershwin song
classics. But before it finally achieved recognition it had an
eventful history. The chorus as it is known today originated as
the verse for another song, but Gershwin soon realized that
the individual melody of the verse was so strong that
robbed the chorus that followed of any
interest.
it
This melody
consisted of a six-note blues progression that reappeared
throughout with accumulative effect, achieving poignancy

through the contrapuntal background of a descending chromatic
scale.
now used the

with a simple but appeal-
In rewriting his song, Gershwin
verse as the chorus, and prefaced
it
ing introductory tune.
"The Man I Love" was sung by Adele Astaire in the

opening scene of the Philadelphia tryout of Lady Be Good.
In that setting the song missed aim completely; it was too
125
static.

Vinton Freedley insisted that
it
be dropped from the
show, and Gershwin consented.

In 1927 Gershwin removed the song from his shelf
and incorporated it into the score he was then writing for
Strike
Up
the
Band
(first
version).
Once again
it
was
tried
out of town, was found wanting, and was deleted.
But the song had admirers. One of them was Otto H.

Kahn, to whom Gershwin played it when he planned using it
for Lady Be Good. Kahn liked the song so much that he
decided to invest $10,000 in the musical. Another admirer
was Lady Louis Mountbatten, to whom Gershwin presented
an autographed copy in New York. When she returned to
London, Lady Mountbatten arranged for the Berkeley
Square Orchestra to introduce the song in London. It became such a success that though no printed copies were
available in England it was picked up by many other jazz
ensembles in London. Now a hit, the song crossed the
Channel and was played by numerous jazz groups in Paris,
where it also caught on. American visitors to London and
Paris heard the song and, returning home, asked for it. Then
singers and orchestras took it up until its acceptance in this
country became complete.

Gershwin has explained that the reason it took the
song so long to be appreciated is that the melody of the
chorus, with its chromatic pitfalls, was not easy to catch; also,
when
caught, was not easy to sing or whistle or
hum
without
a piano accompaniment.
Lady Be Good
set a pattern for several future
Gersh-
win musicals. Sammy Lee staged the ensemble numbers; the

two-piano team of Ohman and Arden assisted in the pres-
126
entation of the Gershwin music; and, most important of
all, its
were written by Ira Gershwin. This was the first musical

in which Ira wrote all the lyrics for his brother's music. From
then on, with some minor exceptions, Ira wrote the words
lyrics
They became the words-andmusic team for the most successful of Gershwin's musicals,
and in that success Ira played a major role.
for all of Gershwin's songs.
had progressed far in plying the trade of lyricist

had collaborated with George on "The Real American Folk Song" in 1918. His first published lyric was "Waiting for the Sun To Come Out" (music by George) used in
The Sweetheart Shop, in 1920. In the same year he wrote
the lyrics to five of George's songs in A Dangerous Maid.
Only one year after that Ira was a Broadway success, but this
Ira
since he
He wrote the
music by Vincent Youmans and Paul Lannin, which had an eleven-month run in
time without the benefit of George's music.
lyrics for
Two
Little Girls in Blue,
New York.
The
security
and self-assurance that attend success
were not lacking in Ira. Up to 1924 all of Ira's lyrics appeared under the pseudonym of "Arthur Francis." The mask
was removed in that year in Be Yourself, a musical whose

book was by George S. Kaufman and Marc Connelly, and
music by Lewis Gensler and Milton Schwartzwald. It was as
"Ira Gershwin" and not as "Arthur Francis" that he now appeared in all the credits, and on the title page of the printed
music. And it was as "Ira Gershwin" that he reappeared a few
months later in Lady Be Good.
Ira revealed new strength in Lady Be Good; his was no
longer an apprentice hand. A line like "I must win some
winsome miss" demonstrates the easy way he now had with
a well-turned, well-sounding phrase.
couplet like "this
is
127
tulip weather, so let's
put two and two together" pointed to a
natural and charming simplicity.
Rhythm" showed a verbal

the music in
its
intricate
The chorus
for "Fascinating
virtuosity in following the lead of
rhythmic movements.
In 1923, Gershwin paid his first visit to London. He

came to write the music for the Rainbow Revue, for which he
received a fee of $1,500 besides the price of his round-trip
The show was a
was due in
part to the threadbare and frequently insufferably dull material provided by the writers ( one of whom was the mystery
writer Edgar Wallace ) Gershwin's music, which he himself
regarded as the weakest score he had ever written for the
stage, was hardly more rewarding. Only one of the thirteen
songs, "Yankee Doodle Blues," had vitality and cogency
(in 1925 it was used as a recurring musical theme in John
passage.
disastrous failure. This
Howard Lawson's
expressionist play Processional); the rest
were pedestrian in style and perfunctory in

technique. But the fiasco was not the exclusive responsibility
of the songs
The leading comedian, chagrined that so much

had been deleted in rehearsal, created a scandal
on opening night by suddenly delivering to the startled audi-
of the authors.
of his part
ence a violent attack against
all
the Americans involved in the
production.
From London, Gershwin went by air to Paris to be

Jules Glaenzer s guest at his Paris home near the Bois de
Boulogne. Bud De Sylva was also visiting Glaenzer at the
time, and for the next few days the three made the rounds of
the most famous restaurants and night places. Gershwin
in love with the city at
him
zer 's
first sight;
everything about
it
fell
came
to
major discovery. One day while traveling in Glaencar through the Arc de Triomphe and down the Champs-
as a
128
he exclaimed: "Why, this is a city you can write

about!" Bud De Sylva answered softly, "Don t look now,
George, but it's been done."
Gershwin returned to London one year later with happier results. At the request of Alex A. Aarons he revised the
score of For Goodness Sake and contributed a few new numfilysees,
London premiere as Stop Flirting. Besides this,

he had a London hit of his own in Primrose to a book by
Guy Bolton and George Grossmith with lyrics by Desmond
Carter and Ira Gershwin. The cast included the comedian
Leslie Henson and Heather Thatcher, favorites of the London stage. Primrose deserves a special footnote since it was
Gershwin's first musical for which he did some of the orchestrations ( three numbers ) and the first whose score was
bers for
its
published in its entirety. His songs struck a responsive

chord with English audiences. "Isn't It Terrible What They
Did to Mary Queen of Scots," "Berkeley Square and Kew,"

and "When Toby Is Out of Town" contain topical suggestions
and
historical
lish hearts.
"Four
and geographical
Little Sirens
We"
Engwelcome echoes
allusions dear to
carried
The winning lyricism of "Wait a Bit

Meet Someone Like You," and "Some FarAway Someone" had the warming quality of English ale,
and the smart melodic one-step, "I Make Hay When the
Moon Shines," had a captivating pulse. From this point on,
Gershwin was almost as great a favorite in Piccadilly as he
was on Broadway.
of Gilbert
and
Susie," "Till I
Sullivan.
12B
9
THE HOUSE ON
103RD STREET
In 1925 the Gershwin family bought a five-story

white granite house on 103rd Street near Riverside Drive. On
room which served as a

meeting place and general hangout for the young people of
the neighborhood. Some were friends of Arthur's or Frances',
some were neighbors, a few were total strangers. On the
second floor were the living- and dining-rooms where the
Gershwin, Wolpin, and Bruskin clans would congregate over
cups of tea, or to play poker or pinochle. The next two floors
had bedrooms. When Ira married Leonore Strunsky on September 14, 1926, they took over the fourth floor. The fifth
the ground floor there was a billiard
130
was George's sanctum. The rooms in which George

worked and entertained had a brick fireplace, a grand piano,
and comfortable chairs. A study lined with books, music,
and a specially designed and built-in cupboard for his manufloor
bedroom.
N. Behrman describes a
scripts led to his

S.
visit to
the Gershwin
me-
nage:*
For a long time I rang the doorbell but got no
answer. Through the screened, curtained door-window, I
could see the figures moving inside, and
impatiently.
No
walked
Three or four young men
in.
answer. Finally
kept ringing
pushed the door and
had never
seen before were sitting around the hall smoking. ...
peered in [the
ress,
but
billiard
knew none
room]
there was a game in prog-
of the players. I asked for George,
No one bothered to reply, but one

young men made a terse gesture in the direction
or his brother, Ira.
of
the
of
went up one flight and there I found

a new group. One of them I vaguely recognized from
110th Street and I asked him where George and Ira were.
He said they were upstairs. On the third floor I found
Arthur
who had just come in and didn't know who
was in the house, but on the fourth I got my answer to
the upper stories.
myby
viting
this
'is
time agonized
me up
sternly,
to
the
fifth.
heard
Ira's
'Where,'
cry. I
.
voice in-
demanded
George?' 'He's taken his old room in the hotel
around the corner.
He
says he's got to have a
little
privacy/
When
sometimes
*
immediate deadlines had to be met George

from the frenetic activity that always seemed
fled
The New
Yorker,
May
25, 1929.
131
to
THE HOUSE ON IO3RD STREET
be a part of the Gershwin household, by renting a room in
a nearby hotel.
He had begun
this practice
when
the family
on noth Street and Amsterdam Avenue, which always

overflowed with relatives and friends, and continued it at
103rd Street. But since his intimate circle usually followed
him to his hotel room and brought with them the tumult and
the shouting, his isolation was ephemeral.
Mostly Gershwin could be found on that fifth floor.
Here he had his favorite piano, a Steinway ( two others were
lived
in the family living quarters downstairs), his books,
music, and the precious
mementos
were lined with photographs
of
of his career.
The
and
walls
famous people affectionately
inscribed to him, together with his favorite portraits of great
composers commissioned by George from Will Cotton. Later

on, a framed poster announcing a performance of the Gershwin Concerto in Paris occupied a prominent wall, while some
of the composers made way for five lithographs by George
Bellows.
Here he did
his
composing, in spite of distractions of
friends buzzing nearby, or the continual
from the
floors
below. Probably
it
was
hum
to find
of activity
more quiet and
he at this time acquired the habit of working

late at night and often until the early hours of dawn. Stripped
down to his waist, and puffing continually at a cigar, he
would sit at his piano and painstakingly work out his ideas.
He always had plenty of ideas, more than he could use.
Once when he discovered that he had lost and couldn't find a
sketchbook containing material for over forty songs, he remarked placidly that he had too many ideas for other songs
to worry unduly about his loss. But working out his material
that was something else again. To find for it the proper
mold, to carve it into its most effective design, to seize the
seclusion that
132
and inevitable phrase, to bring a new touch all this

required laborious effort on his part. For hours at a stretch he
would work on details with the most painstaking fastidiousprecise
ness.
sit
Sometimes, as he worked at the piano, his father would

patiently in the hall outside the closed door. If the piano
played without interruption, his fathers face would beam, for

he knew that all went well with George's inspiration. But
when there was a prolonged period of silence or if the play-
came by fits and starts his father was in torment. He

knew that at such times George was involved in a bitter
ing
creative struggle.
single
On
theme several
one occasion, George kept on playing a
times, then stopped without progressing
The piano was
an insufferably long
time. Unable to stand the suspense any longer, his father
opened the door timidly, pushed his face through the opening, and quickly whistled the fragment of a tune. "Does that
help you, George?" he asked.
George would welcome an endless stream of visitors
to the fifth floor: interviewers; world-famous musicians eager to meet him and tell him how highly they regarded his
music; struggling composers, both serious and the popular,
seeking help and advice; men from the concert or theater
world come to discuss projects. One of Gershwin's most ingratiating traits was that he would greet a high-school student, seriously interviewing him for the school paper or coming for an autograph, as graciously as he would the music
editor of a powerful newspaper. On several occasions he was
known to sit down and play the piano zestfully for an audience of one youngster. He would also welcome an unknown
musician seeking guidance as warmly as he would one with
an established reputation. His door was open to all comers.
to the next idea.
silent for
133
He was never out or too busy to those who tried to reach him
by telephone. His generosity with his time amounted to outright extravagance, and he remained that way regardless of
the increasing pressure of his activities.
On
that fifth floor
he would entertain
his
many
friends
with gay parties, shop talk, and, of course, by playing the

piano for hours. But only one part of his social life was lived
there. Another and more active part was pursued at the
New York society where he was a welcome guest.

There he would mingle with powerful figures in many different walks of life, many of whom became very fond of him.
Besides those already mentioned, there were Otto H. Kahn
(who for a period harbored a hope that Gershwin might
become his son-in-law) and Jascha Heifetz. Also there were
Mary Hoyt Wiborg, at whose home early in 1925 Gershwin
met Igor Stravinsky for the first time; Conde Nast, the magazine publisher, who was Jules Glaenzer's cousin; Jules Glaenzer; the Sidney Fishes; Edsel Ford; the Polish violin virtuoso,
Paul Kochanski; Cole Porter; Samuel Chotzinoff, then music
critic of the New York World, and many others.
He was lionized by these people in New York and
Long Island, and he was lionized by English society in London. In Laughter in the Next Room,* Sir Osbert Sitwell recalled his associations with Gershwin in London:
homes
of
He would
when he
visited
usually
clearly cut face with
its
tures prominent, but, as
power, character and

*
Brown &
come
it
have luncheon with us
Tall
his
fea-
were, streamlined, indicated
talent.
Laughter in the Next Room, by

Co., 1948.
to
and vigorous,
handsome ram's head, the
London.
Sir
have always understood

Osbert Sitwell. Boston:
Little,

134
was the son of immigrants from Russia or Germany, and was brought up in the poorest quarter of New
York; but his manners were notably excellent, his voice
was pleasant, and though the force of his personality was
plain in his whole air, he was modest in bearing, and I
never noticed in him a trace of the arrogance with which
he has been credited.
that he
Eva Gauthier concert in Lonhe was honored by Lord and Lady Canisbrooke, who were cousins of King George V. Late one
night, in that same year, after a party, the Prince of Wales
invited George and the Astaires to Buckingham Palace. The
Duke of Kent then Prince George, son of King George V,
who was killed in an airplane crash during World War II
After a repetition of the
don
in 1925,
became
particularly attached to Gershwin, often invited
to his parties,
and even more frequently dropped
him
in
at
George's apartment in Pall Mall. In the gallery of photo-
graphs at Gershwin's apartment on 103rd Street there hung
one of the Duke with the inscription: "From George to

George." Lord and Lady Mountbatten were also his personal
friends.
Gershwin's social
life
flowed through
still
another
ar-
and continuing
through that decade, he would often meet his Tin Pan Alley
friends during the noon hour at the office of Harms at 62
West 45th Street. There were no specific days for such meetings, but it became habitual for Harry Ruby, Phil Charig,
Bert Kalmar, Joe Meyer, Bud De Sylva, Vincent Youmans,
Irving Caesar, and later on Vernon Duke and Harold Arlen,
to congregate there. George appeared several times a week,
and the group revolved around him. Since there was a piano
tery during this period. In the early 1920s,
135
there,
George often played for
his friends his latest creations
was something of the

delighting the group with impromptu parodies
or works in progress. Irving Caesar
court jester,
and improvised opera arias. Once, while waiting for the

others, Bill Daly accompanied Caesar on the piano as the
latter hummed the "Depuis le jour' aria from the opera
Louise. When Youmans and Gershwin appeared, they listened to the air with rapt attention, Gershwin exclaiming,
"Why, it's wonderful, really wonderful, when did you write
it?" He thought it was a new song by Bill Daly, which Daly
and Caesar were trying out for the first time. The young
composers and lyricists, as well as Gershwin, would sometimes use this social period to discuss
new
projects with the
and their patron saint, Max

Dreyfus. Dreyfus would then take a few of them out to lunch
to the Hunting Room at the Hotel Astor where the special
Dreyfus table was reserved for them.
It was not unusual for young and inexperienced song
writers to come up to Harms to play their unpublished pieces
for Gershwin. He saw them all. One of these visitors, in 1925,
was Arthur Schwartz, then a practicing lawyer for whom
writing songs was still just an amusing diversion. Schwartz
had been so overwhelmed by the Rhapsody in Blue that he
had written a song whose melody quoted some of its material.
The lyric, a paean to Gershwin, began with the lines: "O
wonderful, wonderful Georgie, What you've done to me!" As
he began playing for Gershwin he was seized by the sudden
awareness that this was no masterpiece, and he stopped short
suddenly, and with embarrassment. Gershwin gently asked
him to play some of his other songs, which he did. "I found
his reaction the warmest, most encouraging I had yet received," says Schwartz. Later as a successful composer of
Harms
editor, Dr. Albert Sirmay,

136
Broadway
scores
and
hit songs,
Schwartz was a
member
of
Gershwin's intimate circle.
Broadway had three Gershwin musicals in 1925. Tell

came in mid- April and departed less than a month
later. Built around a romance born at a masked ball, Tell Me
More had one or two appealing elements: Emma Haig's
Me More
ingratiating portrayal of the heroine
who
pretends to be a
and
shopgirl to test the genuineness of her beau's affection,
Lou
Holtz'
own amusing
production as a whole did not

York.
The Gershwin
course since
it
"O So La Mi." But
parody,
jell
was
score
and
failed to please
also far
did not contain a single
below par
number
the
New
for the
that stood out
even remembered.
The Song of the Flame, which opened on December
30, with Tessa Kosta and Guy Robertson, was described
by its producers as a "romantic opera." This musical was also
a failure that deserved its fate. It was an effete attempt on
the part of Gershwin to invade the province of the operetta
dominated by men like Romberg and Friml. The Otto Harbach-Oscar Hammerstein II book made much ado about a
peasant uprising in Russia led by Aniuta, a noble-born rebel
who came to be known as "The Flame." She falls in love with
Prince Volodyn. After each assimilates some of the ideology
of the other, they end up in Paris in each other's arms.
The operetta was conceived along spacious lines
with colorful sets and costumes, big scenes, a Russian art
or
is
chorus, a large corps de ballet, and an enlarged orchestra.

"There were mobs, riots, balls, and carnivals, both in Paris
and Moscow," wrote Percy Hammond. "Picture trod on picture as fast as they came
yet
the play lacked what
.
137
used to be known as 'that something.' " Gershwin's songs

(which were supplemented by several others by Herbert
Stothart ) also lacked conviction, particularly in their pseudoSlavic flavors.
The
title
song bears a blood relationship to
Friml's "Song of the Vagabonds," while
"The Song
of the
known as "Don't Forget Me")

every other Slavic love song in every other Rus-
Cossacks" (perhaps better
sounds
like
sian operetta.
In Song of the Flame Gershwin had temporarily

parted company with some of the collaborators
who had
helped make Lady Be Good so good: the producers, Aarons

and Freedley; the lyricist, Ira Gershwin; the authors, Guy
Bolton and Fred Thompson. But the team was happily reunited in Tip Toes, which opened only two days after The
Song of the Flame. Tip Toes was in the sophisticated manner of Lady Be Good. It was good musical comedy, good
Gershwin and it was a hit. Freedley says that it earned
more money for the Aarons and Freedley combine than any
other Gershwin musical they produced, not excluding Girl
Crazy which had a longer run.
"Tip Toes," played by Queenie Smith, is a vivacious
dancer who is used by her brothers as bait to trap a million-
aire in a profitable marriage.

style befitting a queen.
They bring her
to
Miami
in a
There she finds her prey in Steve, the

They fall in love, but only when
glue-king (Allen Kearns).
convinced she loves him for himself alone, and not

permanently united.
Such a text is not likely to change the destiny of the
musical theater; but it was studded with smart lines, with
piquant topical allusions, and delightful comic situations.
Steve
is
for his millions, are they
Best of
all it
was punctuated with
several outstanding Gersh-
138
[Tip
win songs. "Bright and gay and good looking
Toes] is made altogether captivating by the pretty, rebel,
infectious music of George Gershwin, all told the best score
.
he has written in his days in the theater, all told, I think, the
best score anyone has written for our town this season." So
Gershwrote Alexander Woollcott who added: "It was
win's evening, so sweet and sassy are the melodies he has
poured out ... so fresh and unstinted the gay, young blood
of his invention/' The cream of the Gershwin crop was "That
Certain Feeling," with its subtly insinuating accentuations;
the high-voltage rhythms of "Sweet and Low Down"; the
wistful tenderness of "Looking for a Boy," which one of
England's prominent musicologists, Francis Toye, praised for
its Brahmsian personality.
A special word must be said about Ira's lyrics which,
in Tip Toes, show an advance in technique, assurance, and
flexibility over earlier efforts. Ira himself says that he became
satisfied with his writing for the first time in this production.
Lorenz Hart, himself an ace lyricist and the verbal partner of
Richard Rodgers, was so impressed by Ira's skill that he then
wrote one of his rare fan letters to a rival lyricist.
.
Your
lyrics
gave
me
Mr. George Gershwin's music. ...
good
this
at a time
many a day. ... It is a

when light amusement
as
I
jingles
pleasure as
have heard none so
great pleasure to live

in this country
last losing its brutally cretin aspect.
your
much
Such
is
at
delicacies as
prove that songs can be both popular and
intelligent.
May
rhymes
Tip Toes show a healthy improvement over
in
take the liberty of saying that your
Lady Be Good. You have helped a lot

an evening delightful for me and I am very
those in
to
make
grateful.

139
Ira's
rhyming
"there's a cabaret in this

tricity," or "if
you're in a
ness
you need a
crisis,
Toes has a new resiliency

city
peps you up like elec-
in Tip
tonic,
my advice
come through the
is."
and the need
A new
is
simplicity
chronic,
and
if
direct-
felicitous use of colloquialism ("that
which belonged to the jargon of the day).

new and subtle feeling for the comic,
though this is to be found in a lyric which unfortunately was
deleted from the production, "The Harlem River Chantey."
London also had three Gershwin musicals during this
period, all of them hits in varying degrees. Tell Me More
redeemed itself in London, largely because it was the showcase for two London favorites Heather Thatcher and Leslie
Henson. As we have seen, Lady Be Good with the Astaires
came to London after a highly successful two-week tryout
in Liverpool; it took the town by storm. This was the first
Gershwin musical that Aarons and Freedley imported from
Broadway to London, and when they followed it with Tip
Toes they established the tradition of bringing Gershwin musicals from New York to London that continued for several
certain feeling,"
Ira also demonstrated a
years.
140
lO
THE CONCERTO
Gershwin's shadow
not once but twice.
man and
fell across
On December
his orchestra
IN
Carnegie Hall in 1925

1925, Paul White-
29,
gave a concert there including the
world premiere of Grofe's Mississippi Suite and the first revival of Gershwin's one-act opera, Blue Monday
now rechristened 135th Street since that single-night performance
in the Scandals three and a half years earlier. Gershwin's
opera was now given without formal scenery. A few simple
props suggested a night club. All the action took place directly in front of the
Whiteman
Orchestra, and the distrac-
watching Whiteman conduct behind the stage action

was disturbing. If the Gershwin opera had had inherent vitaltion of
THE CONCERTO IN
141
ity
and dramatic
handicap; as
this
would have surmounted

spite of fine performances by
Jack McGowan, and Benny
interest, it surely
it
was
and in
Charles Hart, Blossom Seeley,
the opera did not impress the
music critics, who

were hearing it for the first time. Perhaps the most favorable
reaction came from Olin Downes who found "excellent material" in it, "some good melodies," and "certain dramatic
passages." But more characteristic of the general critical response was the report of an unsigned music critic for the Sim.
"The music
with the exception of two clever songs
served simply as an unimpressive accompaniment for
an old hokum vaudeville skit."
This was not Gershwin's initiation into Carnegie Hall.
Three weeks earlier he had appeared there in the dual role of
pianist and composer in the world premiere of his Concerto
in F, his first major new serious music since the Rhapsody in
Fields
city
Blue.
few months
after the
premiere of the RJiapsody in
New York Symhad prevailed on its president, Harry Harkness Flagler, to commission Gershwin to write a work for
orchestra. Gershwin decided to compose a piano concerto
and signed a contract with that organization specifying that
he make seven appearances as soloist in New York, Washington, Philadelphia, and Baltimore.
The story that, after the signing of the contract, Gershwin went out and bought a book to find out what a concerto
was is apocryphal. By 1925 Gershwin had had sound training in the sonata form, and he had heard numerous concertos. However, he did make a study of several of the more
famous concertos in the repertory to ascertain the approach
Blue, Walter Damrosch, conductor of the
phony
Society,
of the masters to that form.
142
He began
trie
head
working on
his
music in July 1925. (At
of his preliminary sketches appeared the title
New
York Concerto. But he soon abandoned this name for the

more formal and less descriptive designation of Concerto in
F. ) Since he needed a quiet retreat, Ernest Hutcheson provided him with a studio in Chautauqua, New York, where
Hutcheson was then conducting a master class in piano.
Hutcheson instructed all his pupils that under no circumstance were they to invade Gershwin's privacy until four in
the afternoon. At four o'clock sharp, many of the young students would storm into Gershwin's studio to hear him play
and sing
his music.
The writing of the Concerto took an entire summer;

movement was completed in late September. The
the third
which Gershwin now insisted on doing himself, took another four weeks. At the bottom of the last page
of the manuscript appears the date when the entire work was
orchestration,
completed: November
Soon
after its
10.
completion, the Concerto was tried
out by Gershwin at the Globe Theater.
An
orchestra of sixty
The
hired musicians was conducted
by
Gershwin made during
performance were compara-
this trial
tively slight; they appear
on
Bill
Daly.
revisions
his manuscript.
The official premiere took place on the afternoon of

December 3. The program included Glazunov's Fifth Symphony and Rabaud's Suite anglais, both performed before the
intermission that preceded the Gershwin Concerto.
On
the
day of his concert, Gershwin appears to have maintained his

calm and equilibrium, for at two o'clock that day Phil Charig
had to bang on the door of his bathroom to hurry him out of
his leisurely bath. But as the moment for his appearance came
THE CONCERTO IN
143
closer, his
nerves began to reveal raw edges. During the
and just before the Concerto, Gershwin paced

up and down the artist's room, rubbing his fingers. Damrosch
sat by quietly and remarked with a smile, "Just P^ a y tne
Concerto as well as it deserves, George, and you'll come off
intermission,
with flying banners."
Once
Rhapsody in
was a strange potpourri of jazz enthusiasts and representatives from Tin Pan Alley, serious musicians, and music-lovers. All seemed enthusiastic over Gershwin's Concerto and participated in a magnificent ovation
for the composer at its conclusion. As for the critics, they
ranged from excessive enthusiasm to denunciation. Samuel
again, as at Aeolian Hall for the
Blue, the auditorium
"He
Chotzinoff wrote:
of today
alone of
expresses us.
audacity, impertinence,
He
all
is
those writing the music
the present, with
feverish delight in
its
lapses into rhythmically exotic melancholy.
the smallest hint of self-consciousness.
where
artist
comes
his genius
who
in.
its
all its
motion,
its
He writes without
And here is
George Gershwin
is
an instinctive
has the talent for the right manipulation of the
crude material he starts out with that a lifelong study of

counterpoint and fugue never can give to the one who is not
born with it." W. J. Henderson said: "It has the moods of
the contemporaneous dance without their banality. It has
means and their substance. ... It is interesting

and individual
and it very frequently reminds one
lifted their
of the frantic efforts of certain moderns. It drops into their
language, sometimes, but
In the opposite
it
camp
has more to say."

stood Lawrence Gilman to
the music was "conventional,

Pitts
Sanborn
who found
it
whom
worst a little dull";

fragmentary, uncertain in form,
trite, at its
144
and without an understanding of the requirements of the

orchestra; and Olin Downes who regarded it as much less
original than the Rhapsody in Blue.
Gershwin said of the Concerto's structure that
the sonata form
but.
."
The "but"
is
it "is
important.
Concerto never follows the traditional patterns of the

cal form.
The
structure
free
is
and
elastic;
in
The
classi-
the materials are
presented and restated in an unconventional manner.
The very opening
of the
first
movement
(Allegro)
is
unorthodox: not an orchestral peroration with basic themes

as was habitual with so many classical and romantic masters,
but eight measures of mood setting and atmosphere building. An abandoned Charleston motive is shared between
kettledrums and woodwinds. The introduction over, three
successive ideas emerge. The first is racy, given by the bassoon before the full orchestra takes over; the second is a
wistful melody in the piano; the third, a slow, sensual waltz
for the strings with filigree treatment by the piano.
In the second movement (Andante con moto), an
extended song, with the shimmering haze of a Debussy
melody, is heard in muted trumpet set against nebulous harmonies of three clarinets. When this sensitive and mysterious
introduction ends, an irresponsible jazzy idea
is
given by the
piano against a brisk rhythm in the strings. The second subject
is
discussed in some detail.
A transition
in the solo violin
which provocatively suggests the

germ of a new melody. This new melody is the heart of the
movement, a mobile and sensual song unfolding in the
strings. The movement ends with a return of the muted
trumpet with which it began, and in the same atmosphere of
leads to a piano cadenza
mystery.
145
THE CONCERTO IN
The
finale
(Allegro con brio)
is
in sharp contrast,
erupting like a firecracker, with an outburst of rhythms and

orchestral color.
The emotions held
so long in check are
now
given release. Principal themes from the preceding two move-
ments are recalled but often changed in details; they are

skillfully interjected into the gay and abandoned proceedings. A climax is reached with a stirring restatement in the
strings of the second theme of the first movement, and the
Concerto ends with a brief coda.
The rich palette of Gershwin's orchestration requires

the full symphony orchestra together with a bass drum, snare
drum, cymbals, "Charleston stick," xylophone, and bells.
Gershwin does not use any saxophones.
The Concerto is a much more astute and a much more
musical work than the Rhapsody in Blue. The form has less
tendency to ramble before arriving at the convenient stopping-off point of a
new
salient thought; there
is
less reliance
on convenient passage work to fill in gaps. Most of the time

Gershwin seems to know where he is heading, and he proceeds toward the new idea with the sure gait of one who
knows the lay of the land.
There is greater richness and variety of thought in the
Concerto Vian in the Rhapsody. What we have in the Concerto is not only just one or two good melodies, as was the
case with the earlier work, but a gushing of wonderful ideas,
refreshing in their contrasting idioms and moods. And, unlike the Rhapsody where a new inviting subject comes almost
as a surprise to the composer, most of the ideas in the Concerto are permitted to evolve and develop naturally out of the
musical texture. The Concerto is interesting not only for its
thematic subjects, but also in the way the material is presented, extended, enlarged, combined, and transformed.
140
The gamut
more
of moods, feelings, atmosphere
elastic in the Concerto.
In the larger work
we
is
much
get
some
and nostalgia of the Rhapsody,

but to all this is added something equally vital: the shimmering poetic beauty of the second movement in which jazz
is made to plumb new artistic depths. Walter Damrosch underscored this point by saying so felicitously that in the Concerto Gershwin made a lady out of jazz. He wrote in the
program notes:
of the abandon, wit, satire,
Various composers have been walking around jazz

like a cat
cool
off,
around a plate of hot soup, waiting for
so that they could enjoy
it
by cooks
Jazz,
her
to
without burning their
tongues, hitherto accustomed only to the

liquid distilled
it
more tepid
Lady
of the classical school.
adorned with her intriguing rhythms, has danced
way around
Islands.
larity,
the world, even as far as the Eskimos
North and the Polynesians of the South Sea
of the
But for
all
her travels and her sweeping popu-
she has encountered no knight
would enable her
who
could
lift
her
be received as a
respectable member in the musical circles. George Gershwin seems to have accomplished this miracle. He has done
it boldly by dressing this extremely independent and upto-date young lady in the classic garb of a concerto. Yet
he has not detracted one whit from her fascinating perto a level that
sonality.
He
is
the prince
who
to
has taken Cinderella by
the hand and openly proclaimed her a princess to the

astonished world no doubt to the fury of her envious
sisters.
On May
29,
European premiere
1928, the Concerto in
in a
received
its
performance by Dimitri Tiomkin and
147
THE CONCERTO IN
an orchestra conducted by Vladimir Golschmann. Two yean

after that, the eminent English conductor Albert Coates compiled a list of fifty of the foremost musical works of our time;,
only a single American work was included, and that was the
Gershwin Concerto. On September 8, 1932, two movements

were given at the Second International Festival of Contemporary Music in Venice. Harry Kaufman was the soloist with
Fritz Reiner
conducting.
The correspondent
for
Musical
America reported that it was "the only piece to arouse public

favor." On October 6, 1939, Serge Koussevitzky included
the Concerto in special programs of the Boston Symphony
Orchestra honoring American composers.
Like the Rhapsody in Blue, the Concerto has become a
staple of the contemporary repertory. It is without question
the most frequently performed piano concerto written in the
last half century, and not only in America but also in Europe.
And though this does not follow as a corollary it is also one
of the best. It was used for a ballet, in Gothenburg, Sweden,
in 1954.
"When
once said the Peruvian opera singer

answer to a bitter denunciation of
jazz by John Roach Straton, "I want nothing better than that
Gershwin's Piano Concerto be played over my grave."
Marguerite
I die,"
d' Alvarez, in
148
U
Oh
Kay, Funny Face,
AND THE PIANO
PRELUDES
There were two important parties celebrating the
premiere of the Concerto. One was given by Jules Glaenzer,
at
which a golden
cigarette case, with the signatures of
twenty-eight of Gershwin's friends, was presented to the
composer. At the other, the hosts were Dr. and Mrs. Walter
Damrosch at their home at 168 West 71st Street. The place

swarmed with Gershwin friends and admirers, and the
praises gushed as freely as the liquor. Some of the guests
there started discussing Gershwin's future as an American
composer. The belief was expressed that he should immediately engage in intensive study of theory and composition
Oh
149
Kay, Funny Face
and technique; others counhim of his main assets

spontaneity and freshness and make him studied and selfconscious in his writing. Some suggested that he abandon
popular music and dedicate himself completely to serious
creation; others felt his popular music was much too good
and important in its own right to be discarded.
Gershwin listened to these arguments without comment. He would hear them again and again in the future. If
they made any impression on him that evening at the Damrosch's, the fact was not betrayed by his phlegmatic face or
quizzical smile. But he often discussed the questions raised
at that party. F.P.A. reported in the weekly diary of his column, "The Conning Tower/' in the World, on January 23,
to
fill
in the gaps in his training
tered that such instruction might rob
1926:
Then G. Gershwin,
the composer,
came
in,
and
vie
did talk musique, and about going ahead regardless of

advice, this one saying,
ing, Study;
and another
Do
not study, and that one say-
saying, Write only jazz melodies,
and another saying Write only symphonies and concertos.
Gershwin certainly did not agree with those who felt

and
would damage the gifts with
which he was born. He said to Ira, "I maintain that a comsaid that further study
poser needs to understand
all
the intricacies of counterpoint
and orchestration, and be able to create new forms for each

advance in his work." He had never actually stopped studying; he never would. After Hambitzer's death, Gershwin
took some piano lessons with Herman Wasserman, and received valuable advice and coaching from teachers such as
Ernest Hutcheson. Following his formal lessons in theory
150
with Kilenyi in 1922, he thought of studying composition

with Ernest Bloch. But Bloch was then in Cleveland, and in
1923 Gershwin turned to Rubin Goldmark, an association
of several months' duration that was neither happy nor fruitful for the pupil. There were other teachers after 1926. In
or about 1927 he took lessons in counterpoint from Henry
Cowell, an American composer then an enfant terrible in
American music through his development and exploitation
of "tone clusters": an unorthodox procedure which called for
the use of fists and forearms in playing his piano music. Cowell has written,
The
lessons
something would
three weeks. His
over the place.
were
to
be once a week, but usually

they were nearer once in
interfere, so
[Gershwin's] fertile
He was
mind leaped
exasperated at the rules
all
but not
because he was incapable of mastering them. With no
he rattled off the almost perfect exercise, but

would get side-tracked into something using a juicy ninth
and altered chords that he liked better, and would insert
these into the Palestrina-style motet. The whole period
lasted a little over two years.
effort at all
After Cowell, there were
still
other teachers.
And
less for-
was studying all the time by himself, or receiving guidance from various musicians.
As for giving up popular music and concentrating all
this advice
his energies and efforts on serious composition
made no impression on him at all. Gershwin often confided
to his friends that popular music was not only a way of
making a handsome living but also a means of artistic expression as necessary to him as the writing of large works. The
mally, Gershwin
Oh
151
Kay, Funny Face
Fand the accolades

could not rob him of
Concerto in
it
gathered
among
the in^
popmass consumption.
In 1926 George and Ira Gershwin wrote an excellent
production number, "That Lost Barber-Shop Chord," for an
intimate revue, Americana. Among the other composers who
contributed songs were Phil Charig, whose "Sunny Disposish" and "Blowing the Blues Away" had lyrics by Ira.
Americana, book by J. P. McEvoy, made musical-comedy history on two counts. It introduced Charles Butter worth to the
stage; and it seated Helen Morgan for the first time atop an
upright piano, from which vantage point she sang a plangent blues number, "Nobody Wants Me," which immediately established her as a leading exponent of torch songs.
Also in 1926 the Gershwins wrote the songs for one
of their outstanding musical-comedy successes, Oh Kay. It
was the first American musical comedy starring Gertrude
Lawrence, who had made her Broadway debut in 1924 in
Chariot's Revue, imported from London. When Aarons and
Freedley discussed with her the possibility of coming to New
York in a new musical, she was considering a similar offer
from Ziegfeld. The information that George Gershwin
would write the music was the deciding factor in her acceptance of the Aarons and Freedley contract.
The radiance she always brought to the stage made
her presence in Oh Kay strongly felt. But putting her in the
telligentsia
his zest in writing in a
ular idiom for
role of
Kay was not the only happy piece of casting. The part
McGee, a bootlegger, was assigned to Victor
of Shorty
a sad-faced, thin and broken-voiced, helpless
Moore
man who had
a Chaplinesque
way
of blending
little
comedy with
and pathos. Moore had been appearing on the

American musical-comedy stage for almost a quarter of a
wistfulness
152
century, but Shorty
McGee was one
of his greatest personal
triumphs up to that time and the first of several unforgettable Milquetoast characters with which he brightened the
corners of
seemed
Broadway
for the next decade. Strange to say,
at first so poorly cast as the bootlegger that
he
Vinton
Freedley thought of buying out his contract for $10,000 and

getting Johnny Dooley as a replacement. But before the shift
was made, Victor Moore brought down the house in Philadelphia.
The
rest of the
in the leading
male
memorable
role of
cast included Oscar
Jimmy
Shaw
Winters; Gerald Oliver
Smith as the English duke, Kay's brother; and an attractive

young lady named Betty Compton who was given a minor
role through the influence of the Mayor of New York City,
James J. Walker.
The performances of Gertrude Lawrence, Victor
Moore, and Oscar Shaw helped to bring out vividly the luster
of the scintillating lines and hilarious episodes with which
Guy Bolton and P. G. Wodehouse studded a rather perfunctory plot. The story concerned itself with the rather unoriginal theme of bootlegging. An English duke and his sister
Kay come to the United States on their yacht. They have
been in financial difficulties since World War I, and they are
using their yacht for rum-running. Pursued by American
prohibition agents, they find an asylum in the palatial home
of Jimmy Winter, whose cellar they now use as a secret hiding place for illicit liquor. The liquor is watched over by
Shorty McGee, disguised as a butler. Kay and Jimmy fall in
love. But they must extricate themselves from varied entanglements and misunderstandings including the indefatigable pursuit of Jimmy by various blondes before they can
become
united.
153
Oh
Kay, Funny Face
"It
was an event bordering upon the phenomenal,"
reported Percy
win's score
is
Hammond
a marvel of
after the premiere. "Mr. Gersh-
its
kind." Brooks Atkinson
was
also
comedy seldom proves more intensely

than Oh Kay.
The distinction ... is its
enthusiastic. "Musical
delightful
excellent blending of all the creative arts of musical enter-
tainment."
The Gershwin
score
was a
richer cache of treasure
than even that hidden in Jimmy Winter's cellar. To no other

musical production up to this time had he been so lavish
gifts. There was "Someone To Watch Over Me"
most soaring and beguiling lyric vein, touched with
the glow of Gertrude Lawrence's charm; "Clap Yo' Hands,"
with its fascinating rhythms; "Do, Do, Do," in which Ira
Gershwin's infectious use of repeated words throughout the
lyric was matched by the capricious feathery touch of the
melody. Besides these there were such secondary hits as the
title song, "Maybe," and "Fidgety Feet," each of which
would have been a shining beacon in any other musical.
In 1927 Aarons and Freedley built a new theater for
their productions
the Alvin on West 52nd Street. It was a
house that Gershwin had helped build with the profits from
Lady Be Good, Tip Toes, and Oh Kay. What, then, was more
appropriate than that it should be opened on November 22
with a new Gershwin musical? This was Funny Face, in
which Fred and Adele Astaire made their first welcome return in a Gershwin show since Lady Be Good. Fred Astaire
was cast as Jimmy Reeve, the guardian of Frankie, who was
with his
in his
played by Adele. Frankie's pearls are being held by her

guardian in a safe and he refuses to part with them. In an
effort to retrieve the jewels
lists
from her guardian, Frankie en-
the aid of her boy friend, Peter (Allen Kearns). In his
154
effort to penetrate the safe, Peter gets helplessly
involved
with two comic and blundering thugs, Dugsie and Herbert,
who
are also after the pearls.
As in Oh Kay, it was Victor Moore as the thug,

Herbert who stole the limelight. The book, originally by
Robert Benchley in collaboration with Fred Thompson,
called for a lady crook. In this version the show was tried out
with disastrous results: It lost about $10,000 a week and received annihilating reviews. Surgery was required. Thirteen
Gershwin numbers were eliminated (some of them reappeared in later musicals), and others were substituted to
tighten the score. Besides this, on Gershwin's suggestion,
Paul Gerard Smith was called in to doctor the book to emphasize comedy. ( Robert Benchley bowed out of the picture
completely.) During this revision, the producers had the
happy idea of recruiting Victor Moore to replace the lady
thief. New scenes were rewritten with Victor Moore in mind,
and they became the strong points of the production: in one,

the two blundering crooks get drunk over a punch bowl
with hilarious consequences; in another, Herbert tries to
shoot his partner, who accepts his fate with an almost in-
The change was finally

moment
the show began doing well. By the time it
credible stoicism and resignation.
achieved in Wilmington, Delaware; almost from the
Moore took
over,
reached New York it was playing to crowded houses. Among

those enchanted by it, and particularly by Gershwin's music, was France's leading composer, Maurice Ravel, then on
his first visit to the United States.
The best songs were "'S Wonderful" (the hit of the
show), "Let's Kiss and Make Up," and a number that has
never received the recognition it deserves ( it will probably be
revived some day with astonishing results)
"The Babbitt
1 55
Oh
Kay, Funny Face
and the Bromide." This last is a patter song with a difference

seemed to bring to his writing: an in-
that George always
triguing contrapuntal design runs through the accompani-
ment
and the chorus
of the verse,
instrumental polka.
of his best. This
berger saw
fit
followed by a delightful
is
More remarkable
was the only song
to include in his
still is Ira's
lyric
one
lyric that
Louis Kronen-
An Anthology
of Light Verse,
published in 1934.
Babbitt met a Bromide on the avenue one day,
And
held a conversation in their
They both were
And
own
solid citizens, they
you
as they spoke
clearly
saw
peculiar way.
both had been around,

their feet
were on the
ground.
CHORUS
Hello!
Howsa
How
are you?
folks? What's
new?
I'm great! That's good!
Ha-ha! Knock wood!

WeU, well! What say?
How-ya been? Nice day.
How's tricks? What's new?
That's fine, are you?
we
Nice weather
are having but
it
gives
me
such a pain;
I've taken
my
umbrella, so of course
rain.
Heigh-ho! That's
What's new?
Got
Ta,
to run! Oh,
ta.
life!
Howza
wife?
my!
Olive Oil! Good-bye.
it
doesn't
156
"The Babbitt and the Bromide" was
last
heard
in
the motion picture, The Ziegfeld Follies, released in 1946,

sung by Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly.
On December
4,
1926, at the Hotel Roosevelt,
Mar-
guerite d'Alvarez, the operatic contralto, stepped in boldly
where only Eva Gauthier had previously dared to tread. She

sang some Gershwin songs at a serious recital that included
French and Spanish art songs. Gershwin participated at this
concert, not only by accompanying her in his songs, but also
by appearing as a piano soloist. The program opened with a
solo-piano arrangement of the Rhapsody in Blue, played by
Gershwin. Then, after the first group of art songs, he returned for a solo performance, in the world premiere of his
Five Preludes for the piano. This concert was so successful
that Marguerite d'Alvarez
and George Gershwin went on
tour with the same program.
New
They appeared
in Buffalo,
December
15, 1926, and in Boston on January 16, 1927. In both cities the Rhapsody in Blue was
given in a two-piano arrangement, with Isadore Gorn officiating at the second piano in Buffalo, and Edward Hart in Bos-
York, on
ton.
The Five Preludes was Gershwin's
first
serious
work
Three have been published, performed, and recorded. The first prelude, in B-flat major
(Allegretto ben ritmato e deciso), is a lively rhythmic excursion, utilizing elements of the tango and the Charleston. The
second, in C-sharp minor (Andante con moto e poco rubato),
is the most famous of the set: a poignant three-part blues
melody set against an exciting harmony that grows richer as
the melody unfolds. Rhythm once again predominates in the
third prelude, in E-flat major (Allegretto ben ritmato e desince the Concerto in F.
157
Oh
Kay, Funny Face
an uninhibited outburst of joyous feeling. These three

preludes have been orchestrated several times, notably by
Lewis Raymond, Gregory Stone, and Roy Bargy. Jascha Heifetz arranged them for violin and piano, and has recorded
them in this version for Decca. In addition, the second prelude was transcribed for violin, cello, and piano by Gregory
Stone; for saxophone and piano, by Sigurd Rascher; and for
trumpet and piano, by Stone.
Of the two remaining preludes, one is a thirty-two bar
blues in the style of the Prelude in C-Sharp Minor, and is still
in manuscript and never played. The other is a tender melody with a strong narrative qualify; it has been transcribed
for violin and piano by Samuel Dushkin, and is called Sliort
ciso),
Story.
158
12
AN
IN
AMERICAN
EUROPE
Early in 1928 Gershwin went to Europe with Ira and

Leonore, and Frances Gershwin. It was George's fifth trip
abroad and it turned out to be his last. This time he was not
going in order to work on some new London production, as
he had done heretofore, but to escape temporarily from the
continual pressure of
Broadway commitments and
deadlines.
He felt he needed time to think and breathe perhaps to

study with some European master, perhaps to assimilate
Europe's musical culture, perhaps to complete a new orchestral
work which he had already sketched out.

The first stop was London. They stayed long enough
159
AN AMERICAN IN EUROPE
to see Oh Kay on its closing night, which completed its long

run with Gertrude Lawrence; to attend a performance of a
new London musical, That's a Good Girl, for which Ira had
written some of the lyrics and Phil Charig some of the music;
to participate in a special George Gershwin evening at the
Kit-Kat night club; and to revive old friendships with the
Duke
Lord and Lady Mountbatten, and others.

Then on Sunday, March 25, they crossed the Chan-
of Kent,
nel to Paris
and stepped into a whirlwind of
activity. Six
days later the Rhapsody in Blue was performed by the Pasdeloup Orchestra under Rhene-Baton at the Theatre Mogador. It was the last number of a program that included
Cesar Franck's Symphony in D Minor, two shorter orchestral works, and Bach's Concerto for Two Pianos and Orchestra. Wiener and Doucet, a two-piano team who had per-
formed the Bach Concerto, returned to divide between them

the solo part of the Rhapsody in Blue. This singular arrangement was only one of several disturbing factors about that
performance. The work had not been properly rehearsed; a
stock jazz arrangement was being used; and, since he lacked
a full orchestral score, the conductor had to lead from a piano arrangement. The performance was so haphazard that
George feared disaster and fled from the auditorium to the
bar. From there he was amazed to hear the Parisians acclaiming the work with thunderous enthusiasm and calling to him
to take a bow. "How they knew that George was in the audience was a mystery to me," noted Ira in his diary. His appearance inspired another outburst. Deems Taylor, who was
in the audience
and who had no idea that George was in
Europe was amazed to see him come to the stage. "You can
always count on George to be there when a bow's to be
taken," he remarked to a friend. In response to the ovation,
ISO
Wiener and Doucet gave a Gershwin encore, the song, "Do,

Do, Do."
A few weeks later, at the seasonable opening of the
fashionable night club, Les Ambassadeurs, Frances Gershwin
began a limited engagement in a program of George's songs.
The stage show had been written largely by Cole Porter, who
prepared a special routine for Frances. Her rendition of the
Gershwin songs was prefaced by a lyric explaining how it
felt to be the sister of a famous composer. For her openingnight appearance, George appeared as her accompanist.
On April 16, at the Theatre des Champs-filysees, the

Gershwins attended the premiere of a new ballet, the Rhapsody in Blue. The choreographer and principal dancer, Anton Dolin, had heard Gershwin play the work at a party attended by the cultural elite of Paris. Then and there he had
decided to create a ballet for the music depicting a struggle
between jazz and classical music, with jazz at first succumbing but in the end emerging triumphant. Mme. Vera Neamchinova was Classical Music; Dolin was Jazz.
Six weeks later, on May 29, the European premiere
of Gershwin's Concerto in F took place at the Paris Opera.
Vladimir Golschmann conducted the orchestra, and Dimitri Tiomkin was soloist. This was the first opportunity Gershwin had had to hear another artist play the music. Once
again, as at the Pasdeloup concert in March, Gershwin's
was the last number. The program included Weber's Euryanthe Overture, Liszt's Piano Concerto in A Major (Tiomkin, soloist), and an early work by Aaron Copland, Cortege
macabre. The Gershwin Concerto received an ovation. It
also won over the French critics completely. Arthur Hoeree
rhapsodized over its "inexhaustible verve," the "fascination
of its flowing melodies," and the composer's "keen feeling for
Gershwin, Pallay, and an unidentified Santa Barbara deubutante,

at the El Mirador, in Palm Springs ( 1930).
PPlMK|
'^
'"
"
w M
~"^
/ A
V.J
ft
"
*
Mk
3r
'%"?
rf-
\ K\\i-
Aarons and Gershwin ( 1926 )

(Photo by Keystone View Co., Inc.)
a.
Alex
b.
Koussevitzky and Gershwin
c.
George Gershwin and Ernest HutcheChatauqua (1925). (Photo by Har-
1932 )
son, at
old
Wagner)
d.
George Gershwin
Connecticut.
at the
Warburg Farm,
a.
Gershwin punching bag
at
33 Riverside
Drive, N. Y. C. (1930).
b.
Gershwin
at
c.
Will Daly.
Palm Springs (1930).

camera
portrait
by George
Gershwin.
Henry Botkin.
George Gershwin.
d.
e.
Kay
A camera
Swift (1930).
*>-
portrait
by
George Gershwin, Guy Bolton, and
Ira
Gershwin
in
Beverly Hills
(193<>)-
Ira Gershwin,
man
Leonore Gershwin, George Gershwin, Emerich Kaland several others at the Cafe Sacher in
at George's right )
Vienna
1928).
."*..<.'-,
George Gershwin
at
work
in the living
room
of his East
::_;
'
mm/
72nd
Street apartment, N. Y. C.
Left:
George Gershwin and Lynn Riggs,
in Beverly Hills (1936).
Right: Pirandello, Mamoulian, and George Gershwin (1936).
-,).
Above, Ira, Leonore, and George with Mrs. and Mr. Irving Berlin,
in Nassau (1933). (Photo by Jones b- hanger) Below, George
Gershwin, Harold Arlen, and Lawrence Tibbett, in Beverly Hills
(1936).
George Gershwin and Jerome Kern.
George Gershwin plays his score for Shall We Dance? Seated, left
to right: Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, George Gershwin, Ira Gershwin, and Nathaniel Shilkret (Photo by RKO Radio Pictures, Inc.)
ft
George Gershwin,
Du
Bose Heyward, and Ira Gershwin
the Boston premiere of Porgy and Bess.
just after
o
Du
Bose Heyward.
portrait
by George Gershwin.
"My
Father."
A portrait by George Gershwin
(Photo
(1931).
Peter A. Juley 6 Son)
by
Jerome Kern.
A portrait by George Gershwin (1937). (Photo by Keystone Photo Service)
'Self-Portrait"
1932 )
(Photo by Peter A. Juley
b-
Son )
/*>
"*j|8^
Gershwin and
his last painting,
Keystone Photo Service )
Arnold Schoenberg. (Photo by
The George Gershwin Collection Exhibition

Chicago, November 10-25, 1 933:,..
...,.
at the Arts
Club
of
?..
Paul Whiteman,
Gershwin
J.
Lasky, Ira Gershwin, Marc Connolly, Leonore
at the christening of the
Pedro, California, April 22, 1943.
SS George Gershwin at San
161
the orchestra." Emile Vuillermoz wrote: "This very characteristic
work made even the most
distrustful musicians real-
might perfectly well exert a deep and

beneficent influence in the most exalted spheres." One or
two of the celebrities attending the concert were less apize that
jazz
preciative. Serge Diaghilev, the guiding genius of the Ballet
bad
foremost com-
Russe, complained that the Concerto was "good jazz but
To Serge
Liszt."
posers, the
many
Prokofiev, one of Russia's
work was not much more than a succession
of
"thirty-two bar choruses."
much more than listenwelcome applause of French

music-lovers and critics. There was an endless round of visits
and parties at fashionable salons where Gershwin was very
The
ing to his
much
homes
he
the
Paris holiday consisted of
own music and
man
the
visited
Maurice Ravel.
Ravel one year
He had met
ing that composer's
first visit
fifty-third birthday,
March
to the
7,
earlier in
United
1928,
ranged a birthday party for him.
wanted
he paid calls at the

At Montfort-l'Amaury
of the hour. Less formally,
of leading musicians in Paris.
New
States.
York dur-
On
Ravel's
Eva Gauthier had arasked him what he
"I
"and his
request was to hear and meet George Gershwin." George
played that night for Ravel to the undisguised delight of the
master. Mme. Gauthier has written: "George that night
surpassed himself, achieving astounding feats in rhythmic intricacies so that even Ravel was dumbfounded." The contact
between Gershwin and Ravel was renewed after that at other
New York parties, including one at Jules Glaenzer's.
When, therefore, Gershwin called on Ravel at his
home in France he came as a friend. Once again Gershwin
played for the master by the hour. Later when Gershwin sugfor a birthday present," recalls Gauthier,
162
gested studying with him, Ravel replied,
"Why
be a second-rate Ravel when you can be a
should you
first-rate
Gersh-
win?"
met and played for Darius Milhaud,

Francis Poulenc, Georges Auric, and Serge Prokofiev. This
time Prokofiev was much more impressed by Gershwin's music, singling out several tunes and embellishments for special
praise. He went so far as to predict a successful future for
Gershwin as a serious composer but only if George was prepared to leave "dollars and dinners" alone.
It was a busy life. At the Marbeuf home of the Tiomkins (Mrs. Tiomkin was the famous dancer, Albertina
Rasch) Gershwin drank vodka and played the piano till
dawn. With the composer Alexandre Tansman he went out
to Chatou to spend the day with and play for Rhene-Baton.
Yet somehow Gershwin managed to find the time to work on
his new orchestral composition, An American in Paris. He
Gershwin
also
completed a whole section (the blues) at his apartment in

the Hotel Majestic. When the French pianist Mario Braggioti came there to pay his respects, Gershwin joined him in
playing the recently completed section much to the pianist's
delight for he was an ardent Gershwin fan. ( One year later,
Braggioti with his partner Jacques Fray officiated at two
London production of Funny Face.) Vernon

Duke, who also saw the parts that Gershwin had completed,
complained that there was too much saccharine in the music.
pianos in the
But a distinguished English composer, William Walton, advised Gershwin to disregard Duke's opinion.
One day Leopold Stokowski dropped in at the Hotel
Majestic to see Gershwin. He picked up the manuscript on
which Gershwin was then working and suggested that he
might be interested in directing its premiere. When Gersh-
163
win told him that the premiere had been promised to

Walter Damrosch, Stokowski dropped the manuscript as if it
had suddenly become contaminated and discreetly changed
the subject.
From
Paris, Gershwin went on to Vienna. At the Hohe continued to work on his music. He heard
some of the provocative musical works of the day, including
Krenek's jazz opera Jonny spielt auf and Alban Berg's Lyric
Suite, both of which he enjoyed immensely. The latter work
was played for Gershwin at Berg's apartment by an ensemble
headed by Rudolf Kolisch. When the performance ended,
Gershwin played some of his songs for Berg and the atonalist
responded enthusiastically. "How can you possibly like my
music," Gershwin asked Berg with surprise, "when you write
the kind of music you do?" Berg replied simply: "Music is
tel Bristol
music."
Emerich Kalman, the celebrated composer of such

Viennese operettas as The Countess Maritza and Sari, took
Gershwin to the world-famous Sacher Cafe near the Opera,
once the rendezvous of the royal family and nobility. When
the orchestra struck up the Rhapsody in
Gershwin also came to know Franz Lehar,
composer of The Merry Widow, and he visited the aged
widow of the Viennese waltz-king, Johann Strauss II. Gershwin listened delightedly to her tales of the great Viennese
musician who for half a century had been Vienna's idol.
Then he made a discreet exit, after being offered the manuscript of Die Fledermaus for an astronomic price.
they walked
in,
Blue. In Vienna,
164
13
An American
in Paris
Gershwin returned from Europe at the end of the

of 1928. He brought back with him eight bound
volumes of Debussy's works, a Musel reed pipe organ, and
the manuscript of a part of his symphonic poem, An American in Paris.
The piano version was completed on August 1, and
the final revisions and complete orchestration were done by
November 18. Soon after his return from Europe, Gershwin,
in an interview for Musical America, furnished a clue to his
summer
work:
This
new
piece
...
is
written very freely and
the most modern music I've attempted.
is
The opening part
16S
An American
in Paris
developed in typical French style, in the manner of

Debussy and 'The Six,' though the themes are all original. ... As in my other orchestral compositions, I've
not endeavored to present any definite scene in music.
The rhapsody is programmatic only in a general impresis
way, so that the individual listener can read into
sionistic
the music such episodes as his imagination pictures for
him.
While Gershwin disavowed a program, he not only

accepted but even bestowed his blessings on the detailed and
picturesque narrative provided by
program notes
now
Deems Taylor
for the
That narrative
caught the es-
of the premiere performance.
and it has so felicitously

sence and spirit of the music that its reading is indispensable
for a full enjoyment of the music.
is
celebrated,
You
are
swinging
Paris,
sunny morning
starts
imagine ... an American, visiting
to
down
in
the
May
with preliminaries, and
to the tune of the First
ward, diatonic
air,
freedom and
Gallic
Elysees on a mild
is
what he
off at full
is,
he
speed at once,
Walking Theme, a
straightfor-
designed to convey an impression of

gaiety.
Our American's
eyes,
Champs
or June. Being
ears being open, as well as his
he notes with pleasure the sounds of the
French taxicabs seem to amuse him
city.
particularly, a fact
that the orchestra points out in a brief episode intro-
ducing four real Paris taxi horns.

special
by the
them
theme
allotted to
strings
whenever they appear
Having
These have a
which is announced
.
in the score.
safely eluded the taxis, our
American ap-

IBS
parently passes the open door of a cafe where,
La Maxixe
to believe the trombones,
[recte,
is still
popular. Exhilarated
by the reminder
1900s,
he resumes
through the
his stroll
Second Walking Theme, which

clarinetist in
if
La
is
of the gay
medium
of the
announced by the
French with a strong American accent.
now
Both themes are
is
discussed at some length
the instruments, until our tourist happens to pass

thing.
one
Sorella]
The composer thought
it
by
some-
might be a church, while
the commentator held out for the Grand Palais, where

the salon holds forth. At
in. Instead, as
this
events, our hero does not go
revealed by the English horn, he respect-
fully slackens his
At
all
pace until he
is
safely past.
the American's itinerary becomes
point,
may be that he continues on down

may be that he has turned off
the composer retains an open mind on the subject. However, since what immediately ensues is technically known
somewhat obscured.
the
Champs
It
Elysees;
as a bridge passage,
it
one
is
reasonably justified in assum-
ing that the Gershwin pen, guided by an unseen hand,
has perpetrated a musical pun, and that
Walking Theme makes
its
cessors,
it is
the Third
eventual appearance our Amer-
ican has crossed the Seine, and
Bank. Certainly
when
is
somewhere on the Left
distinctly less Gallic than
its
prede-
speaking American with a French intonation, as
befits the region of the city
forgather.
where
so
many Americans
"Walking Theme" may be a misnomer, for de-
vitality the theme is slightly sedentary in charand becomes progressively more so. Indeed, the
end of this section of the work is couched in terms so
spite
its
acter,
unmistakably, albeit pleasantly, blurred, as to suggest

167
An American
that the
in Paris
American
is
on the Terrasse of a
cafe, exploring
the mysteries of an Anise de Lozo.
And now
episode. Suffice
the orchestra introduces an unhallowed
approaches our
to say that a solo violin
it
hero (in soprano register) and addresses him in the most
charming broken English; and

ble
or
at least unintelligible
repeats
the remark.
one-sided conversation continues for some
Of
being inaudi-
his response
course, one hastens to add,
it is
little
The
time.
possible that a
is being done to both author and protagand that the whole episode is simply a musical
grave injustice
onist,
may
well be true, for
what
ensues; our hero
transition.
The
latter interpretation
otherwise
it is
difficult to
becomes homesick.
He
believe
has the blues; and
of the orchestra be any criterion, he has
oughly.
He
if
the behavior
them very
thor-
realizes suddenly, overwhelmingly, that
does not belong to
this place, that
he
creature in the world, a foreigner.

sky, the distant
upward sweep
is
he
the most wretched
The
cool, blue Paris
of the Eiffel
Tower, the
bookstalls of the quay, the pattern of the horsechestnut
what
leaves on the white, sunflecked street
avails all this
alien beauty? He is no Baudelaire, longing to be "anywhere out of the world." The world is just what he longs
for, the world that he knows best; a world less lovely
sentimental and a little vulgar perhaps but for all that,
home.
However, nostalgia
this instance, of
is
not a fatal disease
nor, in
overlong duration. Just in the nick of
time the compassionate orchestra rushes another theme

to the rescue,
introduction.
two trumpets performing the ceremony of

apparent that our hero must have met
It is
108
a compatriot; for
this last
theme
is
a noisy, cheerful,
self-
confident Charleston without a drop of Gallic blood in
its
veins.
For the moment, Paris
is
no more; and a voluble,
gusty, wise-cracking orchestra proceeds to demonstrate

at
some length
that
always
it's
fair
weather when two
Americans get together, no matter where. Walking Theme
Number Two enters soon thereafter, enthusiastically

Number Three. Paris isn't such a bad place
abetted by
after all:
as a matter of fact,
weather, nothing to do
till
it's
a grand place! Nice
tomorrow. The blues return,
but mitigated by the Second Walking
Theme
a happy
and the
reminiscence rather than homesick yearning

orchestra, in a riotous finale, decides to
it.
is
It will
be great
to
make
a night of
get home; but meanwhile, this
Paris!
As Mr. Taylor's programmatic guide suggests, the

is built on a series of basic themes: some are
episodic and transitory, others are fully developed. These
ideas are presented, enlarged, changed, and brought back in
symphonic manner, and within a structure that has the freedom of a rhapsody. In style, it is American to its very tissues
and marrow, and just as thoroughly Gershwin in its astute
adaptation of such jazz ingredients as the blues and the
tone
poem
Charleston. Despite Gershwin's
has nothing of Debussy in
own characterization,
the
mu-
and the only affinity it has

with the "French Six" is not in any stylistic essentials but in
its incisive wit, wry tongue-in-the-cheek humor, droll effects,
and general insouciance, which are also found in many of the
earlier works of Milhaud, Honegger, and Poulenc.
sic
it;
169
An American
in Paris
The walking theme

in strings
and oboe
is
that opens the tone
poem
heard
not in the stately gait of that other
famous walking theme, in Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, but is light and gay. The music is then punctuated
with angry
taxi
A music-hall
horns to suggest the
madcap
Parisian
traffic.
tune follows in the trombone. As the American
continues his walk, a second walking theme appears,
vigorous than the
first,
in the clarinet.
more
solo violin repre-
melody in muted trumsucceeded by the Charleston melody for two

trumpets. When the blues then returns it is no longer a
lament but robust and joyous. The orchestration is for full
symphony orchestra with snare drums, bass drum, cymbals,
rattle, triangle, two tom-toms, four automobile horns, xylophone, wire brush, wood block, glockenspiel, and celesta.
sents a transition to the wailing blues
pet. This
is
An American
in Paris was introduced on December

by the New York Philharmonic Symphony Society
conducted by Walter Damrosch. Franck's Symphony in D
Minor and Lekeu's Adagio for Strings preceded it; Wagner's
"Magic Fire Scene" from Die Walkure ended the program.
Once again, as with the Concerto, the critical response
was most varied. Samuel Chotzinoff called it "the best piece
of modern music since Gershwin's Concerto in F." W. J. Henderson described it as a "frank humoresque," which "freely
indulges in unbuttoned humor. ... It has a rollicking spirit
and there is a most engaging candor about some of the ideas,
especially the first walking theme, which is aptness incarnate.
There is much cleverness in the score, and some rudeness of
manner." Lawrence Gilman, never before too sympathetic to
Gershwin, now said that the work has the "tang of a new
13, 1928,
170
and urgent world, engaging, ardent, unpredictable. " Olin

Downes found in it a "material gain in workmanship and
structure."
So far so good.
But there was also loud dissent.
Herbert F. Peyser described it as "nauseous claptrap, so dull,
patchy, thin, vulgar, long-winded and inane, that the average
movie audience would be bored by it.
This cheap and
silly affair seemed pitifully futile and inept." Oscar Thompson felt that "for those not too deeply concerned with any apparently outmoded niceties of art, it was an amusing occasion," but took pains to point out that while the music was
"good fun," it also had "blunt banality" and "ballyhoo
.
vulgarity."
An American
symphonic repertory
both here and abroad. On July 27, 1931, it was performed
in Queen's Hall, London, at the fourth concert of the Ninth
Festival of the International Society of Contemporary Music.
Alfredo Casella conducted. Gershwin's was the only work
that day that received an ovation, even though to the English
critics it was "innocent but tiresome babble," "banal and
silly," and "pretty bad music." At about this time, too, Francis Poulenc
in an interview over La Radiodiffusion Fransingled it out as one of his favorite musical composichise
tions of the twentieth century. The major orchestras of the
world have performed it under most of the great conductors
Notwithstanding the adverse opinions,
in Paris has
become a
fixture in the
of this generation, including Arturo Toscanini.
An American
was several times adapted into

ballets, principally in the musical-comedy Show Girl and in
the motion picture An American in Paris. As a mime ballet
designed and mounted by Hedley Briggs, who was also the
principal dancer, it was interpolated into a revue, This
in Paris
171
An American
World
of Ours,
in Paris
which was presented
at the
Cambridge Fes-
Theatre in England in 1932.

After the premiere performance, Jules Glaenzer honored Gershwin with a party at his home. On that occasion,
Gershwin was presented with a brass humidor inscribed with
tival
many friends.
Gershwin, Otto H. Kahn made
the signatures of his
In making the presentation
to
a speech in which he said,
in part:
George Gershwin
music
and, in his
misingly American as
a leader of young America in
is
thoroughly and uncompro-
art,
one of
it is,
[its]
forceful spokes-
men. In the rhythm, the melody, the humor, the grace,

the rush and sweep and dynamics of his compositions, he
expresses the genius of
young America. Now,
genius of young America, there
spicuous by
its
absence. It
is
that
in
one note rather con-
is
the note that sounds a
legacy of sorrow, a note that springs from the deepest

stirrings of the soul of the race.
me
Now,
far
wish any tragedy to come into the
to
nation for the sake of chastening

of
its
be
life
But
the 'long drip of
human
great
tears.
human
of this
soul, or into the life
George Gershwin for the sake of deepening
They have
from
it
tears,'
my
his art.
dear George!
and strange and beautiful power, those
They
fertilize
the deepest roots of
believe in you with full faith
and admiration,
art.
your
in
personality, your gifts, in your art, in your future, in
your significance, in the
field of
And
just
rience
because of that
not
too prolonged
American music.
soul, of that aloofness
could wish for you an expe-
of
that driving storm and
stress of the emotions, of that solitary wrestling
own
with your
which are the most
effec-
172
tive ingredients for the
an
artist's
deepening and mellowing ... of
inner being and spiritual powers.
Otto H. Kahn
was looking upon Gershwin only as a musical humorist and
Like most everybody else at
this time,
even though in certain songs and blues, and in the

second piano Prelude, Gershwin had sounded a more poignant note. Unfortunately, Kahn died early in 1934. Had he
lived another two years to hear the score of Porgy and Bess
and in a province so close to his heart, that of opera he
would have surely realized that even without the influence
of personal storm and stress, Gershwin's art was able to
achieve that deepening and mellowing he had asked for.
satirist,
173
14
THE MAN THEY LOVED
In her autobiography, R.S.V.P., Elsa Maxwell speaks
romance between Gershwin and the Countess de Ganny,

visit to Paris in 1928. Miss Maxwell describes
how smitten he was by the lady's beauty and charm, how she
was the one woman he wanted to marry, how broken he was
to discover suddenly that her intentions toward him were
of a
during his
not half so serious as
his.
Those who were with Gershwin in Paris at the time,

and others with whom he freely shared his most personal
thoughts, all claim there is no truth in the story of this frustrated love affair. It is true that he met and was attracted to
174
the Countess, as he was to a great
many places.
Neither then, or
later,
many women
in a great
did he ever say he wanted
marry her. Their whole relationship consisted of nothing

more than a few casual meetings.
Several different people have tried to identify the
"one woman" in Gershwin's life. In most cases each was
thinking of a different woman. There was a schoolteacher in
1918, a pianist in 1919, and a Ziegfeld Follies showgirl in
1920 who appealed to him because she was supporting a
sister through school. And there was the glamorous motionpicture star in the last months of his life to whom he was
powerfully attracted. In between these periods the beginning and the end of his love life there were others, many
others: a chorus girl in Pardon My English; a sensitive and
well-educated young lady who left him to marry an Albanian
economist; a beautiful and singularly cultured motion-picture actress whom he admired profoundly and whom he
to
often described as "the intellectual aristocrat of the screen";

several other stars of stage
and
screen,
and several
ladies of
The newspaper columnists and tabloid feature writers once had a holiday with a story about a
noted screen star of French origin who presented him with a
gold key to her West Los Angeles estate; while on another
occasion, Walter Winchell linked his name in his column
impressive social rank.
with that of another motion-picture actress to the consternation of both Gershwin and the young lady since she was mar-
somebody else at the time.

At one time or another Gershwin was in love with
most of these women. But when matrimony approached he
always came up with a good reason that satisfied his conscience and explained why marriage had to be avoided. His
reason for not marrying the chorus girl of Pardon My Engried to
THE MAN THEY LOVED
175
lish, though he appeared to be thinking of it seriously, was

because he heard her play some of his own music on the piano and he knew he could not live with that kind of pianoplaying for the rest of his life. He rejected the idea of mar-
riage with one
had
woman
because she was older than he and

he questioned her morals; a
children; another, because
because she came from a different social world, that of

Park Avenue, while "I'm a guy that will always have the
touch of the tenement in me." When he did speak of marriage, which was frequent, it was always a kind of intellectual concept with him. He would say that this and this kind
third,
woman would fit the bill perfectly

woman who was safely and happily
of
usually pointing out a
married to one of his
Of the hundreds of women with whom

contact, and who were available, nobody
friends or relatives )
he came into
seemed able to suit his
low reason or another.
specifications
usually
for
one hol-
Beautiful women attracted him powerfully, and he

found resistance to them either difficult or impossible. But
he rarely pursued a woman. In spite of his many and varied
amatory experiences he was always a bit shy, a bit prudish,
a bit unsure of himself. More than that, he was terribly afraid
of rejection. If he never showered his girl friends with expensive gifts or spent a great deal of money on them, it was not
out of parsimony ( never one of his traits ) but out of an instinctive dread of buying affection. One day he naively inquired from a more worldly friend how one goes about the
business of "keeping" a woman. When told he would have
to furnish and pay for a handsome apartment and then keep
her in funds, he made an ugly grimace and never again referred to the unholy subject.
The women who were most dominant in his life were
176
sought him out and made no effort to conceal their

about him. And women usually very beautiful
women were continually seeking him out. There was the
time when a stunningly attractive redhead rang his doorthose
who
feelings
bell.
She had attended a party on the
floor
below and was
bored; then she heard that George Gershwin lived in the
same house and was

ately
made
terribly eager to
herself completely at
meet him. She immedi-
home
ment. There was also the sexy showgirl
in Gershwin's apart-
who came
to
demon-
strate how well she played the piano. She suddenly leaped
from the piano bench to dance around the room, whirling
her skirts high enough to reveal her shapely legs. And there
was the handsome married lady who lived in Gershwin's
house and who repeatedly told her husband that she was
visiting the Ira Gershwins. From their apartment she would
furtively slip into George's apartment by way of the adjoining terrace. These were three of many similar episodes which
crowded Gershwin's life as he became increasingly famous.
The women came and went. Like the girl in Dorothy Parker's
quatrain, he always got mixed up after the fifth affair.
The simple truth about his love life was that though
he always had women, and though he sometimes loved a
woman, he never really loved one completely and selflessly.
Once, hearing that a girl in whom he was particularly interested had suddenly married somebody else, he remarked
to Ira, "I'd be terribly heartbroken if I weren't so damned
busy." This reaction is both typical and significant. He never
gave himself so completely to a woman that losing her left
a vacuum in his life. Some of the girls he loved complained
he seemed completely incapable of real sentiment or tenderness; most of the time with them he was so wrapped up in
himself and his thoughts that he was only vaguely conscious
THE MAN THEY LOVED
177
One girl who loved him deeply decided to

good when the most ardent thing he could say
of their presence.
forget
to her
him for
was that she was good
for his nervous stomach.
reason sometimes given for Gershwin's failure to
marry was that he tended to idealize women. He would put

a woman on a pedestal, then find that she did not live up to
his ideal, and become disillusioned. This sounds reasonable,
but it does not tell the whole story. A more convincing exlies in the sad fact that his complete absorption
with his music and his career made it impossible for him to
planation
give himself to a
cessful marriage
woman
in the
way
or a suc-
a love affair
demands. Women found
it
impossible to
penetrate the concrete wall of his creative ego. Gershwin often plagued his friends with questions as to whether or not
it was wise for an artist to marry; whether marriage did not
put a serious impediment in the way of an artist practicing
his art. But he was not really seeking an answer, and often
he did not wait for one. He was only looking for an excuse to
avoid a permanent relationship.
If there was one woman whom Gershwin esteemed
most highly and who filled a major role in his life, she was
Kay Swift. A composer of popular songs by 1930 she had
We
which Libby Holman made

famous in the first Little Show, and the entire score for the
musical, Fine and Dandy Kay had an impressive training in
serious music to which she brought a trenchant intellect, a retentive memory, and rare critical discernment. Gershwin admired all these things in her; but he also admired her wit,
culture, refinement, social position, savoir-faire, and personal
written "Can't
Be
Friends,"
charm.
At the time he
banker,
whom
first
met her she was married
she later divorced.
One evening
in
to a
1925
178
Gershwin was brought

cellist of
to their
home by Marie
the Musical Art Quartet.
He
Rosanoff, the
played the piano for
several hours, then leaped nimbly from his
bench
nounce that he was
night.
sailing for
England that
the next year or so their friendship ripened.
to an-
During
Kay had an
overwhelming veneration for his genius, and she selflessly

and even humbly put her intelligence and training at Gershwin's service. In the years that followed she was often with
him when he composed his music: taking down dictation
when he asked her to; helping him edit his manuscripts and
publications; offering discreet and highly valued criticism;
and playing with him two-piano arrangements of his own
works or of the music of the masters. She also brought him a
sensitive appreciation for the subtle refinements of gracious
and for cultural interests outside of music. She looked

him with a solicitude born out of tenderness, filling his
living
after
apartment with flowers, always seeing to it that his boutoncame on time before each of his concerts. Gershwin, in
turn, came as close to being completely in love with her as he
did with any woman; and he remained devoted to her longer
than to any other. He spoke of her in a way few other women
inspired him to do. She was the only woman to whom he
gave an expensive gift (two precious paintings), the only
woman to whom he dedicated one of his works the piano
niere
transcriptions of his songs published
After Gershwin's death
she was able
by Simon and
thanks
Schuster.
to her fantastic
mem-
from oblivion many songs and

ideas he had worked on in her presence and had discarded.
Some were used posthumously in the motion picture The
Shocking Miss Pilgrim. Another treasure house of Gershwin's
melodic ideas that Kay Swift painstakingly put down on paory
to rescue
THE MAN THEY LOVED
179
per from
memory and
notebooks,
in a safe in the office of Dr.
is still
Sirmay
at
untouched, reposing
ChappelFs.
His music was the be-all and end-all of his existence.
He
loved to write
was proud
to say so.
of
it
it,
play
it,
talk about
when he felt it was
He was
in love
He
the time.
He
with his music and he had a lover's
expansiveness in extolling the

loved.
it all
good, and did not hesitate
many
attractions of his be-
talked about himself or his works with an ob-
made
it seem as if he were talking about somesometimes alluded to George Gershwin in the

third person, as if Gershwin already belonged to the ages,
and he were only one of many admirers. This kind of detachment led him to make many ingenuous remarks and responses which have often been quoted to point up his amusing tendency toward self-adulation. When a friend came to
him after an all-Gershwin concert to tell him, with breathless
enthusiasm, that it was "wonderful," Gershwin asked in all
simplicity: "Just wonderful
is that all?" He could describe
jectivity that
body
else.
He
a musical giant like Manuel de Falla as a "Spanish Gershwin."
When
a hotel
manager once
called to report a
com-
he was playing the piano too loudly and at too late

an hour, he remarked: "Maybe they don't know that Gershwin was playing?" From his mother's virtues, he singled out
one for special admiration: "She is so modest about me."
The peculiar thing about his egocentricity was that it
was never objectionable, and nobody ever resented it. There
was such an air of childlike innocence and ingenuousness and
quiet self-assurance to him that people were actually won
over to his exuberance and enthusiasms. Besides, he had a
wonderful gentleness that completely compensated for his
plaint that
180
self-centered nature.
to them,
He
liked people,
and was rarely heard
was kind and generous
to say anything cruel or mali-
cious about anybody.
To
say that Gershwin was egocentric, however,
give only one side of a complex personality;
it is
is
to
essential to
put that egocentricity in proper perspective.

If he was excited about his own music he was also enthusiastic about the good music of other popular composers.
Vernon Duke, Vincent Youmans, Johnny Green, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Harold Arlen, Hoagy Carmichael, Arthur
Schwartz are a few who knew this well. "It will come as a
surprise to many who know
the man s excitement over
his own work and his enthusiastic appreciation of every contribution he had to make, to learn that he also had a very
eager enthusiasm and wholehearted appreciation for what a
great many of us were writing," says Harold Arlen. Kay
Swift reveals that she once told Gershwin she felt his songs
had far greater musical variety and interest than Irving
Berlin's. Gershwin immediately went to the piano and for
over an hour played Berlin to prove to Kay Swift how much
.
versatility
and greatness there was
to Berlin's writing. "He's
a master," Gershwin kept on saying, "and
take about that."
"Many
"And he proved
of the songs
he played
let's
make no
his point," she
knew, but
mis-
commented.
I didn't realize
were Berlin's."
Gershwin not only often played the music of others
with genuine zest and delight but was always ready to provide penetrating criticism when needed. To one composer he
would demonstrate how a certain section might be simplified; to another, how a contrasting mood would be benefithat they
cial;
to a third,
would
how
the use of a certain trick or device
solve a specific problem.
Gershwin helped and en-
THE MAN THEY LOVED
181
couraged many composers when they needed it most. Arlen,

for example, always remembers the lift he received from
Gershwin in 1929 when he had just written his first song
"Get Happy," which was used in the finale of the g:i$ Revue.
Gershwin saw the tryout of the show in New Haven and
sought out Arlen to tell him that he thought the song made
for one of the best production numbers he had seen. "Imagine, the great Gershwin going out of his way to praise a
novice that way." From then on Gershwin did what he could
to help Arlen's career along.
When Vernon Duke
first
came
to
America
in the
he was then using original name of Vladimir

Dukelskyhe went directly to Gershwin
advice and help.
1920s
his
still
for
Gershwin listened
urged
and don't be scared
about getting lowbrow." Dukelsky found in Gershwin a
ready helping hand in his own efforts to penetrate the
him
to his esoteric piano sonatas, then
to try writing "real popular tunes,
Duke wrote his first

popular songs Gershwin took him down to Max Dreyfus in
an effort to get the young composer a publisher. And it was
also Gershwin who advised him to adopt the Anglicized
name of Vernon Duke.
Ann Ronell came to Gershwin to interview him for
popular-music
field:
indeed, as soon as
her magazine at Radcliffe College. Gershwin heard her play

the piano and listened to some of her tunes and was so impressed that he forthwith opened doors for her that led into
the theater and radio. This
made
became the only woman

and the composer of many hit
of the Big Bad Wolf?"
she
musical comedy, Two Little

was produced by Alex A. Aarons only after
Vincent Youmans
Girls in Blue,
which
music director in Hollywood
songs including "Who's Afraid
possible a career in
first
182
JOURNEY
TO
GREATNESS
Gershwin brought the producer the music of the then un-
known composer and played it through for him. Oscar Levant, Dana Suesse, Rube Bloom, and Johnny Green are some
others who profited from Gershwin's encouragment and
benefactions. When Arnold Schoenberg, the celebrated modAmerica in
1933, Gershwin established a fund so that some young composer might study with Schoenberg at the Malkin School of
Music. Artie Shaw and Xavier Cugat were both unknown and
struggling when Gershwin spoke of them to the right people
at the right time and procured significant engagements for
them. "Even at the time of his death," writes George Antheil,
"I personally know of four American white hopes whom
George was supporting."
One other factor, besides his generosity and enthusiasm for rival composers, must be taken into account in the
discussion of Gershwin's egocentricity. He was also capable
of humility and self-depreciation. He might be the proud
ernist of the twelve-tone technique, arrived in
parent boasting of an offspring's commendable

like
many
traits;
but
a proud parent he was also painfully conscious
and sometimes to a greater

There were many times when
of his offspring's shortcomings,
degree than were his critics.

he tended to magnify the shortcomings of his technique out
of all proportion to its importance. On such occasions he underestimated himself profoundly. "There is so much I have
to learn," was a lament he often voiced. To Jerome Kern he
once remarked: "I am a man with a little bit of talent and a
great deal of nerve." (The word he actually used was the
Yiddish expression, chuzpah.) When John Kennedy interviewed him for Colliers, he said: "What I don't know about
music is enough to keep me occupied for the rest of a normally long life." He admired musicians with conservatory
183
THE MAN THEY LOVED
training out of
all
proportion to their significance.
He was
usually in awe of composers with complex and abstruse

techniques, and in their presence he often became as selfconscious as a schoolboy he who could move with such
poise and aplomb
among
the great of the financial and social
When composers like Stravinsky, Ravel, or Schoenberg praised him to his face he became as flustered as if he
world.
had been the perpetrator
of a fraud.
Gershwin was a human dynamo. He rarely walked on

he had to run. He rarely walked
slowly up a flight of stairs, but leaped a few steps at a time.
He had more vitality when sick than others did in the full
flush of health. Harry Ruby tells an amusing and highly
characteristic story about George. In 1931 he took Al Schacht,
then the third-base coach of the Washington Senators baseball team and later the jester of the diamond, to visit Gershwin. When they arrived, George was sick in bed with a
fever and a cold. Nevertheless he welcomed his visitors eagerly. He could not lie in bed idly. As he spoke to his guests,
he picked up sketching paper and pencil and drew a portrait
of Ruby which he then inscribed: "I can write music, too.
Remember Atlantic City?" When Schacht remarked wistfully, "Some day when you feel better, George, I'd love to
hear you play the piano," George jumped out of bed and, sick
as he was, played for a full hour, including the complete
Rhapsody in Blue. "Never in all my many years of sojourn
on this sphere," Ruby has said, "have I ever seen anything
like it. His vitality and purpose were not in the least bit
the street or the golf course
dimmed by
his illness."
He was a man of irrepressible enthusiasms, a man who

had an extraordinary zest for living and for enjoying. He
184
loved games of all kinds, and he had the capacity for making
everything he indulged in a kind of game. When he found
a
new
tensity
diversion he
went
and passion.
When
80s), he played
it
after
it
every free
it
with an incomparable
in-
was golf (his game was in the

moment he could find, and golf
dominated his conversation and thinking all the time. Then

it was something else: backgammon, croquet, ping pong,
photography, fishing, swimming, horseback riding, roulette.
Generally he preferred pastimes that taxed his muscles. He
was physically powerful, with the build of an athlete and
muscles that
knew
the discipline of exercise. Besides partici-
pating in various sports, he was methodical about doing

setting-up exercises at regular intervals.
great deal, but rarely played
it
He
liked baseball a
for fear of hurting his hands.
Once while watching Harry Ruby play
he remarked
sadly, "I couldn't afford to take a chance on my hands the way
you do. But then your hands don't matter so much." It
took a little time for Ruby to realize that Gershwin really
meant no slur on his ability as a pianist but was solely preoccupied with thoughts about himself. Later on Ruby confessed, "He was, of course, right." In baseball, Gershwin
satisfied himself by being a spectator, as he did in boxing and
wrestling, both of which he loved.
His fine muscular co-ordination that made him such a
splendid pianist (and frequently without practicing), and
so good an athlete, also made him an excellent dancer. He
used feet, body, and hands with the limpid grace of a trained
performer. He sometimes gave strikingly effective imitations
of Fred Astaire, even in some of his more adroit steps; and
during the rehearsals of Lady Be Good he gave Astaire a
valuable suggestion for an exit step for "Fascinating
Rhythm." His gift at mimicry was also apparent at other
ball
18S
THE MAN THEY LOVED
keen eye for detail,

he would come home from a party and give remarkable imitations of the gestures, vocal inflections, and little personal
idiosyncrasies of somebody interesting with whom he had
met and talked.
Despite his athletic build and his muscular physique,
he suffered most of his life from a chronic constipation
which sometimes induced nausea and brought acute gastric
times. Highly visual, with a detective's
pains.
He
continually consulted physicians after 1923.
When
they failed to find a cure he sought the help of the psycho-
Gregory Zilboorg, who attended him for a little

over a year between 1934 and 1935. Dr. Zilboorg has said that
analyst, Dr.
the source of Gershwin's trouble was a chronic neurosis,
though precisely what the source of that neurosis was medical ethics have prevented his elucidating. But Dr. Zilboorg
ventured the opinion that Gershwin's ailment was not infrequent with musicians, and it was probably for this reason
that Gershwin often spoke of his "composer's stomach." Psychoanalytic treatment helped Gershwin in several ways it
made him somewhat less self-centered and inhibited but it
did not relieve his physical condition, which continued to torment him until the end of his life. He took agar-agar regularly before retiring. Often he recorded in a special notebook
the details of the day's diet, hoping thereby to check the origin of one of his attacks. He took to eating yeast and to drinking hot water with lemon juice, and for a time he felt they
improved his condition. In 1931, after a long addiction to
cigars, he gave up smoking, hoping it would "help my stomach disturbances." That sensitive stomach made him highly
fastidious about his eating habits. His meals were unimagi-
native, to say the least, consisting of various permutations
and combinations
of cereal, rusk, biscuits,
melba
toast,
Ry-
186
cooked fruits. "Nobody behe would complain endlessly. After Gershwin's death, his physicians were unanimous in their agreement that the fatal tumor discovered in
his last days had had no effect on his stomach.
The sick stomach in an athlete's body of steel was only
one of several contradictions about Gershwin. He was the
prude who could slap his sister in public because she had
used the word "darn," while his own private life well, that
was something else again. Meticulous about adhering to a
Spartan diet during mealtimes, he could, late at night, often
devour a quart of ice cream. In matters that were not of too
much concern to him he could be strongly, obstinately opinionated, resenting differences with his own views; yet in discussions of his music, which was all-important to him, he was
charmingly graceful in accepting unfavorable criticism and
would frequently agree with it instead of offering opposing
arguments. Before a performance of his music before many
thousands he could be as cool as ice; yet he was all nerves at
an unimportant golf tournament. He always made a conscious, even painstaking, attempt to mingle with people in
high places. Yet, once in their presence, he was always his
own simple and disarming self. He once went unshaven to a
party given by an English nobleman, and he dragged along to
a dinner at the Vanderbilt's an arranger who happened to
have been with him that afternoon.
He never put on attitudes or poses for effect, never
assumed grandeur with those less famous than he, nor ever
tried to pretend he was more than he was when he mingled
with the rich or the powerful. In all of his social contacts,
as in his business dealings, he was direct, straightforward,
and unassuming. He never required the services of a busiKrisp, sour cream, fruit salad,
lieves
me when
say
am
sick,"
187
THE MAN THEY LOVED

had
kept a lawyer on a retainer.
he usually refused to
feld refused to
pay him
financial loss to
own press
agent, and never

he had good cause to sue
do so (the exception was when Zieg-
ness representative, never
his
When
royalties for
Show
Girl) preferring a
an ugly squabble in court.
He
never used
was always
his friends who sought him out for his music. While he enjoyed beautiful surroundings and comfort, he avoided ostentation of all kind. He had no expensive jewelry; except for a
second-hand Mercedes Benz in 1927, he never owned a foreign car or a yacht; he never entertained in a baronial manfriendships to promote anything he wrote;
it
ner.
His one indulgence in swank was a beautiful apartment he rented in 1928: a 17th floor penthouse at 33 Riverside Drive. It was furnished modernistically in the then pre-
vogue of blacks and contrasting whites, chromes,

severe lines, and indirect lights. The apartment even had a
small gymnasium where he could keep his muscles in tone
and where, somewhat incongruously, stood a silver-colored
upright piano which had been built for him. His Steinway,
of course, was in the living-room, together with his favorite
books, music, mementos, and objets dart. A terrace, which
overlooked the Hudson River, adjoined a second apartment
the home of Ira and Leonore, which they had rented at
the same time. For both George and Ira, these two apartments represented their first homes away from their parents: the umbilical cord had finally been cut.
George's house-warming consisted of a festive dinner
to which were invited those who had played major roles in
his career from its inception. Among them were Max Dreyfus, Eva Gauthier, Paul Whiteman, Ferde Grofe, Fred and
Adele Astaire, Walter Damrosch, William Daly and, of
vailing

188
course, Ira.
The place cards
carried quotations from various
songs.
From then
had the
were always
business, sometimes so-
on, George's apartment usually
feverish atmosphere of a railroad station. People
coming and going sometimes for

cially; others hung around so long that they almost became a
part of the decorative scheme. The more intimate circle
Arthur Kober, S. N. Behrman, Mischa Levitzki, Vernon Duke,
Lillian
Hellman, Howard Dietz, Milton Ager, Kay Swift,
Samuel Chotzinoff, Oscar Levant would gather at Ira's

place most Sunday afternoons and stay there till long past
midnight, vitalizing the air with wit and wisdom, criticism
and vitriol, shop talk and violent discussions. During the
evening the group would spill over into George's apartment
for music. George would play and sing, and at times he and
Ira would go through the score of a musical comedy they
were then writing. At these parties and gatherings, whether
in George's or Ira's apartment, George would be in the spotlight; he was the cynosure; he was the pivot around which all
activities rotated. Ira, on the other hand, preferred the background, only too glad to turn over the center of the stage to
more dynamic brother.

It was at 33 Riverside Drive that Oscar Levant "flowered as a buffoon" and developed into a "penthouse beach-
his
comber" the descriptive phrases, of course, being his own.

But Levant and Gershwin had met three years earlier. Levant had been trained in Pittsburgh for the concert stage.
After coming to New York in 1921, he made his way as a
jazz pianist, and soon joined Ben Bernie's band. Levant became an ardent Gershwin admirer in 1918 when he first
heard Gershwin accompany Nora Bayes in Pittsburgh. After
coming to New York, Levant's enthusiasm for Gershwin
189
THE MAN THEY LOVED

"Do
Again and "Stairway to

Paradise" quite a contrast to the kinds of songs he was required to play in jazz bands. Early in 1925 he visited a recording studio where Frank Black was about to record the
Rhapsody in Blue for Brunswick. Black's pianist failed to
show up for the session, and Levant took his place, beginning his association with a musical composition that, from
then on, would be a staple in his repertory.
Levant met Gershwin through Phil Charig, to
whom a mutual friend had confided that Levant was eager to
meet the composer. Since Charig at the time was not only
grew
as
he heard songs
like
It
'
Gershwin's friend but also the rehearsal pianist for some of
Gershwin's shows, the friend suggested that Charig bring the
young man to Gershwin. Charig met Levant in a cafeteria

on 43rd Street near Broadway and at once found him to be
a brash and rapier-tongued fellow who talked at the top of a
shrill voice while rocking in his chair and keeping his feet
on the table. Charig brought Levant to Gershwin's home on
103rd Street in 1925. When they arrived, Gershwin was
showing Bill Daly some details of the first movement of the
Piano Concerto, and the visitors were immediately treated to
a preview of the music which was to become so closely
identified with Levant's career as concert pianist. So wrapped
up was Gershwin with his Concerto that he appeared to Levant, at that first meeting, distant and indifferent. Actually,
Gershwin took note of the young man and liked his acid wit
and penetrating intelligence, neither of which seemed to suffer from the awe Levant felt on meeting a man he admired
so profoundly. Soon after this meeting, Levant became a visitor to 103rd Street; and when Gershwin moved to Riverside
Drive, Levant became a more or less permanent fixture there.
He brightened many a Gershwin evening with his impu-
190
dent impersonations of concert pianists, with his spontaneous

wit, and his needle-edged comments on music and musicians,
and enemies.
The George Gershwin apartment on Riverside Drive
contained some interesting art. Some of it represented gifts
from those close to him. In the bedroom George had a handpainted screen depicting scenes from An American in Paris,
the work of his cousin, Henry Botkin, a celebrated artist and
art connoisseur. On the arm of a tiered bookcase in the livingroom stood a bronze bust which Isamu Noguchi had made
of him in 1929. Noguchi described the face as "an exterior
of self-assurance verging on conceit, it does not hide the
thoughtfulness of a rich and sensitive nature." On the walls
were paintings by friends like Max Weber and Maurice
Sterne. In 1931 three famous French paintings were added;
these included a Derain and a Utrillo, purchased for him in
Europe by Botkin. In time Gershwin's collection became
such a rich repository of contemporary art that, in 1933, the
Chicago Art Club presented it in a show. By the time he
died his collection contained more than 140 pieces, includ-
friends
ing sixty paintings: the
work
of Kandinsky, Leger, Pascin,
Masson, Picasso, Utrillo, Rousseau, Siqueiros, Eilshemius,

Benton, Gauguin, Derain, Rouault, Modigliani, together with
fine examples of Negro sculpture, precious drawings, water
colors,
and rare lithographs.
Ira estimates that this collection
cost his brother about $50,000, but at the time of George's
death it was easily worth four or five times that amount. For
example, Picasso's "The Absinthe Drinker," for which
Gershwin paid $1,500, was bought after his death by J. H.
Whitney for the Museum of Modern Art for $15,000.
From the moment he acquired his

Gershwin became passionately interested in
first
art.
painting,
He would
THE MAN THEY LOVED
191
haunt art galleries and the studios of friends and consume

what he liked with a voracious appetite. From the beginning
he revealed a highly sensitive and personalized taste, preferring the subtle and the complex and the elusive to the obvious and the representational. His favorite was Rouault. "If
only
could put Rouault into music," he often said.
him to easel and

Ira
who had always
by
was
shown an aptitude for sketching and drawing and who, upon
turning to water colors, showed at once a strong individual-
The
love of art inevitably turned
brush. In this he
anticipated
and a sound technique. When George started painting,

Botkin helped him set up an easel and gave him some elementary pointers. Botkin says that from his first day at the
canvas George showed he was a painter, with a natural feeling for color and design, and a sure instinct and technique.
His first completed efforts were a still life ("Black Table")
and a "riverscape" ("From the Terrace"). Unlike Ira, who
gave up painting after a year or so, George continued until
the end of his life. He grew all the time. He never received
formal instruction beyond the advice and criticism that Botkin sometimes gave him. His finest works in colors included
two self-portraits one in an opera hat (1932), and another
in a checkered sweater (1936)
a portrait of a Negro child
(1933), and others of his grandfather (1933), Jerome Kern
(1937), and Arnold Schoenberg (1937). Painting became a
ity
passion almost as great as music.
Gershwin described himself
Henry Botkin, who was most
as "a
modern Romantic."
closely associated with his ca-
reer in art, has written the following impressions:
As
specific
his painting progressed,
moods
he displayed
of his musical compositions
how
the
had given a
192
vital
form and emotional strength
intense,
dynamic impulses of
The
to his paintings.
music became the dom-
his
... He strove constantly

same bold combination of accessories that
he possessed as a composer. In his various paintings and
inating force in his painting.
to master the
especially his portraits he tried for the precise contour
and constantly concerned
that defined the form
with composition and
itself
color.
His paintings called for no special esthetic theories
many drawings
or psychology. In his
of completion
and there are over a hundredhe demon-
amazing
strated an
of various degrees
skill
draughtsman.
as
Besides
being an able draughtsman, he possessed a compelling
and powerful
line
and was able
the most economical of means.
George had an
to achieve results
.
with
instinctive sense of art's creative
processes and was especially sensitive to rhythm. In quiet
and
reticent tones
he has painted some
still
lifes
and
landscapes and though they did not come as easily as

the portraits, they
show
a richness and solidity, together
His work
modern and he always avoided
with a considerable amount of assurance.
was never
self-consciously
distressing
later
mannerisms and surface cleverness. In
work he had developed a mastery
even though he found time
all
of his craft
his
and
to create only small studies,
they were never mere exercises but self-contained examples of art.
George planned to hold a oneThat show, embracing thirtyseven paintings (including his maiden efforts) finally did
take place at the Marie Harriman Gallery in New York City
Just before his death,
man show
of his art work.
193
THE MAN THEY LOVED
on December 18, 1937 six months after his death. The

noted art critic Henry McBride wrote in review: "He was
not yet actually great as a painter, but that was merely because he had not yet had the time but he was distinctly on
the
way
to that goal.
He had
all
the aptitudes.
...
If
the
soul be great, all the expressions emanating from that soul

must be great."
194
IS
THE OTHER GERSHWIN
Rarely have two collaborators worked together in such
complete harmony as did George and Ira Gershwin. Each

the other's psychological and emotional pattern and
was ready to conform to it. Each had not only the sincerest
and undivided love for the other but also the highest regard
knew
for the other's special talent.
Beyond
all this,
Ira
is
highly
music conscious, even though he cannot read a note of music;

and George was equally word conscious. This sympathetic
response to and understanding of each other's medium led to
a perfect understanding. It was a marriage of true minds.
The strange part about this harmonious partnership
is that each member was so different in temperament and
195
THE OTHER GERSHWIN
personality from the other.
Where George was
gregarious, a
man who flourished at parties and other social affairs and who
thrived on movement, activity, and work, Ira
is
reticent, shy,
mild-mannered, somewhat slow-moving. Where women were

concerned, George was the man of the world, whereas Ira
has had a disarming naivete. Ira prefers the sedentary life.
He is the kind for whom there's no regrettin' when he's
settin' biding his time. It requires genuine effort for him
to go
anywhere or do anything. There were periods at 33

when he did not descend from his apart-
Riverside Drive
ment
into the street for days at a time.
George had sensitive nerves, and he was given to emoand hyperthyroid reactions. Ira is usually
even-tempered, placid, soft spoken. George was the idealist,
his head in the clouds. Ira is coldly logical and realistic, his
feet planted solidly on the ground. George felt he had an
tional upheavals
artistic mission.
Ira regards himself only as a respectable
workman, competent and methodical. George loved work,

could work anywhere and anytime, and frequently after coming home from a night-long party. To Ira, work is work certainly less desirable than sprawling on a couch and smoking
a series of Montecristo cigars, or spending the day at the
races, the evening at poker, or the late and sleepless hours
of the night with books and magazines. He once said, "I have
a whole day's work ahead of me. I'm going to change the ribbon on my typewriter."
Vernon Duke who in 1935 wrote the music to Ira's
has described
lyrics for the Ziegfeld Follies
Paris) Ira's lackadaisical
Our work
in Passport to
and easygoing working
sessions usually
habits:
began with a family din-
ner with Ira and Leonore, joined by Fanny Brice or Ellen
19G
After a long and copious meal, the
Berlin.
would
company
repair to the drawing room,
which housed the

piano, and hectic conversation would ensue; I, on tenterhooks, would be dying to get to the piano and persuade
Leonore and her guests to go elsewhere for their energetic gossip. I would shoot expressive glances at the everplacid Ira, who affected not to catch their meaning and
willingly joined in the conversation. After an hour or
so of this, I, totally exasperated, would invade the piano
determinedly and strike a few challenging chords. This
time Ira would heed my desperate call, stretch himself,
emit a series of protracted sighs, say something to the
effect that "one had to work so-o-o hard for a living" and
more in that vein, then interrupt himself to intone the
." This "however" meant that
magic word: "However.
the eleventh hour had struck and the period of delicious
procrastination was over. Ira, sighing pathetically, would
then produce a small bridge table, various writing and
erasing gadgets, a typewriter and four or five books, which
.
he seldom consulted
tionary,
Roget's
Thesaurus, Webster's dic-
rhyming dictionary and the
like
wipe
just his glasses, all these preparations at a
and ad-
molto adagio
pace, and finally say in a resigned voice: "O.K., Dukie

.
play that chorus you had last night." After wrestling
last night's chorus for a half hour, Ira would embark

on an ice-box raiding expedition, with me, fearful of too
long an interruption, in pursuit. There we'd stand in the
kitchen, munching cheese and pickles. Ira obviously de-
with
lighted with
this
tending to enjoy
it
escapist
too.
stratagem,
Another
dutifully
sigh, another
pre-
"however,"
then back to the piano. At 2 or 3 a.m. Ira would put away

THE OTHER GERSHWIN
197
his
working
that he
utensils
and victoriously announce
had completed four
Ira provided his brother
period of thirteen years.
It is
lines
Lee
new
chorus.
lyrics
over a
for the
George with
to
impossible to overestimate his
share in the successes of George's best songs and musical com-
development
edies, or in George's
as a
composer
for the
provided George with ideas for verses

which were able to stimulate the composer's imagination.
His dynamic and imaginative concept of what the musical
comedy can be was a vital force in opening for George new
stage. Ira continually
avenues in his musical writing for the theater. And no one

appreciated Ira's talent more strongly than George himself.
It is true that
lyric.
But
it is
the melody usually
also true
and the
that Ira's song ideas, catchy
titles,
fact
came before the
must be emphasized
provocative colloquialisms,
ingenious verbal and rhythmic patterns were sparks which

set aflame the
tion.
combustible fuel of George's musical imagina-
jingle-like effect
such as "Do, do, do what you done,

which Ira thought up even be-
lends
done, done before, baby"

fore he wrote his lyric
itself so
naturally to a mobile,
skipping melody that George was able to write this song for
Oh Kay
in a single sitting, as
soon as Ira presented him with
George was also stimulated by Ira's

trick of transforming words like "passion" into "pash" and
"delicious" into "delish" in one lvric, and in another of
contracting words like "it's wonderful, it's marvelous" into
" Wonderful, 'smarvelous."
The song "Sweet and Low
Down" is one of several examples in which the lyricist
the intriguing
pointed the
first line.
way for
rus with the lines
the composer.
The
digression in the cho-
198
Hear those shuffling

You can't keep your
feet
seat
Professor! start your beat
Come
along get in
it!
demanded and received an unusual

which
release in the
melody
one of the high spots of that song.

Their most intensive work was done between the
is
period
when
would
discuss the musical
was signed and the deadline. They

comedy thoroughly: where the
songs and other musical routines were to be placed, what
would be the style and manner of each number. Ira would
come up with various ideas; George would counter with
other suggestions. Once an idea was seized upon, George
would begin working on the music. Ira, who has a keen
musical ear and a phenomenal retentive memory for musical
phrases, memorized the tune. Then he went off by himself
to
a contract
lyrics to the music.
fit
such a precise, meticulous, and exacting craftsman that he is frequently described by his colleagues as "a
jeweler." He works slowly and is rarely satisfied. It takes
him hours to come up with a neat phrase or an agile rhyme;
then it takes him many more hours to change it. When he
Ira
is
produces a line that
is
will say, "This will do.

I'll
have to revise
it."
seemingly perfect in every detail, he

But if I think of something better,
Some time ago when Lady
Dark
was re-
in the
the Moss Hart-Ira Gershwin-Kurt Weill musical
vived for television, the producers wired him to change one

of the rhymes.
tress,
full
fore
Two
lines
had
to
do with somebody's mis-
a delicate subject for family consumption. Ira spent a
day, and experimented with sixty different rhymes, be-
he was able
to substitute
two
lines that satisfied
him.
199
THE OTHER GERSHWIN
is always for simple lyrics that employ

speech
everyday
and colloquial phrases such as "I've got a
crush on you," or "let's call the whole thing off," rather than
the gaudy and often formal language used in operettas and
comic operas. He will not stretch for a gag or a funny line,
nor will he try to build up comedy with accumulative effect.
His preference is for subtle satire and the slow and dry
His preference
humor
"The Babbitt and

the Bromide," "Bidin My Time," and "Could You Use Me,"
and in the series of couplets in "Union Square":
be found
that can
Down
Down
in such lyrics as
with music by Stravinsky

with shows except by Minsky!
Happiness will
fill
our cup,
When
it's
Down
Down
with Boris Thomashefsky!
Down
with ev'rything
that's up.
with books by Dostoyevsky
Down
Down
with Balzac,
Down
with pianists
who
Down
with
Might
as well include the Masses.
all
the
Upper
with Zola,
play "Nola."
Classes
While there can never be a question about his agility

rhyming take, for example, the series of four-syllable
rhymes in the chorus of "Embraceable You" he is rarely
much concerned with virtuoso rhymes for their own sake.
He prefers to have them flow gracefully and fall easily on
at
the ear, as in
When
I'm with you
Or what
who
the place or
cares what time

what the climate is.
it is,
200
He
feels strongly that the best lyrics are those that
are natural, precise, economical, never distracting the attention of the listener
from the music,
In time the Rockies

Gibraltar
as in the following:
may crumble
may tumble
made of clay.
They're only
But our love
is
here to stay.
Or:
One look and I forgot the gloom of the past,

One look and I had found my future at last,
One look and I had found the world completely new,
When
Such
love walked in with you.
lyrics are deceptively simple; actually
only after considerable

painstaking editing.
they can come
distillation, refinement,
and the most
202
16
EXPANDING HORIZONS
and the
Second Rhapsody
Beyond some
individual songs, there
was nothing
in
the three Gershwin musicals produced between 1928 and
1929 to
command
quickly. Rosalie
especial interest.
came on January
They can be dismissed
10, 1928, starring
Miller as a mythical-kingdom princess
who wins
Marilyn
the love of
an American lieutenant from West Point. This was the first

of two musicals which Gershwin wrote for Florenz Ziegf eld.
Ziegfeld originally gave the musical assignment for Rosalie
to Sigmund Romberg, demanding the score in three weeks.
Romberg, then busy with New Moon, said he could not do
the job alone and suggested Gershwin as a collaborator. To-
202
on schedule, Romberg writing

and Gershwin seven. The juxtaposition of the
names of Romberg and Gershwin tempted Woollcott to suggest that "we shall soon have a novel written by Harold Bell
Wright and Ernest Hemingway." The truth is, however, that
in the case of Rosalie it was "Harold Bell Wright" rather
than "Hemingway" who did the more convincing writing;
with the possible exception of "How Long Has This Been
Going On?" none of the seven Gershwin songs have any siggether, they finished the music
eight numbers,
nificance or interest.
With
Rosalie launched successfully,
new
Ziegfeld sug-
by
Anthony McGuire of East Is West, a play in which Fay
Bainter had a formidable success on Broadway between 1918
and 1920. The idea excited both Gershwins as no other musical had done up till then; they saw it as a sensitive play in
which the music would be integral to the stage action and
germane to the dramatic context. Without any contracts being signed, Gershwin went to work and had produced about
half the score when Ziegfeld suddenly engaged him to work
on Show Girl. By the time Show Girl closed Ziegfeld lost
gested a
project to the Gershwins: a musical version
heart in the earlier project.
Out
of this
uncompleted score came "Embraceable
You," which Gershwin used in a later musical; also the only
song Gershwin ever wrote, "In the Mandarin's Orchid

Garden." He had planned it as a background to a ballet
in East Is West. When the musical failed to materialize, he
published it as a separate song. It has the delicacy of a Japanese print and some day will find a welcome and perart
manent place in song recitals. It was introduced at a song

recital by Eleanor Marum at the Blackstone Theater in Chb
cago on November 10, 1929.
the
203
Second Rhapsody
With East
new
Is
West
in discard,
duced
in
November
1928,
it
a $100,000 treasure buried
grounds of
Ann
Gershwin turned to a
musical for Aarons and Freedley: Treasure
Girl. Pro-
proved to be a silly play about

by Mortimer Grimes on the
during a pirate party. Finders keepers.

seeks the fortune, even while she is pursuing and is
his estate
man and the treasAnn could bring cred-
being pursued by Neil. She gets both her

ure.
Not even Gertrude Lawrence
ibility or
as
brightness to these dull proceedings. Treasure Girl
folded up after sixty-eight performances, leaving behind
it,
however, a few delightful Gershwin songs: "Oh So Nice," a

successful attempt to bring the feeling of the Viennese waltz
into fox-trot time; "Feeling I'm Falling"; and a tender blues
song, "Where's the Boy," which to this day has not achieved
the popularity
it
deserves.
Gershwin went back to work for Ziegfeld with Show

Girl, which opened on July 2, 1929, with Ruby Keeler,
Clayton, Jackson and Durante, Harriet Hoctor, and Duke
Ellington. Show Girl was an adaptation by Anthony McGuire of a spicy novel by J. P. McEvoy, tracing the career
and loves of Dixie Dugan from the time she crashes an interview with Ziegfeld through her stardom in the Follies.
The prodigal Ziegfeld hand, which spread splendor with the
munificence of an Oriental potentate, succeeded only in
transforming a witty, rapidly paced story into a laborious
and slow-moving spectacle. There was an elaborate ballet
danced by Harriet Hoctor and the Albertina Rasch girls to
the music of An American in Paris about which John Mason
Brown was tempted to say that the production suddenly
"broke out in an Albertina Rasch." Jimmie Durante, happily
cast as a property man, sang some of the songs he had pre-
viously popularized in night clubs, including "So I
Ups
to
204
Can Do Without Broadway " and "Who Will Be

with You When I'm Far Away" ( none of them, of course, by
the Gershwins). Ruby Keeler as Dixie Dugan sang and
Him,"
"I
danced to the tantalizing rhythms of "Liza," as her husband Al Jolson ran up and down the aisles singing the refrain to his wife
for several nights an unscheduled, unexpected, and unpaid-for attraction. "Liza" was always one of
He
Gershwin's favorites.
continually played
frequently with improvised variations.
Gershwin song
in that
a beguiling effect
is
Still
it
for friends,
another major
production was "So Are You," in which
achieved through repeated changes of
modality.
But Show Girl failed to win admirers or influence

audiences. It was one of Ziegf eld's most dismal failures, the
only one of his productions to beg for customers at cut-rate
counters. Gershwin's association with the fabulous producer
ended with that show. It was an unhappy ending. Because he
had
suffered severe losses in the stock market, Ziegfeld re-
fused to pay Gershwin any royalties and George had to

threaten a law suit before he could collect them.
Gershwin had been following familiar

He was willing to
accept and work with the formulas and cliches which had
created a tradition. The Gershwin musicals through Show
Girl like most of the musicals of that generation
sought to
entertain the eye and ear rather than the mentality. A musical-comedy book was merely a convenient excuse for the presentation of song and dance, humor and sentimentality; it
was not required to have validity in its own right. Set numbers and routines were interpolated without too much conAll this while
grooves in the musical-comedy theater.
cern for their relevance to the
text, their single justification
being to amuse or entertain.
No one
expected a musical
205
the
Second Rhapsody
comedy to have a basic or significant dramatic idea or to

pursue that idea with consistency.
But with Strike Up the Band, on January 14, 1930, a
new
kind of musical came to Times Square. This was no
longer just a spectacle for the eye and an opiate for the
senses, but a bitter satire
of
good
on war, enlisting
all
the resources
theater.
Strike
Up
the
Band had taken
a long and interrupted
journey before finally settling on Broadway.
It
was
first
launched in 1927, after which it was subjected to drastic

overhauling. George S. Kaufman wrote the book of the original 1927 version. Already, then, he was one of the keenest
and most trenchant wits of the Broadway stage and one of
its ablest technicians. Since 1921 he had collaborated with
various writers on sparkling and briskly paced comedies, frequently coated with acid, including Dulcy, To the Ladies,
Merton of the Movies, Beggar on Horseback, and Minick.
He had also helped prepare books for standardized musicals.
Among them were Be Yourself, for which Ira Gershwin
wrote some of the lyrics, and The Coconuts in which the
Four Marx Brothers went helter-skelter through the plot
and dialogue with the devastating impact of a bulldozer.
Strike Up the Band was a radical departure from anything Kaufman had thus far written for the musical stage.
assumed that audiences would appreciate a play that, ingirl routines, stock numbers,
and synthetic humor, could pursue a subject like war with
satiric ferocity. Apparently the idea and its treatment were
still too unconventional. When Strike Up the Band was tried
out in Long Branch, Philadelphia, in September 1927 (with
Jimmie Savo and Vivian Hart in the two principal roles)
it was a fiasco, and was abandoned.
It
stead of making concessions to
290
In 1929 the authors returned to the play. Morrie

Ryskind, then still a novice in the theater, was called in as
collaborator to contribute his
humor
to
Kaufman's
text,
own
personal brand of broad
while making a compromise be-
tween Kaufmans ruthless satire and some of the existing

comedy. Necessary concessions were
made to commercialism, but in spite of this Strike Up the
Band remained a unique experiment. It brought new dimensions to musical comedy by being one of the first with a
pronounced political consciousness. War was the theme, but
the text frequently digressed to make a stinging commentary
on Babbittry and big business, international relations, secret
and open diplomacy, the drawing up of international treaties, and so forth.
With a new cast, headed by Clark and McCullough,
Strike Up the Band was received with outbursts of enthusiasm by both audiences and critics. As William Bolitho, the
brilliant columnist of the New York World, remarked with
undisguised amazement: "Of all things in the world, here is
a bitter
satirical attack on war, genuine propaganda at
times, sung and danced on Broadway to standing room only."
The principal butt for the authors' attack was Horace J.
Fletcher, a successful American manufacturer of chocolates,
who has a grievance against Washington, D.C., for its refusal to raise the tariff on Swiss chocolates. A sedative administered to him by the doctor induces sleep and dreams.
He sees himself at the head of an American army that
traditions of musical
goes to war with Switzerland over the issue of chocolate. Ac-
to
cidentally, the enemy's secret call to arms is discovered
be sure, a yodel and the American troops are able to corner
and rout the Swiss army. Fletcher, however, is only hero for
207
the
a day.
The American newspapers uncover the unsavory
Second Rhapsody
that Fletcher's chocolates use only
Grade B
fact
milk.
Motivated by an unorthodox book which often made

formal musical procedures unserviceable and stimulated
by the stinging acidity of Ira's lines George Gershwin's
music revealed an increasing awareness of the demands of
the stage. The resources of musical writing were now used
with a new deftness to point up a satiric comment, to em-
phasize a humorous situation, or to translate nuances of a

character or incident into musical terms.
A series
of descend-
ing chords in a nebulous tonality truly suggest that he
most certainly not the man in

for a Girl Like You."
up the hollowness
trance.
"How About
Man
Like
deflated descending passage shows
of Fletcher
when he makes
his first en-
A jazz passage for trumpet in double-time underscores
the American in "I'm a Typical Self -Made American."

tart Prokofiev-like dissonances in the
Army"
is
Me
mercilessly
show the army
The
"Entrance of the Swiss
to
be bogus. These and
other subtle touches throughout the score indicate Gershwin's
new ability
at musical delineation.
But the Gershwin score

entirety
is
which was published
not only rich in details.
A number
in its
of individual
songs stand out prominently: the purple-mood, minor-mode
languor of "Soon," one of Gershwin's most beautiful ballads,
which originated
an eight-bar strain in the Act I finale

Up the Band; the fleet-footed
witticism of "I'm a Typical Self-Made American" and "The
Unofficial Spokesman"; or the caressing charm of "I've Got a
Crush on You," which Gershwin originally wrote for Treasure Girl but which was used there only out-of-town; it was
revived in 1955 in the motion-picture Three for the Money.
as
of the original version of Strike

208
Passages such as the incidental* dream music
both acts
and the extended finale of the first act in which a resume of

what has happened recurs both in the text and in the score
demonstrate Gershwin s new spaciousness in his writing of
stage music.
Outside the theater he was also heading in

rections.
On
July
8,
1929, he appeared
in a
symphony conductor. The event took place
new
at a
new
role
summer
di-
as a
con-
New
York City. He had made

his first appearance at the Stadium on July 27, 1927, when
he was piano soloist in the Rhapsody in Blue and the Concerto in F, with Willem van Hoogstraten conducting. Two
years later he returned to the Stadium, this time to conduct
An American in Paris; the rest of the program was conducted
cert in
Lewisohn Stadium
of
by Van Hoogstraten.
Before making his debut as conductor, Gershwin received some coaching from his one-time teacher, Kilenyi, who
instructed him in the essentials of baton technique and then
had him practice at home with a recording of the tone poem.
One
of the largest audiences to attend a
Stadium concert,
more than 15,000, came to witness the performance. They

saw him do well. The performance was correct and spirited,
his time-beating was clear and precise, and he showed an
ability to lead the orchestra, instead of being led by it. Considering the fact that this was his first effort with the baton,
Gershwin gave a good account of himself.
In the next few months he acquired more conducting
experience. On November 10, 1929, he was the guest conductor of the Manhattan Symphony, his first indoor appearance as a conductor. Once again he led An American in
Paris, while the permanent conductor of the orchestra, Henry
209
the
Second Rhapsody
Hadley, led the remainder of the concert. Gershwin led a

performance of one of his musicals for the first time when
he conducted the Boston premiere of Strike Up the Band
on December 25 at the Shubert Theater. His appearances
with the baton grew more frequent after that, and he often
conducted his music with symphony and radio orchestras as
well as many opening-night performances of his musicals.
Fresh contacts opened up still more vistas for him. In
1929 the book-publishing house of Simon and Schuster
urged him to put down on paper some of the improvisations
and variations with which he had so long been entertaining
his friends. Between 1931 and 1932 he made transcriptions
of eighteen songs in which, as he explained, he indulged
"the desire for complication and variety that every composer
feels when he manipulates the same material over and over
again." The transcriptions were published together with the
original sheet-music versions in George Gershwin's Song
Book
in 1932.
The book was
edition,
and the
Hambro
for
reissued in 1941 in a revised
transcriptions
were recorded by Leonid
Walden Records.
In the fall of 1930 Gershwin received a contract from

the Metropolitan Opera Association for an opera to be completed at an unspecified date.
engaged
The idea
for writing an opera
his thinking for a long time as
suitable libretto. His
first
he searched for a
idea was to find a play about
New
York's melting pot, but he could find nothing that answered
He then selected The Dybbuk, by S. Ansky, a

Yiddish play with an old-world Polish setting filled with
Chassidic mysticism, lore, and superstition. He began noting
his needs.
down melodic
and dances, some filled with

and Chassidic abandon, others without an
Hebraic origin. He had accumulated quite a
ideas for arias
religious fervor
identifiable
210
storehouse of fragmentary ideas
when he
received a cable
from
were not
available,
Italy that the opera rights
having
previously been assigned to Lodovico Rocca, the Italian composer.

Still
another idea was slowly being fertilized in his
mind. One night in 1926, unable to sleep, he reached for a

novel on his table, the recently published Porgy, by DuBose
Heyward.
He became
he read
the morn-
so engrossed in the story that
it was four in
he jumped out of bed to write to the author of his
interest in making the novel into an opera. Heyward replied
that the idea appealed to him and that he would be glad to
discuss it with Gershwin whenever he came north from South
Carolina. Soon after this, the Heywards spent a brief vacation
in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and Gershwin came down from
New York to meet them. The two men paced the boardwalk
discussing Porgy and agreed that it had the basis for a powerful folk opera. But they both decided to postpone the work
for some time. Heyward, at the time, was collaborating with
his wife, Dorothy, in adapting the novel for a play to be produced by the Theatre Guild. And Gershwin was occupied by
various endeavors. Their ambitious project would have to
wait but the idea of writing an opera on Porgy never left
it
through the night. Then, though
ing,
Gershwin.
Another contract brought more immediate results. In

he
signed an agreement bringing him $70,000 for
1929
writing music for a motion picture for Fox. (Ira received
$30,000 for the lyrics. ) The screen had only recently acquired
a voice. In the major upheaval that followed in the industry,
a
new
which emphasis had to be

Hollywood began to call
musicals, and more musicals. To answer this need, Broadorientation took place in
placed on sound as well as

for
sight.
Zll
the
Second Rhapsody
way was combed
for
its
principal composers,
and Gershwin
was one of the first to be called. He told an interviewer, "I

go to work for the talkies like any other amateur, for I know
little
am
about them. Because I am inexperienced with

approaching them with humble mind."
He
arrived in the screen capital in
rented a house on
Chevy Chase Drive
in
films,
November
1930,
Beverly Hills which
Garbo had previously occupied, and stayed several months.

picture to which he was assigned was Delicious, starring
Janet Gaynor as a Scottish immigrant and Charles Farrell as
a wealthy polo-playing Long Islander. They meet aboard
ship en route to New York, and they fall in love. In spite of
their social differences, and sundry complications and misunderstandings, they cannot be kept apart. Gershwin devoted
seven weeks to writing his score; four songs were used, also a
dream sequence for voice and orchestra, and a six-minute
orchestral sequence describing the sounds and movements of
a city and highlighted by the rhythm of riveting. Only one
minute of the six was finally used in the picture, but the
entire sequence seemed so good to Gershwin that he decided
to use it as the core of a major work for symphony orchestra.
"Nearly everybody comes back from California with a Western tan and a pocketful of moving-picture money," he said.
"I decided to come back with these things
and a serious
composition besides, if the climate would let me.
The
old artistic soul must every so often be appeased."
Using the tentative title of Rhapsody in Rivets, Gershwin began making sketches for his materials in January 1931.
The entire work was completed by May 23. On June 26,
he tried it out for two-and-a-half hours by conducting it
three times with a hired orchestra of fifty-six men, in a studio
of the National Broadcasting Company; and at the same
The
212
TOURNEY TO GREATNESS
time he had a private recording made for his own use and
study. "I was more than pleased with the result," he wrote
to a friend, "and so were a few of my friends who came. In
many
them consider it the best thing I have done."

Once again, as had been the case with the Concerto, the
revisions after this trial performance were negligible, consisting mainly in details of orchestration. The basic change
came in the title. Fearing that the word "rivets" might bring
up a disturbing aural image to the listener, besides raising
to mind possible programmatic interpretations not intended
by the music Gershwin finally decided to adopt the more
fact,
of
name of Second Rhapsody.

The idea of "rivets" appears
abstract
opening measures:
an incisive rhythmic subject for solo piano which bears a
family resemblance to the first principal subject of the
Rhapsody in Blue. The rivet theme is assumed by the full
orchestra, which then embarks upon a rhumba-like melody
of its own. Both subjects receive detailed development. A
transitory passage in solo piano leads to the broad-flowing
blues melody which
is
in the
the heart of the composition.
pears in the string choir,
is
It
ap-
taken over by the brass, and then
by both the
and
the orchestra. The two earlier themes are recalled and embellished before the rhapsody comes to a vigorous close in
both piano and orchestra. The work is scored for full orreceives extensive elaboration
chestra with drums, cymbals,

phone, and harp.
Gershwin played
Glaenzer's. "Bill Paley,
wood
block,
solo piano
fly
swatter, xylo-
new Rhapsody at a party at Jules

who owns the Columbia Broadcasthis
ing System, was there," Gershwin wrote to a friend.
"He
was so crazy about it that he called me several days later

and asked me if I would like to have Toscanini conduct it
the
213
Second Rhapsody
next season. I said
would
would
like it
very
much
if
Toscanini
do it."
Nothing came of the plan to have Toscanini introduce
the Second Rhapsody. Sometime in April of 1931 Gershwin
met Toscanini for the first time at Samuel Chotzinoff's. For
some time Chotzinoff had been trying to arrange a meeting
between these two men, and on this evening Toscanini was
Chotzinoff's dinner guest. After dinner Chotzinoff once again
suggested to the Maestro that he meet Gershwin. When
Toscanini seemed receptive to the idea, Chotzinoff rushed to
the telephone and urged Gershwin to come right over. Gershwin appeared with a coterie of his friends, including Oscar
Levant. At first Gershwin was considerably flustered to learn
from Toscanini that the latter had never heard the Rhapsody
in Blue. "Can you imagine a man living in the last seven
years being connected with music and never hearing the
Rhapsody in Blue," Gershwin wrote to a friend with undisguised astonishment. But after Gershwin played for him
not only the Rhapsody in Blue but other of his works including the Second Rhapsody and received a warm and affectionate response from the Maestro he felt much better.
Toscanini, however, said nothing of playing the Second
Rhapsody. About a year and a half later, Gershwin again
played for Toscanini, and again at Chotzinoff's, this time at
a little informal variety show which Chotzinoff arranged for
like to
the Maestro.
Once
again, Toscanini expressed pleasure at
Gershwin's music, and once again he said nothing about playing any of
it. Actually he never conducted anything by Gershwin during the composer's lifetime.
The premiere of the Second Rhapsody was given in
Boston by the Boston Symphony Orchestra under Serge Koussevitzky on January 29, 1932. Gershwin was the piano
214
soloist.
After the concert, Koussevitzky told Gershwin in the
," menroom, "You are ten times the genius of X

name of one of the world's most celebrated composers. But the Boston critics were not so enthusiastic. "The
Second Rhapsody" wrote H. T. Parker in the Boston Evening Transcript, "seemed tempered and in degree denatured
by reflections and manipulation. It sounded over-often from
the study table and the piano rack.
The motives
lack the arresting and driving qualities of the themes of the
First, but the rhythmic, melodic, harmonic, and instrumental
expansion is more inventive and skillful.
Mr. Gershwin
waxes in craftsmanship but at the cost of earlier and irre-
artist's
tioning the
sistible elan." L.
itor:
"The main musical idea
The
Mon-
merely a rhythmic figure
is
other material of the piece
taken from a grab bag of musical comedy.

is
A. Sloper said in the Christian Science
of a type easily imagined.
orchestra
great
is
symphony
not the ideal commentator of Gershwin's music,
which belongs
Hale tempered
essentially to the dance-hall bands." Philip
Herald with some kind

words: "Mr. Gershwin's new rhapsody has not the sweeping
irresistible lyric theme that distinguished the preceding rhapsody. No one should cry out against his chief theme, which
needs no verbal explanation, for its significance is unmistakable; its character is truly national, as are the dash and
recklessness of the better pages. The music has decided inhis criticism in the
dividuality."
The New York music critics were much better disposed toward the new work when it was introduced in that
city by the visiting Boston Symphony, once again with Gershwin as soloist, on February 7. "Jazzarella, undiminished in
The happy few will recgusto and vitality, dances here.
ognize and value the skill of her evolutions and the subtlety
.
the
215
Second Rhapsody
of her guile.
usual, bringing
man. W.
J.
Music's most enlivened daughter
down
is,
as
the house." Thus wrote Lawrence Gil-
Henderson
said:
"Mr. Gershwin
our
is
own
prod-
uct. ... He does not endeavor to soar into the impalpable.

He recognized jazz as a growth from the soil of
this country and tries to shape from it artistic forms of music.
.
What he
does
is
indisputably legitimate.
The work
is
spirited, it is full of youth and recklessness, it is America of

untrammeled manners and cocktail energy."
There were those who were far less impressed. Olin
Downes felt that Gershwin was only copying his own Rhapsody in Blue, and with less happy consequences. To the New
Yorker it was "disappointing in all respects
almost totally devoid of ingratiating melody
offering nothing but
rhythms now grown trite and a reasonably clever though
.
blatant orchestration."
Audiences have not been won over to the Second

Rhapsody, and it is not hard to see why. The Second Rhapsody lacks the wind-swept inspiration of the Rhapsody in
Blue, its wonderful vitality and spontaneity. While the later
composition represents a decided advance in technique, it is
mainly contrived where the first rhapsody was inspired.
The European premiere of the Second Rhapsody took
place in London on March 20, 1933, at a concert of the
London Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Sir Hamilton
Harty. To Francis Toye, writing in the Morning Post, it
seemed to be "spoiled by rhetoric and an effort to be important." Other London critics lamented its "sentimental
banalities" and its "cliches."
216
17
BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
Girl Crazy
and Of Thee
I Sing
In 1929 there was produced on Broadway a hilarious

lampoon on Tin Pan Alley by George S. Kaufman and Ring
Lardner, June Moon. In this comedy a meeting takes place
in the private office of a music-publishing executive. Sud-
denly word spreads in that room that George Gershwin is

outside. An awed silence fills the room. Then the meeting
is disrupted as each one sneaks out of the office to catch a
quick glimpse of the great man.
1929 Gershwin was Mr. Big of Tin
he was to grow bigger and bigger in 1930 and
1931. In these two years he wrote the music for two successive musicals, each in its own way making stage history. For
each he wrote the most important and brilliant stage music
If already in
Pan
Alley,

BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
217
of his career; each was a smash

full
hit;
and, as
if
to provide
testimony to his powers, each was radically different in
approach and in methodology. One was Girl Crazy, in the

techniques and traditions of formal musical comedy. The
other
Strike
Of Thee
Up
Sing
was in the new
the Band, with
its
fresh
satirical manner of
and unorthodox concept
and its subtlety of detail.

Crazy began a long run at the Alvin Theater
on October 14, 1930. The book, by Bolton and MacGowan,
was no better or worse than earlier ones for which Gershof the musical theater
Girl
win had supplied the music. The setting is Custerville, Arizona, to which the rich and girl-crazy playboy, Danny
Churchill, comes from New York in Gieber Goldfarb's taxicab. Danny's parents have sent him to Custerville
a town
without women to keep him out of the fleshpots of the East.
But Danny manages to bring with him the temptations of the
East. He opens a dude ranch with Broadway chorus girls.
By one way or another he manages to get into plenty of
trouble, but
he
finally
mends
his
ways, after falling in love
with Mollie Gray, the postmistress.

of the things that made Girl Crazy
good
One
"a never-ending bubbling of pure joyousness,"
one New York
Ginger
described was the
as
it
was
as
as
critic
it
casting.
screen triumph in Young Man

bow on the Broadway stage as
veteran of so many Gershwin musicals,
Rogers, fresh from her
first
of Manhattan, made her
Molly. Allen Kearns,
Danny; while Willie Howard brought his Yidflair for mimicry to the
part of Gieber Goldfarb. Each of these gave a performance
calculated to steal the limelight. But the limelight belonged
not to any of them, but rather to a young and then still unknown lady whose personality swept through the theater like
was
cast as
dish accent, uninhibited comedy, and
218
a tropical cyclone and whose large brassy voice struck on the
consciousness of the listeners like a sledge hammer. She was
Ethel
Merman
When
she stepped on the stage as Kate Fothergill, the wife
of the
man who
in her first
appearance in musical comedy.
ran the gambling room at the dude ranch,
dressed in a tight black satin skirt
slit
to the
knee and a low-
"Sam and Delilah" she was a

Got Rhythm" she threw her voice
cut red blouse, and sang

tion.
Then
in "I
the footlights the
trumpet.
When,
way
in the
sensaacross
Louis Armstrong does the tones of a
second chorus, she held a high
for
sixteen bars, while the orchestra continued with the melody,
the theater was hers: not only the Alvin Theater, but the
musical theater as well.
Before that evening of October

for years
been
filling
Ethel
Merman had
minor and poorly paid engagements
night clubs, at parties, and weddings.
ment
14,
in
successful engage-
Brooklyn Paramount Theater was the break that

brought her to the attention of Vinton Freedley, then busy
with casting problems for Girl Crazy. He brought her up to
Gershwin's apartment at Riverside Drive for an audition.
Merman sang for Gershwin several swing numbers, including "Exactly Like You" and "Little White Lies." "Don't
ever go near a teacher," Gershwin told her. "He'll only ruin
at the
Then Gershwin played for her the three numbers he

had in mind for her part in the show. Ethel Merman tells
what happened in her autobiography: *
you."
It
if I
may
was the
first
time
I'd
met George Gershwin, and
say so without seeming sacrilegious, to
me
it
* Who Could Ask For Anything More, by Ethel Merman. Copyright

1955 by Ethel Merman Six, reprinted by permission of Doubleday & Com-
pany, Inc.
219
BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
was
like
meeting God. Imagine the great Gershwin
sitting
No wonder
Got Rhythm," he
told me, "If there's anything about this you don't like,
I'll be happy to change it." There was nothing about that
song I didn't like. But that's the kind of guy he was. That
I'll never forget. I smiled and nodded, but I didn't say
anything. I was thinking how to phrase the music. Gershwin seemed puzzled at my silence. Finally he said again,
"If there's anything about these songs you don't like, Miss
Merman, I'll be happy to make changes." It wasn't that;
it was only that I was so flabbergasted. Through the fog
that had wrapped itself around me, I heard myself say,
"They'll do very nicely, Mr. Gershwin." There were those
who thought that my reply was funny when it was repeated to them, as if I'd given the great Gershwin the
old hauteur treatment. I was so drunk with the glory
down and
playing his songs for [me]. ...
was tongue-tied.
of
it all
ever
When
he played
"I
that I could have said anything at
I said, I
meant
it
to
all,
but what-
be grateful and humble. That's
for sure.
Ethel
Merman was
hired for Girl Crazy at a salary
and her voice coach, Al Siegel, was engaged

be her piano accompanist on stage. (Siegel fell sick and
was able to appear only at the opening-night performance
in New York; his place was taken by Roger Edens, now a sucof $375 a week,
to
cessful producer at
The day
MGM.
New
after the
York premiere, Gershwin had
Had she seen the reviews? Ethel

shook her head. She had gone to bed so late the preceding
a luncheon date with Ethel.
make her
moment to read
night and had risen this morning just in time to
appointment so that she had not had a free

220
the
critics.
"They're raves,
all
of them,
,,
Gershwin told
her.
"You're in with both feet."
The
umph
three songs that helped
she was are
among
make Merman
the greatest
the
tri-
by Gershwin. That
evening of November 14 was one of those rare and fortuitous

moments in stage history when the right song and the right
singer collided. "I Got Rhythm" is remarkable in its chorus
not only for the agility of its changing rhythms but also for
the unusual melody made up of a rising and falling five-note
phrase from the pentatonic scale. "Sam and Delilah" is a
tongue-in-the-cheek Barbary Coast ballad in the style of
"Frankie and Johnny," with effective employment of changing tonality and unusual intervallic construction in the melody. "Boy What Love Has Done to Me" shifts from one
point of musical interest to another now in the harmony,
now in the melody, now in accentuation, now in dynamics
with the deftness and versatility of Fred Astaire passing from
one intricate routine to another.
Other songs were equally exciting. "Bidin' My Time,"
sung by a quartet of rubes who drifted in and out of the production during scene changes, is in the subtle satiric vein
"Sam and Delilah." Here was not only a refreshing take-off

on Western ballads, but also on Tin Pan Alley through the
wry and skillful interpolations of the titles (and at times
of
melodic reminders ) of several songs popular in 1930. And the

dry and casual humor of Ira's lines provided a perfect foil
for Gershwin's tune:
Next
year, next year
Somethin's bound to happen,
This year, this year,

I'll
just
keep on nappin'.
221
BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
"Embraceable You," the hit song of the production (and

written two years earlier for East Is West) belongs to the half
dozen or so of Gershwin song classics in which his melodic
writing is most expressive. In a similarly tender vein is the
sentimental ballad "But Xot for Me"; strange to say, Willie
Howard used it to exhibit his adeptness at imitating famous
performers of the day but not before it had been poignantly
introduced by Ginger Rogers. On the other hand, "Could
You Use Me" is more refreshing for its lyric than the mel-
ody. Lines like these are characteristic:

There's a chap
Who's
know
as strong as
in
Mexico
he can be,
Eating nails and drinking Texaco
He
There
is
the type for me.
one in California
More romantic
When
is
far than
you
he sings hot-cha-cha-chornia
I
often think he'll do.
Some mention should be made of the orchestra in the

and of its share in the performance of Gershwin's music.
That ensemble was surely the kind about which jazz enthusiasts dream, for it included Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller,
Red Nichols, and Gene Krupa!
pit
The strength of the Girl Crazy score lay in individual

Of Thee I Sing the individual songs are of lesser
significance. Especiallv noteworthy are the numerous details
which show Gershwin emercnncr as an outstanding; musical
songs; in
and as a composer who consciously and adroitlv

adapted sound to sight, tone to words, and musical means
satirist
222
to stage action.
satirical
Gershwin interpreted the nuances of the
play with the sensitivity and appropriateness he had
merely suggested in Strike
Up
the Band. In none of his
musicals before this had score, book, and lyrics been so in-
combined into a single unity.

Gershwin had a brilliant book and some of the most
brilliant lyrics of Ira's career to work with. The authors were
the same who had produced Strike Up the Band. Book and
lyrics were filled with laughter and mockery; wisdom was
couched with wit; gentle irony sometimes developed into outright malice. As George reported to one of his friends, "Ira
and I have never been connected with a show of which we
were prouder."
In Strike Up the Band the focal point for attack had
been war and international diplomacy. In Of Thee I Sing
it was a presidential campaign and the local political scene.
In a smoke-filled hotel room the political bosses decide to
extricably
run Wintergreen for the Presidency, with Throttlebottom

as his running mate. Wintergreen is a blustery, brash kind
of fellow ( played with the necessary elan and gusto by William Gaxton ) Throttlebottom, on the other hand, is a meek,
sad little man with a high-pitched voice that is always breaking, and a spirit that is always broken; he, to be sure, was
played by Victor Moore in the most poignant characterization of his long career. The campaign issue is "Love." A
Miss White House is chosen in an Atlantic City beauty contest to become the First Lady; she is Diana Devereux.
.
If
girl is
sexy
She may be Mrs. Prexy.
The
prize
is
consequential
Pres-i-dential.

BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
223
Love sweeps the country and Wintergreen into the White

House. But Wintergreen upsets the applecart by falling in
love with homespun Mary Turner because:
Some
girls
Made up
Some
girls,
can bake a pie

of prunes
and quinces
an oyster
fry;
Others are good at blintzes;
Some lovely girls have done

Wonders with turkey stuffin's
But
have found the one
Who
really can
Wintergreen marries Mary.
when
make corn
An
muffins.
international incident de-
is
discovered that the spurned Diana
French descent, "the illegitimate daughter
of the illegitimate son of an illegitimate nephew of Napoleon." America and France are about to break diplomatic
relations; there is even a movement afoot to impeach the
President. Then Mary announces, "My husband is in a
delicate condition. He is about to become a father." Throttlebottom points out that the United States has never yet
impeached an expectant President and thus Wintergreen
velops
Devereux
is
it
of
is
saved.
The complicated
but Throttlebottom himself
own
is
unraveled by nobody
when he
accepts Diana as his
situation
wife.
The general outline, however, is only the frame for

work in which a wide gamut of subjects is mercilessly exposed and ridiculed. The devices and the ofteu
the detail
absurd maneuvers by which political bosses select candidates

for the highest office in the land, the vacuity of campaign
issues, the
ballyhoo and circus showmanship accompanying
224:
presidential campaigns, the often strange goings on in the
hallowed
halls of the Senate, the often
confused judicial pro-
ceedings of the Supreme Court, the obscurity surrounding

the Vice President
all this is grist for
the mill of a
satirist,
American Gilbert and Sullivan. And the authors make

the most of their opportunities. They combine political rallies with a wrestling match. They have the Senate debate
of an
over granting a (long overdue) pension to Paul Revere's
upon learning to their surprise that Jenny

is dead, the members of the Senate stand in reverence to her
memory. The authors insist upon having the Supreme Court
horse, Jenny; and,
decide the sex of Mary's child or, rather, children, since

she has twins before she can give birth, the vote being
strictly along party lines.
The
the man nobody
portrait of the Vice President
knows is particularly trenchant. He does not want to run

because his mother might find out; once elected, he cannot
join the Public Library in Washington because he cannot
provide two references; the only way he can gain admission
into the White House is by joining a conducted tour; even
the
man who nominated him
remember
his
name.
does not recognize him or
Victor
Moore brought a touch
of
pathos as well as ridicule to this sad little creature.

In Of Thee I Sing the play's the thing, and for its
sake the old threadbare formulas of musical comedy were
once and for
became, instead, a play with

and
lyrics. Musical devices become the means by which the skillful composer achieved not only a desired effect but underscored some stage business and provided a provocative comment on a character or situation.
all
abandoned.
music, and the music
is
It
as vital to the text as dialogue
Early in the play there
is
a five-minute political torch-

225
BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
light parade,
with
all
the trimmings.
The
illuminated signs
"Even Your Dog Loves Wintergreen" and "A Vote for

Wintergreen is a Vote for Wintergreen," and so forth. A
read:
chant
sounded, "Wintergreen for President,"
is
filled
with
provocative musical quotations from "Hail, Hail the Gang's
"Tammany," "A Hot Time in the Old Town

Tonight," and "Stars and Stripes Forever." At one moment
in the melody there is a faint suggestion of the Irish and
the Jews for Wintergreen loves them both. Thus stage action and music become indivisible.
As the play progressed, the music continued to stress
and point up each situation; always Gershwin managed to
All Here,"
find the proper musical equivalent for the stage shenanigans.
Wintergreen goes on his campaign tour with a theme song

that begins like a solemn hymn ( even as do the words ) and
suddenly lapses into maudlin Tin Pan Alley sentiment: "Of
thee I sing baby." Patriotic songs and Tin Pan Alley are
thus felled with a single blow. The Senate scene (which
opens with startling informality with some "vamp till ready"
chords) makes a mockery of the pretenses of grand opera;
also in the quasi-operatic vein are the recitatives
sprinkled judiciously throughout the play.
achieved
when
which are
droll effect
is
the judges of the Supreme Court count them-
selves off to the tones of the whole- tone scale. Viennese-waltz
sentimentality
is
just right for
Mother," while there

Salvation
Army
is
"I'm About to
Become
an appropriate recollection of the
Around the Corner."

Thee
I Sing came to New
Of
1931. It was hailed with hosannas.
in "Posterity Is Just
After opening in Boston,
York on December 26,

In Boston, H. T. Parker called it a "most significant addition to the theater," and "one of the drollest satirical operettas of all time." In New York, Brooks Atkinson wrote
226
that
it
"substituted for the doddering musical-comedy plot
a taut and lethal satire of national politics, and George
Gershwin has compounded a score that sings in many voices,

simmers with ideas, and tells the story more resourcefully
than the book. ...
It
has very nearly succeeded in liberat-
ing the musical-comedy stage from the
minded formula
It is
mawkish and
feeble-
that has long been considered inevitable.
funnier than the government, and not nearly so danger-
George Jean Nathan hailed it as a "landmark in Amercomedy" which "set a fresh pattern for
the American musical stage."
The greatest salute of all came on May 2, 1932,
from the Pulitzer Prize committee at Columbia University.
With remarkable courage it shattered tradition by making
Of Thee I Sing the first musical comedy to win the Pulitzer
Prize. "This award may seem unusual," read the citation,
"but the play is unusual. ... Its effect on the stage promises
to be very considerable, because musical plays are always
popular, and by injecting satire and point into them, a very
large public is reached." There is only one cause for regret
in the award: no mention was made of the part played by
Gershwin's music in the over-all success of the play. The
Pulitzer Prize judges felt at the time that they were not authorized to make an award to the composer of a musical play.
However, eighteen years later, they decided music could be
included in their award and Richard Rodgers received it for
South Pacific.
Another distinction earned by Of Thee I Sing was
that it became the first American musical comedy whose
text was published in book form. It was selected by George
Jean Nathan for a series on the contemporary drama of
which he was editor: The Theater of Today Dramatic Li-
ous."
ican satirical musical

BROADWAY TRIUMPHS
227
brary.
titles.
As Nathan has disclosed, it outsold all other previous

The play reads well the best lines still have sting on
the printed page, and

still
many
of the uproarious situations are
mirth-provoking. But as one reads the text one realizes
how much was added by
the comments, asides, and finger-
pointing of the score.
Of Thee I Sing enjoyed the longest run of any Gershwin musical: 441 performances. After that it went on an
extended road tour, returning to Broadway on May 15, 1933,
for a new engagement. This tour was supplemented by another throughout the whole country over a period of almost
eight months by a second company starring Oscar Shaw, Harriet Lake (now better known as Ann Sothern), and Donald
Meek, which opened in Chicago early in 1933. This was the
only Gershwin musical to have two productions running simultaneously.
Twenty
new
years later, on
Presidential
campaign
May
5,
Of Thee
1952 on the eve of a

I Sing was revived at
the Ziegfeld Theater with Jack Carson as Wintergreen and
Paul Hartman as Throttlebottom. With a slightly modernized text to bridge the gap of the intervening years but
with no change of music, Of Thee I Sing was

arouse the
critics to
still
able to
enthusiasm. But the critical approbation
could not bring audiences into the theater. Despite the sac-
made by
and by
owner of the
Ziegfeld Theater to keep the play running, it had to close
for lack of patronage. It is hard to guess why it was such a
failure in 1952. It was still a very funny play; its satire still
had plenty of edge; the music sounded even better and more
rifices
the cast
Billy Rose, the
adventurous than before. Possibly in the musical theater of

the 1950s,
surprise,
Of Thee
and
I Sing
had
electrify audiences
lost its
capacity to
startle,
through the unorthodoxy
228
of
its
procedures because
it
has so often been imitated not
only on the stage but even on the screen. Possibly in the
changed
political climate
aftermath
of four terms of the
audiences
Roosevelt Administration and a world war
no
longer were able to respond favorably to this kind of political satire.
229
IS
the
No
Cuban Overture
Early in 1932 Gershwin went to Cuba for a holiday.

sooner did word get around that he was a visitor than a
rhumba band appeared under

with Cuban music.
his
window
to serenade
him
Gershwin heard much Cuban music by native pervisit and was continually fascinated by
the rhythms of the Cuban dances and by native percussion
instruments. He decided then and there to write a work in
which these rhythms and instruments would be combined
formers during his
with his
own
First
thematic ideas.
he planned
to
go to Europe, but these plans
230
were abruptly frustrated by
death of his father on

of one for whom he had always
trie
May 14. The poignant loss

had such affection and tenderness made it impossible for
him to consider a vacation at this time. Instead he went to
work on his new composition. He wrote it in about three
weeks, completing it in July. Orchestration took him eight
days between August 1 and August 9. He called it Rhumba.
The
overture
is
in
three
sections.
provocative
rhythm, partly rhumba, partly habanera, opens the work.

The first theme, of Cuban identity, makes its appearance in
the strings. A three-part contrapuntal episode then leads to
is soon combined contrapuntally
with fragments of the first theme. A solo-clarinet cadenza
leads to the middle section, which is mostly a gradually developed canon in a melancholy vein. This canon is in two
the second theme, which
and is unusual in that (unlike traditional canons) it

has a harmonic background. After a climax is built out of
the ostinato theme of the canon, the finale makes its appearance. This finale uses themes of previous sections but treated
voices
in a stretto-like
manner. The composition ends with a dy-
namic and exciting rhumba in which native Cuban instruments of percussion are used. In his conductor's score Gershwin specified that these instruments be placed in a row in
front of the conductor's stand: first the cuban stick, then the
bondo, the gourd, and the maracas.
The premiere of Rhumba took place at the Lewisohn
Stadium on August 16, 1932, Albert Coates conducting.
Gershwin himself did not think the work was heard to best
advantage that evening, since its percussive effects and tone
colors were weakened or completely lost in an open-air stadium. A few critics, however, liked it. The Musical Courier
said it was "a highly effective vehicle for Mr. Gershwin's
the Cuban
231
gifts/'
and
Pitts
Overture
Sanborn considered
it
fresh
and spontaneous,
superior in rhythmic inventiveness to Ravel's Bolero.
Gershwin wrote
"I really believe,"
morning
after the concert, "that last night
to a friend the
was the most
ex-
because the Philharmonic Orchestra

played an entire program of my music [this was the first
time that an all-Gershwin program was given anywhere],
citing I ever had. First,
and second, because the all-time record for the Stadium Concerts was broken. I have just gotten the figures: 17,845 people paid to get in, and just 5,000 were at the closed gates
unsuccessfully." When future

attendance records were broken
the Stadium happened
1941 was always for an all-Gershwin
1937 and again
trying to fight their
way
in
at
in
in
as
it
concert.
This
Up
in
first
all-Gershwin concert opened with
the Band," conducted
"Strike
by William Daly. The Concerto
followed, with Levant as soloist, and Daly conducting.
(This was not Levant's
appearance at the Stadium; one

year earlier he had made his debut there with the Rhapsody
in Blue.) Albert Coates then conducted An American in
Paris. After the Rhapsody in Blue ( Gershwin as soloist, and
Daly conducting), Coates returned to conduct the Second
Rhapsody and the world premiere of Rhumba. The program
ended with four Gershwin songs orchestrated and conducted
by Daly: "Fascinating Rhythm," "The Man I Love," "Liza,"
first
and "I Got Rhythm."

on November 1, Rhumba was
performed for the first time in an indoor auditorium the
Metropolitan Opera House. The occasion was a benefit concert of the Musicians Symphony Orchestra. It was for this
concert that Gershwin changed the title of his new work to
the one by which it is now known, Cuban Overture. He ex-
The following
winter,
232
plained:
"When people
Vendor' or a
read
like piece of
Rhumba they expect

music.
the 'Peanut
Cuban Overture
gives a
just idea of the character and intent of the music."

That concert was divided between Cesar Franck and Gershwin. Franck's Symphony in D Minor was led by Sandor
Harmati in the first half of the program. In the second, Daly
conducted the Concerto in F (Gershwin, soloist) and his
own transcription of four Gershwin songs; Gershwin conducted An American in Paris and Cuban Overture. This
performance, with Gershwin seated at the piano, and with
more
many
of his intimate friends seated in the
been caught permanently
by
in a painting
first
row, has
Siqueiros.
This concert, incidentally, was the immediate cause

of one of the severest attacks leveled against Gershwin's
music. During the rehearsal of the four Gershwin songs, for
which Daly had written the connecting
transition passages
besides orchestrating the whole, the trumpeter played a part

of one of the transitions that puzzled Daly.
I
He
asked, "Did
write that there?" This question led one of the violists in
the orchestra, William Lincoln Langley, to infer that Daly
had had quite

wrote an
hand
article
in all of Gershwin's compositions.
He
"The Gershwin Myth"
the
entitled
for
American Spectator ( December 1932 ) a four-page monthly

founded and edited by George Jean Nathan. Langley found
that all of Gershwin's serious music was full of "blatant
orchestrations" and "transparent anachronisms"; he called
the Concerto "disgusting" and ended up by inferring that
others men like Grofe and Daly did much of Gershwin's
composing for him. "As for An American in Paris, the genial
Daly was constantly in rehearsal attendance, both as repititeur and adviser, and any member of the orchestra could
testify that he knew far more about the score than Gershwin.
,
233
the Cuban
The point
Overture
no previous claimant of honors in symphonic composition has ever presented so much argument
and controversy as to whether his work was his own or not."
Daly rushed to set Langley straight, in a letter to the
New York Times (January 15, 1933): "I thank Mr. Langley
for the compliment, but I neither wrote nor orchestrated the
American. ... I have never written one note of any of his
compositions, or so much as orchestrated one whole bar of
his symphonic works."
is
that
234
19
YOUNG MAN
WITH A PIANO
In 1933 George Gershwin moved from 33 Riverside

Drive to new, more spacious, and more elegant quarters at
132 East 72nd Street. Ira and Leonore moved to an apartment across the street. The collaborators formerly joined by
a terrace
were now connected by a private telephone which
enabled them to consult each other at any time of the day or

night.
George's apartment was one befitting a
now
man who was
a giant figure in American popular music, earning over
$100,000 a year. It was a fourteen-room duplex, equipped

with gymnasium, art studio, paneled reception room, English

235
YOUNG MAN WITH
PIANO
den, trunk room, a sleeping porch with jalousies, and a glass

bar.
The high-ceilinged living-room was a
veritable art
mu-
seum, with its collection of great paintings together with

several examples of his own work, notably his portrait of
his father. His study had a special desk which he had designed and had built for his work. It was wide enough to
hold comfortably his large manuscript paper (printed expressly for him, with his name in the left corner) and had
special drop-leafs, panels, a built-in pencil sharpener,
all
sorts
of compartments
and racks
for pencils,
and
rulers,
and so forth. (After George's death Ira presented

this desk
and the four executors of the Rose Gershwin
Estate, the manuscripts and sketchbooks of his serious works
to the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., where
they can now be seen.) The entire apartment was handsomely furnished along restrained modern lines and colors
by "one of our best decorators," as George always took pains
to point out to a first-time visitor. He had by now outgrown
the severe and formal modernity of the Riverside Drive place,
and his apartment was filled with the traditional pieces which
he liked.
The Sunday convocations of the Gershwin circle at
Riverside
Drive now became Saturday night jamborees
33
at George's new apartment. The scene and time might
change; the proceedings, never. Here, as before, and wherever else George might be, the focal point of interest and
activity was George playing his own music. It was something
to hear. He had a beautiful singing tone, a sensitive touch,
a sure instinct for rhythmic effect, and a glittering but precise technique. His use of the pedals was tellingly effective.
The right and left hands were remarkably independent of
each other, as he kept two different rhythms flowing evenly.
erasers,
236
He had
a unique
way
of using his
color of a brass instrument.
thumb
to bring out the
Chords were produced with a

was magnetizing. Serge
percussive, steel-like precision that
Koussevitzky
once described
as
"incredible"
Gershwin's
"sweeping brilliance, virtuosity, and rhythmic precision.

His dynamic influence on the orchestra and audience
was electrifying." Other celebrated musicians Fritz Kreisler, Efrem Zimbalist, Leopold Godowsky, Josef Hofmann,
Leopold Auer, Jascha Heifetz, Maurice Ravel could listen
to him by the hour. Even those who did not know a chord
from a glissando were held spellbound. The pity of it is that
not more of that playing was permanently caught by the
modern machine. Between 1916 and 1925, Gershwin made
numerous piano rolls for Perfection, Universal, Standard,
and Duo-Art which are now both obsolete and unavailable.
And he made several recordings: the Rhapsody in Blue,
which he played with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra for Victor; and an English Columbia record of the slow section of
the Rhapsody in Blue and the three Preludes which is out of
circulation. In the 1930s Gershwin made records of some of
his songs, and some of these have been preserved in special
reissues on long-playing records. (See Appendix 8.)
He was at his best, however, in the intimacy of
a living-room either his own or that of others surrounded
by his admirers and friends, and communicating to them
through his music. He was always playing the piano at the
slightest pretext (George S. Kaufman once remarked, "I'd
bet on George any time in a hundred yard dash to the
piano" ) because there were few things he liked to do more.
"I have never seen a man happier, more bursting with the
sheer joy of living than George was when he was playing
his songs," recalls Bennett Cerf. "He would improvise and
.
YOUNG MAN WITH
237
PIANO
introduce subtle variations and chuckle with childlike delight
when
his audiences
exclaimed over them." His friends
used to say that an evening with Gershwin was always a

Gershwin evening; that Gershwin's music simply had to live
just as long as Gershwin was around.
He was
not long at a gathering before he drifted to
the piano, running his fingers casually across the keys the
way some men
caress the hair of a beautiful
woman, and then
slipped onto the stool and began playing for his
He would
keep right on playing for the
own
delight,
rest of the evening.
Before long, everybody's attention in the room would be fo-
cused on him, and every other activity stopped dead. It was

after a series of such impromptu concerts that Oscar Levant
was tempted to ask him acidly: "Tell me, George, if you had
to do it all over again would you still fall in love with your-
self?"
less
Combined with an extraordinary pianism was a no

remarkable gift at improvisation. The modernist, Henry
Cowell,
who
at
one time taught Gershwin counterpoint, says:
"He improvised on the piano with such security and

that it sounded like a written-down and memorized
facility
piece."
No two Gershwin
performances were ever the same. He

would begin by throwing out the melody of one of his songs,
then catch the melody of another. "He would draw out a
melody out of the keyboard like a golden thread,"

wrote Rouben Mamoulian, "then he would play with it and
juggle it, twist it and toss it around mischievously, weave it
into unexpected intricate patterns, tie it in knots and untie
lovely
it,
and hurl
it
into a cascade of ever-changing
counterpoints." His rhythms

bulldozer.
At other times
his
rhythms and
had the irresistible drive of a

poignant lyricism acquired the
238
movement of a ballet dancer. Then he would

momentum. His imagination would roam without
restriction. The left hand would produce novel harmonic
delicate
pick up
A canonic passage would suddenly leap into the patan ingenious counterpoint would bring new dimensions
to a stated idea. The melody in the right hand would plunge
into an unexpected modulation and be off toward a new direction. New ideas would emerge; they, too, would grow and
change like some living organism. This was no longer interpretation but creation. "As I watched him," wrote Koussevitzky, "I caught myself thinking, in a dream state, that this
was a delusion, the enchantment of this extraordinary being
too great to be real."
At the piano Gershwin not only made music; he was
part of the music. He would perform a kind of restrained
dance in which every part of his body participated. His face
colors.
tern;
expressive. He would achieve a

kind of exaltation as if he were suddenly the audience and
not the performer or composer. Mamoulian put it well when
would become eloquently
he said: "George at the piano was George happy

like a
gay sorcerer celebrating his Sabbath."
On the rare occasions that George yielded the piano
stool to a rival composer, the newcomer would frequently
fall into the swing of things by playing more Gershwin.
Once Richard Rodgers found himself performing Gershwin,
.
and the humor
of the situation struck
him midway
in his per-
He
stopped short and remarked, "Hell, I'll never

earn a dime this way." There was a time when Gershwin invited a composer-friend to play his latest hit. George S. Kaufman commented, "If Gershwin wants to hear it, it's only be-
formance.
cause the song was stolen from him."
The Gershwin
gatherings at East 72nd Street gave
239
YOUNG MAN WITH
Kaufman and Moss Hart
PIANO
the idea for the character of
Sam
We Roll Along (1934). Sam was a popwho played his own music at the slightest
And these gatherings were also in Moss Hart's
Frankel in Merrily
ular composer
provocation.
mind when, a year
later, he wrote the book for Cole Porter's

There the celebrated hostess Eva Standing (by another name, Elsa Maxwell) provides a shocking novelty at
one of her parties: the presence of George Gershwin but
without his playing the piano.
Jubilee.
240
20
SOME BROADWAY
FAILURES SOME SUCCESS
ELSEWHERE
Porgy and Bess is regarded as an opera and not as a
musical comedy, then Gershwin's last two musicals on Broadway came in 1933. Both were failures.
Pardon My English, which opened on January 20,
was from the beginning a sorry misadventure for all concerned. Alex Aarons had signed Jack Buchanan and Lyda
Roberti to exclusive contracts, guaranteeing the former
$3,000 a week for eight weeks, and the latter $1,000 a week
as
for a similar period. Aarons needed a show for them and
he told his partner, Vinton Freedley needed it quickly. Herbert Fields concocted a book involving a pair of actors who
If
SOME FAILURES SOME SUCCESS
241
which a kleptomaniac
marries the daughter of the chief of police. Into this frame
Fields fitted, as best he could, as strange and varied an assortment of accents as has been heard at one time on the American musical-comedy stage, involving Jack Buchanan (British ) Lyda Roberti ( Hungarian ) Jack Pearl ( German ) and
George Givot (Greek). Some of the gags were the kind that
Jack ( "Vas you dere, Sharlie" ) Pearl had popularized on his
radio program as a modern Baron Munchausen: "I traveled
it was a
to America on a ship with nine hundred chefs
Cook's tour." The book fell flat on its face. Gershwin's score
are confused with swindlers,
and
in
one of the weakest

Pardon
in
My English had
many
years
provided
little
support.
about a month, involving

exceeding $75,000. Freedley fled to
to close in
the producers in a deficit
Panama to escape his creditors and stayed away for several

months. The bitterness aroused by this disaster had one permanent
result: it broke up the producing partnership of

Aarons and Freedley. For Aarons this meant the end of his
career on Broadway. He left for Hollywood, where he died
a decade later. Just before his death he was associated with
the impending Gershwin screen biography, Rhapsody in
Blue. The
had closedAarons ended as he had begun
with Gershwin's music. Freedley, on the other hand, did
circle
new victories, as producer of sevCole Porter musicals, beginning with Any-
not delay in passing on to

eral smash-hit
thing Goes in 1934.

In this same year of 1933 many of those
helped make Of Thee I Sing the historic occasion
who had
the theater joined forces for a sequel entitled Let
'Em Eat
Cake. Once again George

wrote the book; Ira, the
again
Sam H.
S.
it
was
in
Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind

George, the music. Once
lyrics;
Harris was the producer, and the principals in
242
the cast were William Gaxton as Wintergreen, Lois
Moran
Mary, and Victor Moore as Throttlebottom.

In Let 'Em Eat Cake Wintergreen and Throttlebottom run for election and are defeated. Wintergreen then
heads a revolution to overthrow the government, recruiting
an army with the aid of Union Square's Kruger (Philip
Loeb). The revolution succeeds, and a dictatorship of the
as
proletariat
is
In the end, a
set up.
critical international dis-
with a baseball game between nine members

of the Supreme Court and nine foreign representatives of
the League of Nations. Throttlebottom is the umpire. One
pute
is
of his
settled
unhappy
him
decisions sends
has been imported from France for
to the guillotine
this occasion.
He
is
which
saved
hour by Mary Wintergreen's quick thinking; he

even becomes, at last, President, when the republic is
at the zero
restored.
ing:
There was much that was bright and witty and stingmany needle-edged lines, many amusing episodes, some
"Union Square" had the pungent

flavor of the recipe used so successfully in Of Thee I Sing.
Other moments also brought back to mind the high spots of
the earlier play, as, for example, the opening scene, the
Union League Scene, and "Comes the Revolution."
On the positive side was one of Gershwin's important
songs "Mine." This uses a vocal counterpoint for the main
melody ( a practice subsequently employed so effectively by
Frank Loesser in "Baby, It's Cold Outside" and by Irving
Berlin in "You're Just in Love") The vocal counterpoint consisted of an amusing aside by the chorus:
brilliant lyrics.
song
like
The
point they're making in the song
Is that
they more than get along;

243

And he is not ashamed to
She made him what he is
say
today.
But a musical dish in which a left-wing revolution is

was an unsavory meal, even in 1933. The picture
of a dictatorship in America, a blue-shirt army, and Throttlebottom preparing to meet his doom at the guillotine hardly
added spice to it. "Their hatreds have triumphed over their
sense of humor," remarked Brooks Atkinson. Newsweek
called the play "strained, dull, and dreary." Let 'Em Eat
Cake failed to reach its hundredth performance on Broadway, and it did just as badly on a brief road tour.
successful
The song "Mine" was
originally written as an exerone of Gershwin's lessons with Joseph Schillinger.

Schillinger, who died in 1943, was Gershwin's last teacher.
A mutual friend the composer-violinist, Joseph Achron
first told Gershwin of Schillinger's original theories of composition and suggested that Gershwin might profit from
studying them. Gershwin began these studies with Schillinger in 1932 and continued on and off for almost four
cise for
years.
The
entire subject of Schillinger's influence
win has inspired
so
many
on Gersh-
claims and counterclaims, particu-
larly since the composer's death, that
it
demands
clarifica-
tion.
Schillinger
was a theorist who evolved a new approach
to musical composition through the application of scientific
methods. Feeling that
all
great works of music were con-
structed according to exact principles, Schillinger systematized the procedures of the great composers of the past
present.
He
also analyzed all the possibilities in
and
melody, har-
244
mony, rhythm, orchestration and form, and in all known

musical styles. Thus he evolved a system of exact techniques
and procedures for the writing of music in any style and for
any combination. Composition was reduced to mathematical
formulas; effective creation was made possible through the
application of these formulas and systematic patterns, and
through use of graphs and slide rules. Schillinger once
showed how a polyphonic composition in the style of Bach
could be manufactured by tracing on graph paper the fluctuations of a business curve in the New York Times, and then
translating the units of the graph into proportionate values
melodic and harmonic intervals. The text of his theories

and their application was published posthumously in a twovolume edition: The Schillinger System of Musical Composition (1946). Among some popular composers and arrangers
it has become something of a Bible. Courses in the Schillinger method have been given in several leading universities and conservatories.
Some excessive claims have been made, first by Schillinger himself, and after his death by the Schillinger Society,
as to the influence of this method on Gershwin. In the prefin
ace to one of his
texts,
Kaleidophone (1940), Schillinger
wrote:
When
the
first
experiences.
completely
said,
"Here
hundred
the late George Gershwin
met me
for
time he was at a dead end of creative musical
He
felt his resources,
exhausted.
is
my
problem.
not his
When we
I
affirmative,
Can you help me?"
and a day
later
met,
were
Gershwin
have written about seven
songs. I can't write anything
repeating myself.
abilities,
any more.
I
am
replied in the
Gershwin became a
sort of

SOME FAILURES
245
SOME SUCCESS
Alice in Wonderland. Later on he
with some of the material in

through. "You don't have to
it's
became acquainted
book by playing them

compose music any more
this
here," he remarked.
all
who were conGershwin during and after 1932 and who

since he was an open book about his creative processes and
any problems confronting them have every reason to know
his most intimate reactions to his own work, can recall a
single incident or remark to substantiate Schillinger's contention that, in 1932, Gershwin was "at a dead end of creative musical experience." Gershwin was such a fount of both
musical ideas and enthusiasms all the time that it is imposNone
of the close friends or associates
tinually with
sible to conceive of his ever suffering creative sterility or
fatigue at any time.

Schillinger,
and the
Schillinger Society,
have main-
tained that whatever Gershwin wrote after 1932

larly
Porgy and Bess
was according
particu-
to Schillinger processes.
communicated to this writer on October

"Forgy and Bess was written en20,
tirely under my supervision; it took a year and a half, at the
rate of three lessons a week (which at the time consumed
Schillinger himself
1942, this assertion:
four-and-a-half hours )
."
Gershwin seized upon the Schilcoming

upon a complicated network of electric trains. He always
loved games of all sorts, and the Schillinger method became
a kind of game with him. He was fascinated by the idea of
composing by formula and was both startled and delighted
to find that it worked well
to a certain degree. His keen
and alert mind was stimulated by the intellectual processes
These are the
linger
facts:
method with the
delight of a precocious child
24G
involved. For a brief period he spoke continually to his

friends
and fellow-musicians about
citement of a
man
discovering a
Schillinger,
new
with the ex-
world.
There is no doubt that Gershwin derived much stimulation from his lessons and exercises and that to a certain
extent he strengthened his own technique with them. It is
also true that he occasionally applied the Schillinger
method to his own musical writing. This application can be
found in sporadic scale passages (used as thematic material)
in the Cuban Overture, in the Variations on I Got Rhythm,
in passing choral incidents and in some of the storm music
in Porgy and Bess. During the orchestration of his opera,
Gershwin sought out and profited from Schillinger's advice.
But Gershwin discovered that though the Schillinger
formulas might reinforce his technique they could never be
a substitute for inspiration. His music after 1932 was written along the more formal and traditional creative procedures. Ira Gershwin made this emphatic point in a letter to
Newsweek (October 23, 1946), in response to an article in
which the Schillinger claims about Gershwin in general,
and Porgy and Bess in particular, were put forward. "If the
writer of the article wishes to give the impression that Porgy
and Bess wouldn't have had quite the same value or integrity
or acclaim if George hadn't studied say 'Rhythmic Groups
Resulting from the Interference of Several Synchronized
Periodicities,' with Schillinger, he is musically uninformed.
Lessons like these unquestionably broaden musical horizons,
but they don't inspire an opera like Porgy and Bess.
The year
of 1934 was crowded with activity.

began with an exhaustive tour of one-night stands
with the Leo Reisman Orchestra, conducted by Charles PreIt
247
vin and with James Melton as soloist, in programs
made up
Harry Askin, who had been

manager
for
company
Miss 1917 and who had brought
Gershwin to Max Dreyfus, was in charge. Previn had also
had a long association with Gershwin, for he had been in the
orchestra pit of La, La Lucille and later had been the conductor for Of Thee I Sing; he had also conducted Ira Gershwin's first musical-comedy success, Two Little Girls in Blue.
The tour opened in Boston on the afternoon of January 14, and ended at the Academy of Music, in Brooklyn,
New York, on the evening of February 10. In a little less
than a month, the company traveled 12,000 miles and performed in twenty-eight cities in as many days, going as far
north as Toronto, as far south as Richmond, and as far west
as Omaha. Gershwin conducted An American in Paris and
was the piano soloist in the Concerto, the Rhapsody in Blue,
and in a work written expressly for the tour, the Variations
on I Got Rhythm. There were two groups of Gershwin songs,
together with two groups of songs by other composers. After
the formal program, long though it was, came another improvised one, with Gershwin playing numbers repeated by
principally of Gershwin's music.
the audience.
The
entire route provided testimony to the
immense
appeal of Gershwin's music, not only through the enthusiasm

of audiences everywhere but also through the box-office re-
With a top of $2.75, the tour grossed over $66,000,

averaging approximately $4,000 gross for most of the concerts. It would have done even better if the itinerary had not
ceipts.
included seven stops that were too small to support such an

expensive undertaking. These stops, and the long jumps be-
tween
concerts,
were responsible
for creating a deficit for the
entire project, despite the almost universally sold-out audito-
248
riums. Gershwin,
who had been persuaded
to
be a partner
in
the tour, received nothing except his fare and hotel expenses,
and had
to contribute $5,000 to the deficit.
The
tour demonstrated something else, too: Gersh-
win's remarkable stamina
withstanding his
man.
He
and physical
own tendency
indestructibility, not-
to regard himself as a sick
took in stride not only the ordeal of continual travel
but also the more formidable demands made upon him by

twenty-eight concert appearances in twenty-nine days in an
exhausting program. Seeing him after the Brooklyn concert,
were amazed to discover that the exhilaration and

excitement he had brought to the tour at its inception had
not lost much of their edge for him. There was, to be sure, a
certain amount of fatigue, though not too much of that. But
there was nothing jaded or effete about him now that he had
come to the end of the long road. It was felt by many then
that he would have been ready and willing he might even
have relished continuing the tour the next morning with anfriends
other twenty-eight one-night stands.
The Variations on I Got Rhythm whose world premiere took place at the Boston concert on January 14 was
written mostly during a vacation in Palm Beach in December
1933, where Gershwin was a guest of Emil Mosbacher. It
was completed in New York on January 6, 1934. The work
represented an effort on his part to put on paper and formalize some of the more salient ideas he had so often developed
for his friends while improvising for them on "I Got
Rhythm." While the Variations, as it now stands, does not
have the combustible heat and spontaneity that made Gershwin's extemporizations so exciting, it does provide the present generation with at least a glimpse at his powers of improvisation.
249
SOME FAILURES
SOME SUCCESS
symphony orchestra, E-flat

and Chinese gong. It opens
with a four-note ascending phrase from the first measure of
the "I Got Rhythm" chorus given by the solo clarinet. The
theme is passed on to solo piano, then to full orchestra. At
The work
and
last
is
scored for full
B-flat saxophones, banjo,
the solo piano presents the song
chorus only ) in
its
en-
tirety. The variations that follow demonstrate Gershwin's remarkable progress in the science of developing and altering a
stated theme. He changes not only its basic structure, melodically and rhythmically, but also its mood and feeling. The
first variation is a release of animal energy; in the second, the
theme suddenly becomes a melancholy dirge. In other variations the melody grows muscular and aggressive; or it is as
festive as a New Orleans Mardi Gras, with the orchestration
a veritable pyrotechnical display of fireworks and the piano a
glittering cascade of whirling figures; or it is a poignant and
deep-throated blues melody.
With the ambitious tour over, Gershwin did not wait

long to embark on still another project. On February 19 he inaugurated a sponsored radio program. For the next few
months "Music by Gershwin" (with "The Man I Love" as the
theme song) presented him over WJZ every Monday and
Friday evening from 7:30 to 7:45 in the varied role of genial
master of ceremonies, conductor, composer, and pianist. For
this chore he received $2,000 a week.
This radio series was not his
first
appearance before a
had taken place on the

on December 14, 1926, when
radio microphone. His radio debut
Ever-Ready Hour over WEAF

he played some of his songs and a part of his Concerto ( without orchestra ) Following this he had been a guest performer
on various programs: the Rudy Vallee program, the Ted
.
250
Weems
show, the American Telephone and Telegraph radio

hour, and as a soloist under Walter Damrosch. But "Music
by Gershwin" was
his first radio show,
of the opportunities
it,
and
talk
teristic of
about
it.
it
offered
Much
him
and he made the most
to play his music,
to Gershwin's credit,
conduct
and charac-
the man, he also used these programs as a forum
some of the best popular music of

other composers, and more important still he frequently gave
a hearing to unknown composers. Among those who were
still comparatively unknown when Gershwin introduced
them on the air were Harold Arlen, Rube Bloom, Dana
Suesse, and Oscar Levant. The following October Gershwin
returned to the radio for a second series: this time he had a
weekly half -hour program, every Sunday at 6:00 p.m. over
for the presentation of
WABC.
In some ways Gershwin found his radio duties more
taxing and exacting than his road tour. As he explained,
when
he traveled with the orchestra he had only a single program

to give. Since it had been carefully rehearsed beforehand, all
he had to do was go through the motions. But a regular oncea-week or twice-a-week stint over the radio meant the continual preparation of new programs and never ceasing rehearsals
as well as the mass of details involved in selecting songs by
other composers and guest artists.
Nevertheless, in the midst of all this he found both
time
the
and energy to begin working intensively on his
greatest serious composition, the opera Porgy and Bess.
251
21
Porgy and Bess
The idea of writing an opera continued to haunt

Gershwin, and he knew he would have no peace of mind
until he did it. He had long since decided that his text would
be DuBose Heyward's Porgy, but it had been several years
since he had discussed the project with the author. But on
March 29, 1932, he suddenly wrote to Hey ward: "In
thinking of ideas for compositions, I came back to the one
that I had several years ago namely Porgy and the thought
of setting it to music. It is still the most outstanding play
that I know about colored people." Heyward replied by re-
affirming his interest in the opera.
tual
But even now Gershwin kept on postponing the acwriting, for there were various commitments he had to
252
fulfill.
He probably would have delayed the opera indefinitely
always choosing some assignment that needed doing right

now, and pushing
Porgy further into the future
off
if
his
hand had not suddenly been forced. One day in 1933 Heyward called him to say that the Theatre Guild was pressing
him for permission to allow Jerome Kern and Oscar
Hammerstein II (the authors of Show Boat) to adapt Porgy
into a musical for Al Jolson. It seems that Jolson, too, had
long expressed an interest in the play for himself, and had
even used a part of it for one of his broadcasts. Gershwin told
Heyward that he was reluctant to stand in the way of Heyward's accepting a deal that gave every indication of becoming a tremendous box-office attraction and that his own
opera could easily wait a few years more. Heyward countered
by insisting that he was not interested in money; he wanted
Porgy to become a folk opera not a musical comedy. "I want
you to tell me if you are really going to write that opera and
soon" Heyward continued. "If you are, I'm going to turn the
Guild down definitely." Gershwin thought a moment, then
said he would begin working without any more delays. And
he kept his word.
There now ensued a lively and continuous exchange
of correspondence between Heyward and Gershwin as they
discussed how the Dorothy and DuBose Heyward play could
be made into a suitable opera. Almost half had to be cut
away, while drastic revisions had to be made in the dialogue
to
make it acceptable
for the operatic stage; besides there
was
the additional task of writing lyrics for the songs.
Heyward has
written:
At the outset we were faced by a difficult problem.

was firm in my refusal to leave the South and live in
253
Porgy and Bess
New
was bound
York. Gershwin
for the duration of his
The matter
happy union between words and music
contract to the microphone at Radio City.

of effecting a
across a thousand miles of Atlantic seaboard baffled us

for a
moment. The solution came naturally when we
we
ciated Ira Gershwin with us. Frequently
my
system by which, between
dash to Charleston,
asso-
evolved a
North, or George's
visits
could send scenes and
Then
lyrics.
the brothers Gershwin, after their extraordinary fashion,
would get
pound, wrangle, sweat, burst into
at the piano,
weird snatches of song, and eventually emerge with a

polished
lyric.
The following exchange

ence over a period of
is
typical of their correspond-
many months
as the libretto
began
tak-
ing shape:
Follywood,
Folly Beach,
So. Ga.
Feb.
Dear George:
I know you
am
so I
will
be eager
to see
more of the
sending the next two scenes herewith.
about completed the next scene

typed, and
Act
2,
want
to
Scene
do a
little
may
still
also,
6,
but
it
is
more work on it.

seem a little long
34
script,
I
have
not yet
to you,
it from 39 pages in the talking script

to 18 for the opera, and it is strong on humor and action.
have reduced
but
Let
me know how you
needs more
lyrics.
feel
about
it
and
if
you think
it
254
Act
Scene 2 ought to be good.
2,
have cut out
the conventional Negro vaudeville stuff that was in the
and incorporated material that is authentic

and plenty "hot" as well. I have discovered for the first
time a type of secular dance that is done there that is
straight from the African phallic dance, and that is undoubtedly a complete survival. Also I have seen that
native band of harmonics, combs, etc. It will make an
original play
extraordinary introduction to the primitive scene of passion
between Crown and

I
think
maybe
done better wait
until
we
something for them but

ing, especially the
if
you
feel
Bess.
the composition on the lyrics
get together.
and
all
it
by
writ-
let that stop
ideas of your own.
Affectionate greetings
us
have in mind
cannot well suggest
boat song. But don't
moved with
have
you,
good wishes from
all.
Sincerely,
DuBose
26 February 1934
Dear DuBose:
I
received your Second Act's script and think
fine. I really
new
the
and
think you are doing a magnificent job with
and I hope I can match it musically.

I have begun composing music for the First Act
am starting with the songs and spirituals first.
I am hoping you will find some time to come up
libretto
North and
you
it is
live at
my
apartment
so we can work together on
for Scene 2,
Act
1.
if it is
some
convenient for
of the spirituals
255
Porgy and Bess
Hoping you and your wife and child are 100% well
and looking forward to seeing you soon, I am,
As ever,
George G.
Folly Beach, S.C.
March
2,
igs4
Dear George:
I
was very glad
As for the
deadlock.
hear from you.

from now on, I
to
script
am
sort of at a
The storm scene must stand about
as
is
with
must be done
when we are together. It must carry itself on the big
scene when Crown sings against a spiritual, and I can't
very few cuts in dialogue. Musically
do the
lyrics until I get
doing a
ready
any
lyric for
to drive
Porgy
it
your ideas as to time. Then

just before the curtain as
out for Bess.
am
he gets
Have you any thoughts about
of this last section of the play?
8 March 1Q34
Dear DuBose:
I
was happy
to get
your
of Act II enclosed. I think
with the 3rd Scene
letter
it is
a very interesting and
touching scene, although a bit on the long

I see
and which could be
sure that the opera
is
am
I
cut.
not too long as
believer in not giving people too
and
However,
one or two places that do not seem terribly impor-
tant to the action
make
side.
sure you agree with
this.
much
.
of a
You must
am
a great
good thing
would like to write the song that opens the 2nd

by Jake with the fish nets, but I don't know
Act, sung
25G
mind especially for the answers

would appreciate it if you would put
dots and dashes over the lyric and send it to me.
I am looking forward to seeing you next month.
Hoping you and your family are well, I am,
the rhythm you had in
of the chorus, so I
Sincerely,
George
The Metropolitan Opera
hoped
have an opera
by Gershwin, and it was interested in Porgy. Otto H. Kahn
even proposed giving Gershwin a bonus of $5,000 if he signed
a contract with the Metropolitan Opera. While Gershwin was
flattered by the offer and grateful for it, he felt any arrangement with the Metropolitan over Porgy would be highly impractical. He did not relish having his opera performed three
or four times for one or two seasons and then being thrown
into discard
the fate of most new operas performed there.
He wanted Porgy to reach a large audience of Americans,
rather than a limited opera public. Most important of all, he
felt strongly that this opera should be performed by a cast
made up mostly of Negroes, and this, of course, was out of
still
to
the question at the Metropolitan.
When, therefore, contracts were signed for Porgy

was with the Theatre Guild, which had produced the play.
The signing took place on October 26, 1933. "It's going to
be a labor of love," Gershwin wrote a friend as soon as the
deal was consummated, "and I expect quite a few labor pains
it
with
it."
December 1933 Gershwin went to Charleston to

Heyward further details of the opera and to get
the "feel" of the city which was the locale and setting of the
opera. "I would like to see the town," he said, "and
In
discuss with

257
Porgy and Bess
and perhaps go to a colored cafe or two

if there are any." Two weeks later, on his way back to New
York from Florida, he once again paid a brief visit to Charleshear some
spirituals,
ton.
But a much more extended stay
South Carolina was

possible during the summer of 1934. Then Gershwin and his
cousin Henry Botkin who was at the time painting Negro
entrained for the South, preceded by a car
subjects
filled with baggage and art equipment. They settled on Folly
Island, a small barrier island ten miles from Charleston, and
occupied a screen-porched shack near the waterfront. It was a
primitive existence. Their rooms were crude, with an old iron
bed, a small wash basin, and decaying furniture. Their drinking water had to be brought in from Charleston. Gershwin's
room had an old-fashioned upright piano. There they lived
under a scorching sun through July and August. They visin
in
numerous
and other Negro places

an avid search for musical materials and subjects for paint-
ited
plantations, churches,
ing.
that
DuBose Heyward has vividly described the impact

this visit made on Gershwin:
James Island with
its
large population of primitive
Gullah Negroes lay adjacent, and furnished us with a

laboratory in which to test our theories, as well as an
inexhaustible source of folk material. But the interesting
discovery to me, as
we
sat listening to their spirituals, or
watched a group shuffling before a cabin or country store,

was that to George it was more like a homecoming than
an exploration. The quality in him which had produced
the Rhapsody in Blue in the most sophisticated city in
America, found
its
counterpart in the impulse behind the
258
music and bodily rhythms of the simple Negro peasant

of the South.
The Gullah Negro

"shouting." This
is
prides himself on
what he
a complicated rhythmic pattern beaten
out by feet and hands as an accompaniment to the

uals,
and
is
calls
undoubtedly of African
forget the night when, at a
spirit-
survival. I shall
never
Negro meeting on a remote
sea island, George started "shouting" with them.
And
show from
their
eventually to their huge delight stole the
champion
white
"shouter." I think that
man
he
is
probably the only
America who could have done that.*

Another night, as we were about to enter a dilapiin
dated cabin that had been taken as a meeting house by
my arm
and held me. The sound that had arrested him was the
one to which, through long familiarity, I attached no
special importance. But now, listening to it with him, and
noticing the excitement, I began to catch its extraordinary
quality. It consisted of perhaps a dozen voices raised in
loud rhythmic prayer. The odd thing about it was that
while each had started at a different time, upon a different
theme, they formed a clearly defined rhythmic pattern,
and that this, with the actual words lost, and the inevitable pounding of the rhythm, produced an effect almost
terrifying in its primitive intensity. Inspired by the extraordinary effect, George wrote six simultaneous prayers proa group of Negro Holy Rollers, George caught
ducing a terrifying primitive invocation to
God
in the
face of the hurricane.

* In the spring of 1938, after Gershwin's death, Kay Swift visited
Folly Island and spoke to the Negroes there about Gershwin. Many remem-
bered his
was able
visit vividly,
to join
them
and spoke with renewed excitement of the way he

and become one of them.
in their "shouts"
259
Porgy and Bess
The opera occupied Gershwin about twenty months.

Most of the actual composition was done in about eleven
months and was completed in mid-April 1935. While some
of the orchestration for the first act had been done in September 1934, that task consumed about eight months in
1935. Part of the orchestration was done in Palm Beach in
February of that year; part, at Mosbacher's home in White
Plains that spring; part, at Ocean Beach on Fire Island ( off
Long Island) where Ira and Leonore Gershwin rented a
house with Moss Hart during the summer; part, in New York
City the same summer. The actual date of completion it
appears at the end of the last page of the manuscript was
September 2, 1935, but revisions continued throughout the
rehearsal period and even up to opening night. During the exacting and all-consuming labor of putting his opera down on
paper, Gershwin was continually assisted by Kay Swift, Joseph Schillinger, and Stephan Zoltai, a copyist.
Then it was completed: seven hundred neat and compact pages of written music ( 560 pages of the published vocal
score), which would require four-and-a-half hours if performed as written. The name Porgy and Bess was on the
title page. Gershwin had decided that to call the opera Porgy
would create an inevitable confusion between the play and
his opera and that a title like Porgy and Bess was in the operatic tradition of Tristan und Isolde and Pelleas et Melisande.
Rouben Mamoulian, who had directed the original
stage production of Porgy for the Theatre Guild, was chosen
to direct the opera as well. He was in Hollywood when he
signed his contract, and at that time he had not even seen or
heard a note of the music. But on his first evening in New
York he visited Gershwin's apartment and there heard the
complete score.
He
recalls:
260
was rather amusing how all three of us [George,

Ira, Mamoulian] were trying to be nonchalant and poised
that evening, yet we were trembling with excitement.
The brothers handed me a tall highball and put me in a
comfortable leather armchair. George sat down at the
piano while Ira stood over him like a guardian angel.
George's hands went up in the air about to strike the
shining keys. Halfway down he changed his mind, turned
to me, and said, "Of course, Rouben, you must understand, it's very difficult to play this score. As a matter of
fact it's really impossible! Can you play Wagner on the
piano? Well this is like Wagner!" I assured George that
I understood. Up went his nervous hands again and the
next second I was listening to the opening "piano music"
in the opera. I found it so exciting, so full of color and so
It
provocative in
its
rhythms that
after this first piano section
was over, I jumped out of my armchair and interrupted

George to tell him how much I liked it. Both brothers
were as happy as children to hear words of praise, though
heavens knows, they should have been used to them by
then. When my explosion was over and they went back to
the piano, they both blissfully closed
fore they continued with the lovely
George played with the most
He seemed
their
eyes
be-
"Summertime" song.
beatific smile
on
his face.
on the waves of his own music with

the Southern sun shining on him. Ira sang he threw
his head back with abandon, his eyes closed, and sang
like a nightingale. In the middle of the song George
to float
any longer and took over the singing

from him. To describe George's face as he sang "Summercouldn't bear
time"
is
it
something beyond
my
"Nirvana" might be the word. So
capacity as
it
went
on.
a writer.
George was
20 1
Porgy and Bess
the orchestra and played the parts. Ira sang the other
was touchwould become so overwhelmed with admiration for his brother, that he would
look from him to me with half-open eyes and pantomime
with a soft gesture of the hand, as if saying, "He did it.
Isn't it wonderful. Isn't he wonderful?" George would
frequently take his eyes away from the score and watch
me covertly and my reaction to the music, while pretending he wasn't really doing it at all. It was very late into
half. Ira
was
ing to see
also frequently the "audience/' It
how
he, while singing,
the night before

felt exultantly
Ira
we
finished with the opera.
had completely
shall
the enthusiasm of the two
the music, their anxiety to do
being appreciated and with

tion for each other. It
ries
We
all
For two days they
lost their voices.
couldn't talk; they only whispered.

that evening
happy. The next morning both George and
is
one so cherishes in
it
it
never forget
brothers about
justice, their joy at its
all
their touching devo-
one of those rare tender memolife.
The state of euphoria in which Gershwin played his

Mamoulian was one into which he invariably succumbed whenever he played or listened to his opera. In the
Arthur Schwartz-Howard Dietz revue At Home Abroad, in
which Beatrice Lillie was starred in 1935, Gershwin appeared
score for
who sang to the tune of "I Got Rhythm":

wrote Porgy who could ask for anything more?" This
scene reflected rather than satirized Gershwin's reaction to
his own opera. Its writing had been, as he had anticipated, a
labor of love, and to it he brought an exhilaration and excitement unique even for him. Once the opera was written, he
never quite ceased to wonder at the miracle that he had been
as a marionette
"I
202
composer. He knew it was his greatest work. While he

was partial to each of his earlier serious compositions, this
was the first one that satisfied him completely. He never
stopped loving each and every bar; never wavered in the conviction that he had produced a work of art. After the first rehearsal (which, like most first rehearsals, had gone rather
badly) he telephoned Mamoulian to tell him how "thrilled"
and "delighted" he was. "I always knew that Porgy and Bess
was wonderful," he told Mamoulian with his directness and
its
never thought I'd feel the way I feel

now. I tell you, after listening to that rehearsal today I think
the music is so marvelous I really don't believe I wrote it."
ingenuousness, "but
He was
vinced of
to
be
dent
by
its
so completely absorbed with his opera, so con-
significance, that
he expected everybody
else
Mamoulian tells of a revealing inciLindy's (a Broadway restaurant frequented mostly
similarly affected.
at
theater people) right after one of the rehearsals. During
Mamoulian whistled a snatch from Rimsky-Korsawas immediately upset. "How can you be humming some Russian melody when you have just been rehearsing my music all day?" he asked with obvious pique. But
the depression disappeared and his face lit up as a thought
came to him. "I know why you hummed that Russian music
it's because my parents came from Russia."
During the rehearsal period he thought, breathed,
dreamed, and played Porgy and Bess all the time; nothing
and nobody else was of even secondary interest. At one point
during the rehearsals when the music was beginning to
drive everybody to distraction Gershwin suggested to Mamoulian and several others connected with the production
that they all go out to Long Island for a week-end "to forget
completely about Porgy and Bess." The suggestion was wel-
the meal,
kov. Gershwin
263
Porgy and Bess
corned warmly.
When
they returned from
this
three-day ex-
cursion, Mamoulian was asked what they did all the time. He
answered wearily: "Can't you guess? From morning to night,
for the three days, George was at the piano, playing the music
from Porgy."
The Theatre Guild had also immediately contracted

Alexander Smallens as conductor, Alexander Steinert as the
coach for the singers, and Serge Soudekeine as scenic
designer.
The grueling process
of selecting a cast followed.
Assembling a practically all-Negro cast presented formidable

limitations, since few Negroes had extensive opera-house experience and new singers had to be discovered. Hundreds of
auditions followed, and out of them came the two principals,
Todd Duncan and Anne Brown. Duncan was teaching music
courses at Howard University in Washington, D.C., when
he was sent to Gershwin by a mutual friend to audition for
the role of Porgy. Duncan sang for Gershwin highly classical
arias like Sacchfs "Lungi dai caro bene." His manner was
stiff, but his voice had such beautiful texture and was projected so easily and fluidly that Gershwin arranged a second
audition with the producers present, and he was instantly engaged. Anne Brown came to Gershwin without benefit of any
introduction. She came to his apartment one day asking to
be heard, since she had been told that Gershwin was looking
for a Bess. She sang both spirituals and pieces from the classical repertory. She, too,
revealed her inexperience in her
enough for Gershwin

a Bess had ended.
consciousness, but she sang well

ize at
once that his search for
The choice
of John
W. Bubbles
as Sportin
self-
to real-
Life also
represented an act of discovery on the part of Gershwin, even
though Bubbles,
as the partner of
Buck, was a tap dancer
204
with a long and successful career in vaudeville. But Bubbles

as an opera singer was something else again, particularly since
he could not read a note of music and seemed incapable of
learning to sing with any degree of accuracy as to pitch,
tempo, or rhythm. For example, he simply could not learn
how to sing the slow triplets in "It Ain't Necessarily So" the
way Gershwin wanted; finally Steinert hit upon the happy
idea of tap-dancing the rhythm for him, and only then did
Bubbles understand what was wanted from him. Training

Bubbles in other songs and in the recitatives was an ordeal to
try the patience of a saint. There was one day when Gershwin
lost his temper and wanted to fire him, and was only
restrained from doing so by Mamoulian. However, the effort
expended on Bubbles paid off rich dividends. His characterization of Sportin' Life was one of the freshest and most unforgettable performances of the production, both in the way
he used his restless dancing feet and in his personal manner
of half-chanting his part. Gershwin often spoke of him affectionately as "my Bubbles" with the justifiable pride of a
Pygmalion who has fashioned his Galatea.
One of the many problems Gershwin had to solve
was the fact that many of the singers in the cast, having had
training in serious music, were intent on covering up any Negroid qualities in their singing and speech. Gershwin, on the
other hand, was insistent on accentuating the Negro inflection in music and diction. With his protruding full lips and
whining voice he seemed more Negro than many members of
the cast as he stood on the stage and sang for them the music
the way he wanted it to sound.
It was not all trial and pain, however. Other moments
of the rehearsals came when the genius of the opera shone
265
Porgy and Bess
with a blinding light to dazzle
all
those present.
Todd Dun-
can describes such a moment:
One day we were
in the midst of hard
Serena's Prayer Scene, he
work
in
[Gershwin] walked in and
the back of the dark

where he quietly took his seat. The director,
Mamoulian, was working like mad with the actors, setting the entrances, positions, the music, and the action.
This is a very quiet scene, one of profound religious fervor.
We singers were very tired, tired enough fortunately to
set up the exact atmosphere for the prayer. It must have
been our tenth consecutive trial.
Miss Elzy [Serena]
went down on her knees. Two seconds of silence intervened that seemed like hours, and presently there rose
the most glorious tones and wails with accompanying
amens and hallelujahs for our sick Bess that I ever hope
to experience. This particular scene should have nor-
immediately disappeared into
theater
mally
moved
did not.
It
into the scene of the Street Cries, but
it
stopped there. The piano accompaniment
ceased, every actor (and there
were
sixty-five of
them)
had come out of his rest position, sitting at the edge of

and Rouben Mamoulian was standing before us
quietly moving his inevitable cigar from one side of his
mouth to the other, his face lighted to sheer delight in
realization, and then, George Gershwin, like a ghost from
his seat
the dark rows of the Guild Theater appeared before the

footlights.
ful
He
simply could not stand
it.
As the rehearsals continued, heading toward the fatepremiere, cuts had to be made in order to compress the
2SG
opera within the prescribed limits of a normal evening at the

theater. These cuts hurt Gershwin, who loved every note; but,
showman
that he was, he accepted them willingly and often

on them. Slices were taken out of the opening scene
the sinuous dance and chant of the Negroes that precedes
"Summertime," from Maria's reading in the second act, and
from the last scene trio. After the Boston opening, Porgy 's
effective "Buzzard Song" and other of his passages in the
third act were removed at Gershwin's suggestion. "If we
don't," he told Ira, "you won't have a Porgy by the time we
reach New York. No one can sing that much eight performinsisted
ances a week."
its
And then the opera was ready. About a week before

premiere in Boston, a final run-through of the entire score
but without
action, sets, scenery, or costumes

was made
Carnegie Hall before a handful of Gershwin's most intimate friends and closest associates. "In some ways," recalls
Henry Botkin, "I think it was the most beautiful performance
of Porgy and Bess I ever heard. Without the distractions of
at
the stage, the music
itself
became a profound and moving
experience that stirred everybody listening to
it
to the very
depths of their being."
Porgy and Bess opened at the Colonial Theater in Boston on September 30, 1935, with the following cast: Todd
Duncan, Porgy; Anne Brown, Bess; Ruby Elzy, Serena; John
W. Bubbles, Sportin' Life; Ford L. Buck, Mingo; Abbie
Mitchell, Clara; Edward Matthews, Jake; Georgette Harvey,
Maria; Helen Dowdy, Lily; Henry Davis, Robbins; Warren
Coleman, Crown; J. Rosamond Johnson, Frazier; and the Eva
Jessye Choir.
The audience began early to demonstrate its enthusiasm and by the time the opera ended the ovation reached
207
Porgy and Bess
such proportions that the shouts and cries lasted over fifteen
When George Gershwin, Rouben Mamoulian, and
minutes.
Alexander Smallens appeared on the stage and were embraced by the principals in the cast pandemonium was let
loose in the theater. The excitement infected all of those present. S. N. Behrman was beside himself. "It's immense," he
exsaid. "It should be played in every country of the world
cept Hitler's
Germany
it
doesn't deserve
it."
When Sigmund
Spaeth approached George Gershwin he had tears in his eyes.

"Hey, look," Gershwin remarked to a friend, "we've got the
old doc crying." Serge Koussevitzky, who almost never de-
scended from his cloistered refuge in the Jamaica Plain section of Boston ( except when he had to conduct the concerts
of the Boston Symphony Orchestra ) was also present. "It's a
great advance in American opera," he said, "and one of the
greatest." J. Rosamond Johnson told Gershwin simply,
"You're the Abraham Lincoln of Negro music." Eva Gauthier
a few days earlier had given Gershwin the birthday gift of
a score of Monteverdi's Orfeo inscribed, "the first opera ever
written to the composer of the latest opera"; and she, with
Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, and Roland Hayes expressed unqualified enthusiasm. Gershwin's own reaction to his opera
might have been expected, "It sounded exactly as I thought
it would sound when I wrote it."
There was a virtually unanimous acclaim in the
Boston newspapers. Moses Smith wrote in the Transcript:
"It is unique. Is there another American composer for the
lyric stage who exhibits at once such eclecticism and individuality? ... He has traveled a long way from Tin Pan Alley
to this opera. He must now be accepted as a serious composer." The drama critic for the same paper, Edwin F. Melvin, said: "The composer has put together something that
268
has dramatic intensity and power, with songs, dances, and
humors that seem to spring naturally from the place

Opera as it is set forth in Porgy and
and the people.
Bess can become a cause for popular rejoicing." Elinor
Hughes wrote in the Herald: "It was an interesting, often
striking event.
Porgy and Bess is a folk opera, American
opera, and at the same time it is the play, fortified and en-
racial
larged." In the Christian Science Monitor, L. A. Sloper re-
garded
it
"easily as Gershwin's
most important contribution
to music."
Two weeks later, on the evening of October 10, Porgy

and Bess came to New York, to the Alvin Theater. Once
again the audience a virtual Who's Who of Broadway, Tin
Pan Alley, Hollywood, and Carnegie Hall was heatedly demonstrative. But the critics the next day were divided in
their judgment. Generally speaking, it was the leading drama
who gave
critics
a strongly positive verdict. Brooks Atkinson
wrote, "Mr. Gershwin has contributed something glorious to
the spirit of Heyward's community legend." John
Brown
some
said, "Unless
Mason
my untrained ears deceive me it contains
of the loveliest music he has written. Its idiom
is
the
idiom of spirituals and of Harlem. But he crossed them so

... it succeeds at most times in being compellingly
that
dramatic."
The music critics were far less impressed than their

dramatic colleagues. Olin Downes liked some of the parts,
but the whole
left
him
cold. "It does not utilize all the re-
sources of the operatic composer or pierce very often to the
depths of the pathetic drama.
ment
The
style
is
at
one mo-
and another of operetta or sheer Broadway entertainment." Lawrence Gilman, on the other hand, felt that
the individual parts were deficits. "Perhaps it is needlessly
of opera
269
Porgy and Bess
Draconian to begrudge Mr. Gershwin the song hits which he

has scattered through the score and which will doubtless
enhance his fame and popularity. Yet they mar it. They are
cardinal weaknesses.
They
integrity. Listening to
are the blemishes upon its musical

such sure-fire rubbish as the duet be-
tween Porgy and Bess, 'You

wonder how the composer
.
My Woman
Is
.
Now'
you
could stoop to such easy and
such needless conquests." Virgil Thomson described the

opera as a "fake" in Modern Music (November-December
1935 ) "It is crooked folklore and halfway opera, a strong but
crippled work.
Porgy is falsely conceived and rather
clumsily executed." To Paul Rosenfeld, in Discoveries of a
Music Critic,* the opera was "an aggrandized musical show.
;
The
score sustains
no mood. There
neither a progres-
is
it. The individual numbers

and ending, leave one largely where
they picked one up. Nor do they communicate a reality.
It would seem as if Gershwin knew chiefly stage Negroes and
that he very incompletely felt the drama of the two protagonists." Even Samuel Chotzinoff
always ready to accept
everything Gershwin wrote had reservations "As entertainment it is hybrid, fluctuating constantly between music
drama, musical comedy, and operetta.
The score contains pages of beautiful and original music but the interruptions of the facile and the inconsequential are too frequent
to give to the work the true aspect of homogeneity."
There were always gala parties after important Gershwin premieres, and there was one after Porgy and Bess at
the home of Conde Nast at 1040 Park Avenue. The entire
cast was present to repeat highlights from the opera, and Paul
sive nor
an enduring tension to
spurt from a
flat level,
* Discoveries of a
court, Brace
&
Co., 1936.
Music
Critic,
by Paul Rosenfeld.
New
York: Hard-
270
Whiteman brought
in Blue with
Gershwin
at the piano.
graved with one hundred and

the composer
The
fifty
large silver tray, en-
signatures of George's
and most ardent admirers, was presented
closest friends
win's living
perform the Rhapsody
his orchestra to
it
now
to
decorates a coffee table in Ira Gersh-
room )
New York's
music critics
did not shake Gershwin's own enthusiasm and complete
somefaith. He returned frequently to the Alvin Theater
times as often as four times a week and stood in the back
listening. Nor did he experience serious disappointment that
Porgy and Bess had the comparatively unimpressive run of
124 performances. He looked upon it this way: if, say, an
opera like Die Meistersinger was given about six times a season at the Metropolitan Opera, then the 124 performances
of Porgy and Bess represented a run of over twenty years for
a great opera house.
It had cost about $17,000 a week to keep Porgy and
Bess running, and the box office lagged far behind this figure
both in New York and during a three-month tour that followed the New York closing. George, Ira, and DuBose Heyward lost the $5,000 investment each had made in the production. George earned $10,000 in royalties, but he had spent
more than that in copyist fees. DuBose and Dorothy Heyward divided $8,000, and Ira received $2,000.
During the three-month tour, Alexander Steinert took
over the baton from Smallens as the company played in Detroit, Pittsburgh, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. During the
run in the nation's capital, Porgy and Bess helped to shape
social history. For the first time in a century racial barriers
were dropped at the National Theater for performances of
the opera, and Negroes were accorded their rights as Amerihalf-hearted response of

271
Porgy and Bess
can citizens to attend performances without the indignity of

segregation.
Gershwin revealed and
methods and apthe New York Times:
clarified his
proaches in writing his folk opera in
When
I first
began work on the music
decided
against the use of original folk material because I
the music to be
own
spirituals
music
all
and
wanted
my
of one piece. Therefore I wrote

folk songs.
But they are
still
folk
and therefore, being in operatic form, Porgy and
Bess becomes a folk opera.
However, because Porgy and Bess deals with

Negro life in America it brings to the operatic form elements that have never before appeared in opera and I
have adapted my method to utilize the drama, the humor,
the superstition, the religious fervor, the dancing, and the
irrepressible high spirits of the race.
in
If,
doing
this, I
have created a new form which combines opera with the

theater, this
the material.
It is
that
it
new form
.
my
idea that opera should be entertaining
should contain
Therefore,
has come quite naturally out of
when
all
the elements of entertainment.
chose Porgy and Bess, a tale of Charles-
ton Negroes, for a subject,

enable
it
me
made
sure that
to write light as well as serious
would enable
me
to include
humor
it
would
music and that
as well as tragedy
in fact, all the elements of entertainment for the eye as
well as the ear, because the Negroes, as a race, have

these qualities inherent in them.
They
are ideal for
all
my
purpose because they express themselves not only by the
spoken word but quite naturally by song and dance.
272
Humor is an important part of American life, and

an American opera without humor could not possibly
run the gamut of American expression. In Porgy and
Bess there are ample opportunities for humorous songs
and dances. This humor is natural humor not "gags"
superimposed upon the story, but humor flowing from the
story
For instance, the character of Sportin'
itself.
instead of being a sinister dope-peddler,
dancing
villain,
same time
I
evil.
Bess. I
is
am
is
likable
and believable and
my
true that
have written songs
Porgy
and Bess I realand without
for the theater
could be neither of the theater nor entertaining,
it
from
my
point of view.
But songs are
... Of
entirely within the operatic tradi-
course, the songs in Porgy
only a part of the whole.
The
make
as close to the
inflection in
and
believe
for
not ashamed of writing songs at any time
was writing an opera
songs
tion.
at the
music to be an integral part of

I
so long as they are good songs. In Porgy
ized
Lne,
a humorous
have written
the story. It
and
who
is
my
Negro
recitative I
and Bess are

have
tried to
speech as possible,
song writing apprenticeship has served
invaluably in this respect, because the song writers of
America have the best conception of how to set words to

music so that the music gives added expression to the
words. I have used sustained symphonic music to unify
entire scenes,
and
prepared myself for that task by fur-
modern harmony.
and Bess I believe that Mr.
ther study in counterpoint and
In the lyrics for Porgy
Heyward and my
brother, Ira, have achieved a fine syn-
chronization of diversified
moods
Mr.
Heyward
writing
most of the native material and Ira doing most of the
273
Porgy and Bess
sophisticated songs.
There
is
the prayer in the storm
scene written by Mr. Heyward; and in contrast there
is
Ira's
song for Sportin' Life in the picnic scene. Then
there
is
Mr. Heyward's lullaby that opens the opera; and,
again, Ira's song for Sportin' Life in the last act, "There's
New
a Boat That's Leavin' Soon for
York."
come naturally
music. Thus Porgy
All of these are, I believe, lines that
from the Negro. They make for folk

and Bess becomes a folk opera opera
with drama, humor, song, and dance.
It is
the folk element that
is
for the theater,
the strong suit of the
opera,* rather than the outpouring of unforgettable songs and

duets. Like another great national opera
Godunov
the chief protagonist
is
Mussorgsky's Boris
no single character, not
Gershwin opera nor the Tsar Boris

in Mussorgsky's. Mussorgsky's masterwork is first and foremost a mighty drama of the Russian people, particularly of
the lower strata of Russian society. Gershwin's opera is an
epic of Negroes, mostly a picture of the lower depths of Negro life. The tragic love of Porgy and Bess is incidental to the
humor and pathos, the emotional turbulence, the psychological and social maladjustments, the naivete and childlike terror, the violence and tenderness of the much-abused Negro
Porgy or Bess
in the
in a Southern city.
To
portray this people in
personality,
Gershwin
made
all
the varied facets of
extensive
use
its
musical
of
Negro people. His recitatives are

molded after the inflections of Negro speech. His songs are
grounded either in Negro folk music or in those American
materials basic to the
* For a detailed plot of Porgy and Bess, together with

numbers, see Appendix 1.
its
principal
274
popular idioms that sprang out of Negro backgrounds. His

street cries simulate those of Negro vendors in Charleston.
His choral pages are deeply rooted in spirituals and "shouts."
So completely did Gershwin assimilate and absorb all
the elements of Negro song and dance into his
own
writing
without quoting a single line from outside sources, he

was able to produce a musical art basically Negro in physiognomy and spirit, basically expressive of the heart and soul of
an entire race. The pages that stir one most profoundly, and
which bring to the opera its artistic importance, are those
most deeply rooted in Negro folk culture: the wake scene
beginning with the lament, "He's a-gone, gone, gone/' and
that,
continuing through the stirring choral, "Overflow, Overflow"

to Bess' ecstatic spiritual,
"Oh
the train
is
at the station";
the ecstatic "shout" of Serena in her prayer for
Bess'
recovery; the piquant street cries of the honey man, crab
man, and strawberry woman;
Jake's
work song,
"It take
long pull to get there"; the moving choral exhortation to
Clara on the death of her husband,

Rise
Up
An' Follow
"Oh Lawd, Oh
Him Home"; and
My Jesus,
the final hymn,
"Oh
Lawd, I'm on My Way."

The transmutation of Negro musical idioms and styles
into a powerful and moving art was one indication of Gershwin's growth as a composer. Another was his new ability in
tone-painting, in translating into musical terms
ent
moods and backgrounds. The opening
many
differ-
prelude, with
its
brilliant picture of the helter-skelter turmoil of life in Catfish
Row is in marked contrast to the eloquent portrait of a serene

Catfish Row early at dawn in the prelude to Act II, scene 3.
The dramatic
writing in the Kittiwah scene, in the hurricane
room during the storm is

balanced by the tender lyricism of his love music in duets
music, and in the scene in Serena's
275
Porgy and Bess
like "Bess,
You
Is
My Woman Now"
and
"I
Loves You,
Porgy."
But it is in the many subtle details of his writing that

Gershwin proves most conclusively his new-found mastery as
a composer for the serious stage and his formidable development as a creative artist. One cannot fail to note how he uses
vocal glissandi to heighten the tragedy of the
how he
wake scene;
work song
interpolates the ejaculation "huh" into the
"It take a long pull to get there" to suggest the physical

effort of
rowing a boat;
how
dramatically telling
is
his juxta-
position of the spoken dialogue of the detective with the antrio in Act III, scene 2; how the use of
spoken dialogue for the white folk and sung recitatives for
swers sung in the
the Negro provides subtle contrast between the races;
how
he continually alternates chords and ostinato rhythmic patterns to keep the play moving; how skillfully he either gives
warning of a later song or subsequently refers to it with an
orchestral recollection; how he breaks up the accents in "My
Man's Gone Now" to intensify the pathos (not unlike the
way Beethoven did in the closing measures of the funeral
march of the Eroica); and how effective is the use of the
broken monotone in the closing lines of "A Woman Is a
Sometime Thing." If one notices these details, the shattering
impact of the whole becomes understandable.
Writing Negro music so strongly flavored with folk ingredients was certainly the logical goal for Gershwin. The
man who wrote Porgy and Bess grew out of the boy who had
acquired a vivid and unforgettable musical experience from
hearing a Negro band in Harlem; out of the young man
whose first effort to outgrow the limitations of a song was to
write a one-act Negro opera; out of the successful composer
whose best writing was in the Negro idioms of the blues and
276
ragtime; the white
man who could compete
successfully with
Negroes
But
Porgy and Bess was Gershwin's inevitable achievement for
still another reason: it represents, at last, the meeting point
for the two divergent paths he had all his life been pursuing
those of serious and popular music. The serious musician is
found at his best in the musically distinguished tone-speech,
in the powerful antiphonal choruses, in the expressive dissonances and chromaticisms, in the brilliant orchestration, in
in their competitive "shouts" in Charleston.
the effective atmospheric writing, in the skillful use of
counterpoint in the duets and particularly in the last-scene

trio.
The popular composer emerges
of several choruses like that in Act
in the jazz
II,
scene
1,
background
"Woman
to
Lady"; in the two songs of Sportin' Life, "It Ain't Necessarily So," and "There's a Boat That's Leavin' Soon for New
York"; and in Crown's sacrilegious blues ditty, "A Red-
Headed
Woman Makes
Choochoo Jump
Its
Track." Yet
no feeling of contradiction, no sense of incongruity,

in this mingling of the serious and the popular, for the popular is as basic to Gershwin's design as the serious, with its
there
own
is
specific artistic function.
Neither George Gershwin nor DuBose

to see vindicated their faith in
Heyward
lived
Porgy and Bess, nor did they
reap their rewards for the sacrifice they
made
in writing
it.
Gershwin died two years after the premiere. DuBose Heyward succumbed to a heart attack in Tryon, North Carolina,
three years after Gershwin's death.
By
1937, the year of Gershwin's death,
some
of the
songs from the opera had achieved considerable popularity,

particularly
"Summertime,"
"It Ain't Necessarily So."
"I
Got Plenty
The opera
o'
itself,
Nuttin',"
and
however, had
277
Porgy and Bess
fallen into that oblivion
so
many American
win upon
Bess ...
which sooner
his death, the

is
or later seems to await
operas. Indeed, in
New
its
editorial to Gersh-
York Times
said:
"Porgy and
utterly innocent of elemental tragedy or of real
dramatic import." Gershwin, consequently, had no
way
of
knowing that the opera he loved so dearly and which he

knew was his crowning achievement would survive him.
For Heyward, at least, there were one or two clues.
One of these came soon after Gershwin's death when the
David Bispham silver medal was bestowed on Porgy and Bess
"for distinguished contribution to native American opera."
Another clue came in Los Angeles on February 4, 1938, when
Merle Armitage revived the opera. The cast was made up
mostly of the original members, with one major exception:
Avon Long replaced Bubbles as Sportin' Life. George Gershwin himself had discovered Avon Long at the Ubangi night
club in Harlem and had picked him out as a possible understudy or replacement for Bubbles. When Bubbles demanded
from Armitage too high a fee for his appearances in the
opera's revival, Alexander Steinert, the conductor of the revival, remembered Gershwin's choice of Long and suggested
that he be engaged. Once again Mamoulian was the stage
director.
In Los Angeles, and after that in Pasadena, Porgy and
Bess was an outstanding box-office success and one of the
major
artistic
events
in
California
that year.
"It
won,"
reported a correspondent for Musical America, "the emphatic approbation of a star-sprinkled first-night audience."
Unfortunately,
to
engage
when
the opera
in a losing battle
came
to
San Francisco
it
had
with the elements. Just before the
opera opened there, San Francisco had been ravaged by one

of
its
worst floods in
many
years,
which
isolated all the out-
278
was
so
before the end of
its
lying districts from the heart of the city. Attendance
poor that the opera had to close
down
run.
Awareness of the greatness of Forgy and Bess did not

DuBose Heyward. Late in 1940
Cheryl Crawford, who had been casting director for the Theatre Guild when it first presented Porgy and Bess, once again
revived the opera, with some basic and significant changes.
The over-all production was more subdued in color, sound,
and movement than Mamoulian's. Parts of the opera were
cut to speed up the action, and some of the recitatives gave
way to spoken dialogue. The result did not change the artistic
value of the work, but it did extend its popular appeal. Porgy
and Bess in this new presentation proved itself to be grand
entertainment as well as grand art.
The cast was virtually the same as that seen in the Los
Angeles revival. It opened in Maplewood, New Jersey, in October 1941, and Virgil Thomson, then the music critic of the
New York Herald Tribune, attended. He now found that
Porgy and Bess was "a beautiful piece of music and a deeply
come
until after the death of
moving play for the lyric theater. Its melodic invention is

The score has both
abundant and pretty distinguished.
musical distinction and popular appeal." Thus one major
New York music critic had the courage to reverse himself.
.
Others followed his lead
when
New
the production hit the Majes-
York on January 22, 1942. Olin Dowries

own way and according to his own
lights, Gershwin has taken a substantial step, and advanced
the cause of native opera/' The New York music critics recanted as a unit, too the Music Critics Circle singled out
the opera as the most significant musical revival of that year.
tic
Theater in
now conceded
that "in his
279
Porgy and Bess
Audiences responded in kind. Porgy and Bess became a hit. It

stayed on Broadway for eight months, enjoying the longest
run of any stage revival up to then in the history of the New
York stage. Then the company went on tour. In spite of
restrictions imposed on travel by the war, it appeared in
twenty-six cities three of these being one-night stands. In
several cities new box-office records were established. When
the opera returned to New York for a limited engagement of
two weeks at the New York City Center on February 4, 1943,
the run was sold out.
Europe, too, began to acclaim the opera.
The European premiere took place at the Danish
Royal Opera in Copenhagen on March 27, 1943, in dramatic
circumstances. Denmark was then occupied by the Nazis,
and it was no secret that the Nazis did not look with favor
upon the presentation of an American opera. The performance took place, nevertheless, in a Danish translation by
Holger Bech, and with a Danish cast that included Einar
Norby as Porgy, Else Brems as Bess, Franz Andersson as
Crown, and Paul Wiedemann as Sportin' Life. Johan HyeKnudsen conducted, and the stage director was Paul Kanneworff. It was given twenty-two times that year, always to
sold-out houses; a cordon of Danish police surrounded the
opera house to protect it from Nazi interference. But when
the Gestapo threatened to bomb the opera house if another
performance was given, Porgy and Bess was withdrawn from
the repertory. After that, and throughout the war, the opera
became a symbol of Danish resistance to the Nazi invaders.
Each time the Nazis boastfully sent their victory communiques over the Danish radio, the secret Danish underground
cut in with a recording of "It Am t Necessarily So." The
280
song became to the Danes as

victory as Churchill's
sign
much
a symbol of ultimate
and the
first
four notes of
Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.
Porgy and Bess returned to the Danish Royal Opera

in 1945 with the same cast that had introduced it there. Between then and 1952 the opera was given forty-nine times,
always to capacity houses. For a few of these performances
Todd Duncan and Anne Brown appeared as guests in the
title roles.
Porgy and Bess was introduced in Sweden, at the

Lyriska Teatern in Gothenburg, on February 10, 1948, where
it was given fifty-five performances. On April 1, 1949, it came
to the Oscarsteatern in Stockholm, and on March 19, 1952,
to the Stadsteatern in Malmo. Anne Brown appeared as Bess
in Stockholm, and Evy Tibell in the other two cities; Bernhard Sonnerstedt was Porgy.
Meanwhile, on May 14, 1945, Porgy and Bess was
performed in Moscow by the Stanislavsky Players, with staging by Konstanin Popov and under the musical direction of
Prof. A. Khessin. "The audience, which included famous musicians, greeted the performance enthusiastically ," was a report to the New York Times. This enthusiasm is all the more
remarkable when it is realized that the accompaniment used
for the production was a piano and drum instead of a symphony orchestra. Shostakovich, one of the most celebrated of
Soviet composers, called it "magnificent" and did not hesitate
to compare it favorably to the great Russian folk operas of
Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov, and Mussorgsky.
A few weeks later, in June, Porgy and Bess was given
annual Zurich Festival in Switzerland, at the StadttheaVeteran European opera singers were recruited: Desider
at the
ter.
281
Porgy and Bess
Kovacs (Porgy), Claire Cordy (Bess), Karl Pistorius (Robbins), Andreas Bohm (Crown), and Laslo Csaby (Sportin*
Life). Victor Reinshagen conducted. Josef Kisch, eminent
Swiss
critic,
described the opera as "a miracle of technique,
transcribing the sounds of
life
into the precinct of music. It
how
this work succeeds in reflecting the emoand the realistic elements of the stage action." Willi Reich, another eminent European critic, called
the event "an honor to the Zurich Municipal Theater and a
triumph for Gershwin's inspired work."
The enthusiasm aroused by this performance was not
forgotten. Five years later, in the fall of 1950, Porgy and
is
astonishing
tional, the naive,
Bess entered the regular seasonal repertory of the Zurich

Stadttheater.
tion,
Of the
only Andreas
principals in the earlier Zurich produc-
Bohm
returned.
Manfred Jungwirth and
Emmy Funk were brought in from Vienna to play Porgy and

Bess respectively. "It scored a resounding success," reported
Horace Sutton
in the
New
York Times.
The Zurich performance,
as well as those in the Soviet
Union, were with white performers in blackface, and in a
German
translation by Dr. Ralph Benatzsky. Katherine

Harvey, the only American appearing in the second Zurich
presentation, said that "they treat Porgy as an opera, and it
comes out slower, more melodious, and more serious." Alexander Smallens, who attended this same Zurich performance,
found it too slow and humorless by American standards. Besides, the Negro vernacular of Charleston was completely lost
in the German translation in which it was presented.
The triumph of Porgy and Bess abroad became complete when Europe had the opportunity to see and know the
opera as America did, with a Negro cast. This happened in
282
when
the Blevins Davis-Robert Breen production was

Europe with the support and blessings of the United
States Department of State.
Before that production went to Europe, however, it
opened in Dallas, Texas, on June 9, 1952, before a brilliant
audience that included Ira and Leonore Gershwin. Much that
had been deleted from the score in earlier performances was
restored, particularly some of the finer choral passages and
1952
sent to
the "Buzzard Song," the latter
now
being placed in the third
The entire presentation was vitalized

by the imaginative settings of Wolfgang Roth, the costumes
of Jed Mace, and a swiftly paced and vividly dramatic staging by Robert Breen that emphasized sound as well as sight
values. There was also a new freshness of approach to other
details, particularly to the choral singing and the performance
of the minor roles.
The Dallas cast had new leads: William Warfield
(Porgy), Leontyne Price (Bess), Lorenzo Fuller (Sportin'
Life), John McCurry (Crown), Helen Thigpen (Serena), and
Helen Colbert (Clara). In later performances of the same
production there were some changes. Cab Calloway stepped
act for better balance.
into the dancing shoes of Sportin' Life;
withdrew
LaVern Hutcherson,
to allow
William Warfield
Leslie Scott,
and
Ir-
ving Barnes to share the role of Porgy; and Urylee Leonardos

alternated with Leontyne Price as Bess. Georgia Burke, Helen
Dowdy, Ray
Yeates, Joseph Crawford, Joseph James,
Catherine Ayers
as well as
and
conductor Alexander Smallens
were carry-overs from the original
and the Eva Jessye Choir

1935 production.
When
this
production reached
New
York, Brooks At-
was the best that the opera had thus far

received, "and it was magnificent. ... It is all Gershwin and
kinson wrote that
it
283
all
Porgy and Bess
gold.
They all sing and act as though they believed

what they are doing. The performance is not
in the validity of
so
much
uninhibited as powerfully sincere, expressing the
tempestuousness of the music with conviction
Porgy and Bess a sustained exultation

recent productions. This
be
is
it
what a theater
alive in every fiber, full of passion for a
[giving]
has not had in

classic
ought to
theme."
With a gross of over $100,000 for its two-week run,

Porgy and Bess became, as the Dallas Times-Herald reported,
"the box-office champion in the history of summer musical
shows in Dallas.
One test of Porgy and Bess' power:
.
For the first time, the large majority of each audience remained in their seats applauding past every curtain call/'
During the next few weeks, the production visited
Chicago, Pittsburgh, and finally Washington, D.C., where it
played before President Truman and other high dignitaries of
the United States government and of foreign legations.
Then the State Department sent the opera on its mission of good-will to Europe, at a cost of $150,000, to prove
that American art could be vigorous and significant and that
the Negro in America was not always the object of humiliation and oppression. What happened after that exceeded
the wildest hopes of those who had proposed and supported
the tour. Porgy and Bess made artistic and political headlines.
The first stop was Vienna where, on September 7,
1952, it gave the first of five performances at the Volksoper.
Tickets were at such a premium that they could only be
bought on the black market,
at several times face value.
distinguished audience that included the American Ambassa-
and Chancellor, and representafrom the foreign embassies gave the opera a tumultuous
ovation. A city that had seen so much opera history created
dor, the Austrian President

tives

284
at
first
hand
and where an American opera had always been
regarded either with condescension or outright hostility

called Porgy and Bess "sensational," "a great event," and an
"unqualified masterwork." The Wiener Kurier reported that
"the applause and jubilation of the unique
company reached
proportions hitherto given only to the most beloved
the State Opera."
One
had been received
this
critic said that
artists of
no new foreign opera
way by Vienna since
the Austrian pre-
miere of Cavalleria Rusticana in 1902.
Then
company went on to Berlin to participate in

the Cultural Festival there. Though the audience did not
understand a word of what was being said on the stage, the
reaction at the premiere was so stormy that the company
had to take more curtain calls (twenty-one) than any other
modern opera in over a quarter of a century. The audience
kept shouting out its enthusiasm to individual members of
the
the company. Reporting from Berlin to the
Jack
Raymond
wrote, "It
mendous outburst
is
New York
Times,
impossible to exaggerate the tre-
of popular acclaim
it
received from the
people of Berlin night after night." Der Tag called the presentation a "triumph.
None of us has ever seen anything
.
and
we never will again." H. H.

Stuckenschmidt, probably one of Germany's most distin-
like
it
it is
probable that
guished musical scholars, did not hesitate to
call the
opera "a
masterpiece."
The excitement
Vienna and Berlin was repeated in

Paris and London. In London, three days after the premiere,
the Stoll Theatre was sold out for three months, and the
opera had to stay on for almost half a year. The Daily Herald
blazed the headline that "It Was Worth Waiting 17 Years for
Porgy." In Paris the limited engagement threw all other musical and dramatic events into a shade. Porgy and Bess had
in
285
Porgy and Bess
French capital the following season for a

ten-week run, the longest of any American production in
to return to the
France.
up and took notice. President EisenBlevins Davis on March 30, 1953:
Washington
hower wrote
to
sat
have heard reports of the extraordinary success
met your
trip. I cannot emphasize too strongly
how serious and enduring the value of this work seems to
me. You and your distinguished company are making a
real contribution to the kind of understanding between
peoples that alone can bring mutual respect and trust.
that
You
are, in a real sense,
ambassadors of the
arts."
company returned
to the United States early

an extended engagement at the Ziegfeld
Theater in New York on March 10 and after that to undertake a tour of nineteen cities that began on December 1 in
Philadelphia and ended the following September in Montreal
the State Department dispatched Porgy and Bess on another foreign jaunt. This time the tour began on September
22 in Venice, at the Festival of Contemporary Music, of
which it was the highlight. For the first time in a half-dozen
years, box-holders at the historic La Fenice opera house
threw flowers onto the stage. In December, after a ten-week
stay in Paris, the company went eastward, opening in Zagreb,
Yugoslavia, on December 11, and appearing in Belgrade five
days later. "All Yugoslavia is singing," was a cabled report
to the New York Times. "The workers and the peasants are
After the
in 1953 to begin
singing.
The Communist
students,
all
officials,
the
are singing the songs of
man
in the street, the
George Gershwin and
the praises of the cast of the folk opera.
When
the cur-
280
down
tain rang
for the final performance, the
packed house
stayed for twenty minutes ." There were more than twenty
curtain
calls.
In Egypt
Alexandria on December Cairo,

the opera and performers made
31;
the following January 7

so
many
two
friends that
its
when
the
company
left
each of these
cities there were thousands of Egyptians to see
at the railroad stations.
them
The same excitement was aroused
off
in
Athens, Tel Aviv, Casablanca, and Barcelona, between January 17 and February 5. "Forgy and Bess brought laughter
and
tears
to
sophisticated Athenians" reads
New
still
another
York Times. An Israeli newspaper

described the performance as "an artistic event of first-class
importance." The eight performances in Tel Aviv were sold
out even before the company arrived; twenty thousand applications for seats had to be turned down. A critic for the
Diari de Barcelona wrote: "In all truth it may be said that a
greater perfection in unity than that achieved by the American artists is not possible."
Then Forgy and Bess swung back to Italy. After a
stopover at Naples at the venerable San Carlo, on February
15 it came to the stage of the world's most celebrated and
historic opera house
La Scala in Milan on February 22. Milan was not the end of the road by any means. The company
subsequently played in Florence, Rome, Marseille, Switzerland, Belgium, and the Netherlands; on July 8, 1955, it started
a four-month tour of South America at the Teatro Municipal
in Rio de Janeiro; on October 12, 1955 it began a two-week
engagement in Mexico City; and before the year ended it
made a history-making appearance in the Soviet Union. But
La Scala was surely the climax of the entire tour. This was
the first time an American company had been invited to appear in the theater; the first time that an opera by an Amercabled report to the
287
Porgy and Bess
ican-born composer was performed within those hallowed

halls; the first
entire week.
time that a single opera held that stage for an

those who witnessed this historic event
Among
were Leonore Gershwin, who had accompanied the production on its entire Near East tour, and Dorothy Heyward, who
had flown from New York just for this performance. "Music
lovers went wild tonight in the staid La Scala Opera House,"
reported the New York Herald Tribune. "Italian opera fans
who jammed the famous opera house forgot their traditional
reserve and loudly cheered the performance. ... At the
conclusion of the performance, the American cast received an
eight-minute ovation." The Italian critics were unanimous in
their praises of both the opera and its performance. In
VUnita Rubens Tedeschi placed the opera "among the masterworks of the lyric theater."
On February 24, a George Gershwin exhibition was

inaugurated at La Scala, sponsored jointly by the theater and
the United States Information Service.
tion,
Made up
of informa-
photographs, manuscripts, and other documents rele-
vant to Gershwin's career, the exhibition drew huge throngs
whose curiosity and interest in the American composer had

been aroused and stimulated by the phenomenal success of
his opera.
288
BEVERLY HILLS
When the complete 560-page vocal and piano score of

Porgy and Bess was issued in 1935, it bore the imprint of a
new publishing house: the Gershwin Publishing Company,
at whose head still sat Max Dreyfus. Gershwin was inordinately proud of the fact that the company bore his name,
and he reacted with an almost childlike glee to the handsome
office outfitted with two Steinway pianos for him.
Many changes had taken place in the music-publishing
industry to bring about the emergence of the Gershwin Publishing Company. Up to 1927 Gershwin's music was published by Harms, which had discovered him and which was
run by Max Dreyfus and his brother, Louis. In 1927, begin-
BEVERLY HILLS
289
ning with Funny Face, the
was founded
as a subsidiary of
when
music. In 1929,
Hollywood
talk,
erties
Publishing
Harms
its
Company
to issue Gershwin's
the motion-picture screen began to
started frantically scooping
could lay
it
New World
up
all
the prop-
hands on for the making of talking
films.
In the scramble, Warner Brothers entered into a giant deal,

estimated at $10,000,000, to buy out three leading
song publishers: Harms, Witmark, and Remick.
The Gershwin Publishing Company was
New York
started
by
Dreyfus in 1935 as a subsidiary of Chappell and Company,

which he headed, expressly for the Porgy and Bess music. As
originally published, this music appeared in the difficult
piano version Gershwin had prepared before his final orchestration.
it
to
He
firmly told his editor, Dr. Sirmay, that
be printed
as
he wrote
ular,
it,
instead of in popular arrange-
when some
ments. Only later on,
he wanted
of the songs
became pop-
did he allow them to appear in simplified piano versions.
The Gershwin Publishing Company
also issued the principal
songs from the scores Gershwin wrote for the motion pictures.
With the publication
of his opera out of the way,
and
with the opera itself running smoothly at the Alvin Theater,

Gershwin decided to take a deserved and badly needed rest.
He had not been too well. The chronic constipation had still
not been relieved and
despite all the exhilaration and excitement attending the writing and the production of his
opera his spirit was low at times. "I cant eat, I can't sleep, I
he complained to friends. Kay Swift prego to Dr. Gregory Zilboorg for psychoana-
can't fall in love,"
vailed on
him
to
He
did not complete his analysis
lytic
treatment in 1934.
since
he
cians
had been prescribing for him
finally felt
being helped.
as
with
all
the other treatments physifor years
that he was not
29
JOURNEY
GREATNESS
TO
A holiday
was another attempt to relieve the tensions

Late in November 1935 he went on a fourweek trip to Mexico, in the company of Dr. Zilboorg, Edward
Warburg, and Marshall Field. There he heard considerable
Mexican music, but little of it made much of an impression on
him. He was much more excited by Mexican art. One of the
and
anxieties.
highlights of his vacation
was a
visit
to the outstanding
painter Diego Rivera. Gershwin planned to ask Rivera to
paint his portrait but instead ended up by sketching Rivera.
He
returned to
New
York
in
mid-December on the Santa
Paula to be greeted at the gangplank by the entire cast of

Porgy and Bess and the Charleston Orphan Band playing his
music.
The
trip
had refreshed him considerably.
His plans for the immediate future touched neither

Broadway nor Carnegie Hall, but Hollywood. He had been
signed by RKO to write the music for a new Fred Astaire-
Ginger Rogers musical, and he had considerable misgivings

about the assignment. Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers had
been paired
as a
dance team
screen triumphs, including
in a succession of striking
Top Hat and Follow the
Fleet,
both with music by Irving Berlin, and Swingtime, with a

Jerome Kern score that included "The Way You Look Tonight,"
The
which won the award
of the
Motion Picture Academy.
conviction was strong with Gershwin that anything
Astaire and Rogers might do henceforth, and anything he

might write for them, could be only anticlimactic.
His fears were without foundation. As it turned out,
his new Astaire-Rogers picture, Shall We Dance, was described by Frank S. Nugent in the New York Times as "one
of the best things the screen's premiere dance team has done,
a zestful prancing, sophisticated musical."
lowed familiar grooves. Astaire was
The
story fol-
cast as Peter F. Peters,
291
BEVERLY HILLS
who
dances in the Russian Ballet under the name of Petrov;

Ginger Rogers is a ballroom dancer, Linda Keene. They
meet, fall in love, accidentally take the same liner to America,
confront many unpleasant situations arising from the mistaken notion of the American press that they are married,
and finally end up that way. During the progress of this
perfunctory plot, Astaire is given an opportunity to do an
intriguing engine-room dance to the sounds and movements
of the ship's machinery; to join Ginger Rogers in a rollerskating dance on the Central Park Mall; and to do a routine
that alternated an entrechat with a tap dance. Gershwin's
score was a gold mine: "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off,"
"They Can't Take That Away from Me" (which in 1949
returned to the screen in The Barkleys of Broadway)
That Bass," "They All Laughed," and the title song.
"Slap
One chore completed, Gershwin went to work on anRKO. The star was once again Fred Astaire, but this
time he was paired with a new dancing partner Joan Fontaine. In this new film, A Damsel in Distress, to a story by
other for
P. G.
Wodehouse, Astaire is a matinee idol who, though acand retiring, is publicized by his press agent as a
tually shy
lady-killer.
Somehow
of English nobility,
is
the hero gets the idea that

in love with him.
The
Lady Alyce,
initial distaste of
Lady Alyce for each other is succeeded

by love. As was customary with Astaire films, dance routines
were emphasized. Here the best numbers included an ec-
the matinee idol and
centric dance at a country fair with the help of carnival para-
And Howard Barnes wrote
New
York Heraid Tribune that those routines would not "have been half so
good without the splendid Gershwin melodies." The best of
those melodies were: "Nice Work If You Can Get It," "The
Jolly Tar and the Milkmaid," and "A Foggy Day."
phernalia.
in the
292
The
George, with Ira and Leonore

home, with swimming pool and tennis
court, in Beverly Hills, on 1019 North Roxbury Drive. The
elite of Hollywood
movie magnates, top directors, film stars
opened their doors to them. For George, life in Hollywood
consisted of an interminable round of evening parties and
dinners. During the day, when he was not working, he enjoyed taking long, brisk hikes accompanied by his wirehaired terrier, Tony; or playing a hard game of tennis with
rented a
three Gershwins
palatial
warm-up volley with his factotum,

surrounded by many old and close friends: Oscar Levant, Harold Arlen, Yip Harburg, Moss Hart, George
Pallay, Alexander Steinert, Lillian Hellman, Arthur Kober,
Bert Kalmar, Edward G. Robinson, and Harry Ruby, among
friends, after a vigorous
Paul.
He was
others.
And new
friends supplemented the old.
Among
those
whom he liked particularly was the celebrated modernist

composer and theorist, Arnold Schoenberg, who lived nearby
and who came once a week to play tennis.
As he stayed on in Hollywood through 1936 and into
1937 George grew increasingly restive. Despite the many attractions of California,
climate,
and
it
did not appeal to him strongly.
the lackadaisical, easygoing existence
aged, might suit
Ira's
more placid nature, but
it
it
The
encourirritated
who preferred the frenetic whirlwind activity of New

He missed poignantly the music, the art, and some of
George,
York.
the friends he had left behind. Besides, he found working
motion pictures distasteful. The producers could not

would not understand or accept his fresh and new approaches to screen music. He was continually upset by their
efforts to give his songs Gargantuan settings and elaborate
orchestrations, when he was now seeking simplicity and
for the
or
293
BEVERLY HILLS
economy. Hackneyed musical procedures were a sore trial,

and he was continually beset by artistic frustrations. He
chafed under his assignments and was impatient to get back
to writing music for stage productions and, particularly, serious compositions, now that he had found new creative
strength within himself through his opera. He spoke of writing some choral music along original lines, and he planned
to make a trip abroad to hear the leading choral groups of
Europe perform native folk music. He thought of writing a
string quartet, a symphony, a ballet, and
anto be sure
other opera. As far as the opera was concerned, he had already contacted Lynn Riggs (whose folk play. Green Grow
the Lilacs, had alreadv been produced by the Theatre Guild.
It later became the source of the Rodders and Hammerstein
musical play, Oklahoma.) Riggs was writing a libretto for
George called The Lights of Leamy.
Despite his
many
friends
and
his active social life,
Gershwin was suddenly beginning to feel terribly alone. For

first time, his fame and success did not provide the answer
to his everv need. He beân to talk continuallv of setting;
married for the time being there was no specific woman in
his mind
and with a kind of fierce desperateness. Once he
sat down and wrote letters to a few of his old sirl friends inviting them to come out to California to visit him. When not
one of them came, his feeling of aloneness grew more chill-
the
ins;
than ever.
Then he fell in love or thought he did. At a eala

Hollywood party he met Paulette Goddard, then married to
Charlie Chaplin. He was instantly drawn to her powerfully,
and when he came home from the party he was convinced
she was the woman he would marry, even though she was
then married to somebodv else. He was deaf to the advice of
294
who tried to convince him that such a

marriage would not work out for him. A turbulent love affair
during the next few weeks absorbed him completely. Just behis closest friends
fore his fatal illness
he continually spoke
to her of possible
marriage; her refusal to leave Chaplin was a blow that shook
him
and loneliness were intensified. The news that Bill Daly, one of his dearest friends,
had suddenly died of a heart attack on December 4, 1936,
at the premature age of forty-nine, further increased his
mounting despondency.
Little things began to annoy him out of all proportion
to their importance. He began to grow sensitive about the way
he was losing his hair. He purchased a machine as large as a
refrigerator in which a hose connected a motor pump to a
metal cask. The cask was to be adjusted to the scalp of the
head. For half an hour each day, he subjected himself to rigorous scalp treatment which brought a rush of blood to his
head through electric suction; at the end of each treatment
his scalp was so callous that it could not feel anything if a
pin were stuck into it. What effect this treatment had upon
his then dormant brain tumor is hard to say, but it certainly
could not have been salutary.
New assignments came. Samuel Goldwyn signed him
and Ira to write the songs for a lavish screen revue to be
called The Goldwyn Follies, for which George Balanchine,
the celebrated ballet-master of the Ballet Russe de Monte
Carlo, was brought to Hollywood to plan the choreography.
But the one-time zest and excitement George always brought
to new assignments were not there any longer. He was slipping into periods of melancholia. One day he asked Alexander Steinert, "I am thirty-eight, famous, and rich, but profoundly unhappy. Why?" He said he wanted to get away from
to his very roots. His restlessness
295
BEVERLY HILLS
everybody for a while. The only hitch was that he
also could
not stand being by himself for any length of time.
Yet he looked remarkably well. His face was a healthy

bronze; his eyes were keen and alive. His strong athletic
body had
lost
none of
its
power
or resiliency. His doctors,
finding nothing physically wrong with him, insisted he was

suffering from no more than a temporary attack of nerves that
would surely pass.
But before long there were portents that something
was seriously wrong.

296
journey's end
On February 11, 1937, Gershwin appeared with the

Los Angeles Philharmonic in an all-Gershwin program.
While playing the Concerto in F, his mind went suddenly
blank. For a fraction of a minute he lost consciousness and
missed a few bars. Then, in complete control of himself and
his senses, he continued the performance as if nothing had
happened. Later he said that during the blackness he had
the curious sensation of smelling burned rubber.
He had a repetition of the same experience the temporary mental blackout and the smell of burned rubber
the following April, while sitting in a barber-shop chair in
Beverly
Hills.
However,
until
June he gave no
visible evidence of
297
journey's end
ill. In that month he began to grow somewhat
Some mornings he would wake up in a befuddled
being seriously
listless.
state, physically
washed
ing the day there were
out, slightly
dazed mentally. Dur-
moments when he found himself
swaying. At times he suffered agonizing headaches.
On one or two occasions he was found sitting in his

bedroom, the shades drawn to keep out the light that seemed
to annoy him. His head was bent low; his eyes glazed. When
questioned he said he did not know how long he had been
sitting there and that his body seemed so sapped of vitality
that he was unable to move. It took a concerted effort for him
to get up and go downstairs. He was, of course, under the
continual surveillance of his physician, Dr. Gabriel Segall
(Garbo's doctor), but repeated examinations showed
be
him
to
sound physical condition.

With each passing day he grew increasingly jumpy,
irritable, and restless. One evening at dinner he was so upset
by a political conversation about Nazi Germany and Hitler
that he fled from the table after making a bitter and cutting
remark. He sought refuge in his bedroom, where he complained of a splitting headache and ragged nerves. He went
to bed and stayed there a day or two, unable to summon
the energy to leave it.
Some of his intimate friends felt that all George was
suffering from was a hateful association with the motionpicture industry and that he was eager to escape his commitments and return to New York. Others insisted that he was
reacting to physical and mental fatigue. For a while, the latter had reason to believe they were right. On June 12
George went on a brief holiday to Coronado with his agent
and friend, Arthur Lyons, and he seemed suddenly to revert
to his one-time good spirits.
in
298
But on Sunday, June 20, after a dinner at the Irving

he complained to Leonore of a blinding headache.
Two days later he had a luncheon engagement with Paulette
Goddard, George Pallay, and Constance Collier. His general
listlessness and his lack of interest in his friends convinced
them that something was basically wrong. Leonore consulted
the physicians, who suggested a thorough and immediate
physical check-up for George at the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital. George entered the hospital the following day, on
Wednesday the 23rd, and stayed there until Saturday the
Berlins',
The very comprehensive three-day tests revealed nothing; the physicians insisted that he was a perfect specimen
of health. They had taken into account the possibility of a
brain tumor, but there was simply no symptom to substantiate
26th.
this suspicion.
finitive proof,
A spinal test, which might have provided dehad been vehemently rejected by George as
too excrutiatingly painful.

It was at this point, on June 27, that Walter Winannounced on his radio program (and repeated the
following morning in his syndicated column ) that Gershwin
was seriously ill. An avalanche of inquiries descended on the
Gershwin household at 1019 North Roxbury Drive and on
his mother's apartment at 25 Central Park West in New York
City. Everybody was told that Winchell had greatly exaggerated the situation, that the recent hospital tests had
proved that there was nothing organically wrong with George,
and that quiet and rest would surely prove beneficial.
George's mother told reporters in New York that she had recently seen George in California and that he had looked remarkably fit but that he was terribly nostalgic for New York.
Nevertheless, George was now placed under daily
treatments with the psychoanalyst, Dr. Ernest Simmel; and a
chell
299
journey's end
male nurse, Paul Levy, was engaged to be with him
all
the
time. Despite his daily visits to his physician, George's condition was becoming more alarming all the time. Late one night
he and Ira were returning from a party at Samuel Goldwyn's,
and before they could step into the house, George sat down
at the curb of the street and held his head. The pains and
the smell of burned rubber, he said, were driving him crazy.
Not long after this, during dinner one evening, the knife fell
out of his hand, as though it had suddenly lost all control.
At another meal George lost his equilibrium so much so that
he was unable to bring his fork directly to his mouth, and
the water spilled from his glass as he tried to drink.
Dr. Simmel finally decided to isolate George for a
while from all friends and relatives, to remove from him all
possible sources of friction. "Yip" Harburg, then leaving Beverly Hills for New York, turned his house over to George.
Thereafter, from July 4 on, George was attended by his male
nurse, and by his man, Paul. Ira and Leonore visited him for
brief periods several times a day.
Nobody
The
to
else was permitted

do some good. George
complained less about his headaches and even found the inclination to play the piano for brief sessions. But when
George played the piano for Dr. Simmel on July 8, he was
access to him.
seclusion
seemed
beginning to lose his coordination.

A few days after George had come to Harburg's house
on Friday, July 9 Ira and George Pallay dropped in for a
moment
George
to see
asleep.
how George was
They waited
for
They found
awaken, but when he
progressing.
him
to
and return later in the day.

At five o'clock that day, George finally awakened. He
was so weak that he had to call his nurse to help him to the
bathroom. Suddenly he slumped, collapsed, and fell into a
didn't they decided to leave
300
coma as if he suffered a fit. His physical symptoms at that moment revealed to the nurse the unmistakable fact that had
so long been explored and dismissed: George was the victim of a brain tumor.
Ira
startling
and Leonore were immediately informed of
development. They arrived at Harburg's
this
just as
George was being carried out on a stretcher to an ambulance.

George tried to say something to Ira. From the incoherent
mumble, Ira could make out only a single word: "Astatic"
George was rushed to the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital
for surgery. The Los Angeles surgeon, Dr. Carl A. Rand,
suggested calling in one of the country's foremost brain specialists, Dr. Walter E. Dandy. Hurried telephone calls to Dr.
Dandy's office, home, and hospital failed to locate him. He
was cruising somewhere on Chesapeake Bay with the Governor of Massachusetts on a private yacht that could not be
reached.
George Pallay telephoned the White House and enlisted its aid in locating Dr. Dandy. On Saturday, two government destroyers were dispatched down the Chesapeake to
locate the yacht. When it was found, Dr. Dandy was brought
by special motorcycle escort to Cumberland, Maryland.
There, in a three-way telephone conversation, Dr. Segall
from Los Angeles authorized Dr. Dandy to come out to the

Coast for the operation, while at the same time arrangements
were made with Emil Mosbacher in New York for a private
Newark airport for Dr.

Dandy was then rushed by another private plane
plane to stand by in readiness at the
Dandy. Dr.
to Newark.
While
waiting at
was going on, George's man, Paul, was

the Burbank airfield at 9:00 p.m. Saturday to pick
all this
up the noted California surgeon, Dr. Howard Nafziger, who
301
journey's end
had been brought in for consultation. Dr. Nafziger had been

found at Lake Tajoe where he was then vacationing. He arrived at the hospital at 9:30 p.m. where he was awaited by
Ira and Leonore. After examining Gershwin, Dr. Nafziger
found that the patient's pulse had fallen so low that an immediate operation was imperative; it was impossible to wait
for Dr. Dandy. At 10:30 p.m. George was wheeled into the
operating room for the preliminary surgery of opening a window in his head to locate the exact position of the tumor.
This operation ended at midnight, when George was taken
into the X-ray room where, after two and a half hours, the
precise position of the cystic tumor was found to be the right
temporal lobe of the brain. Gershwin was now prepared for
when Dr.
the major operation. Meanwhile, at 11:45 PM
Dandy arrived at the Newark airport he was informed by
Pallay of all the developments which now made it unneces-
sary for
him
to continue his flight west.
George was returned
to the operating
room
at 3:00
a.m. Since Dr. Nafziger did not have his assistants or instru-
ments, the operation was performed by Dr. Carl Rand, with
Doctors Nafziger, Segall, and Eugene Ziskind attending. The

all that time Arthur
operation lasted four hours. During
Lyons was
room; Pallay waited outside. All

the others were downstairs: Ira and Leonore, Henry Botkin,
Moss Hart, Oscar Levant, Eugene Solow, Elizabeth Meyer,
Arthur Kober, Alexander Steinert, and Lou and Emily Paley
who had arrived in California only two days earlier.
As soon as the operation was over, Pallay learned
from one of the attending physicians that George suffered from a cystic degeneration of a tumor on that part of
the brain that could not be touched. There was not much
hope for recovery. Even if George survived which at the
in the operating
302
moment seemed
doubtful
he would probably be disabled,
or blind, or both for the rest of his days.
Pallay repeated the sad prognosis to Leonore as they
drove back to 1019 North Roxbury Drive. Ira was driven back
Paul. At home, Leonore could not find the courage to tell
Ira the truth. She insisted that all was well, that he should
take some badly needed rest. Just then Max Dreyfus tele-
by
phoned from New York. "What are they doing to my boy?"

Dreyfus asked. Half-dazed, Ira told him: "George will be
all right, Max. The operation was a success. There is nothing
to worry about."
Ira, then,
did not
know
was dying. A few

say that George had died
that George
hours later the hospital called to

at 10:35 a.m. without having regained consciousness.
Ira relayed the tragic
news
to his
who had been waiting at

25 Central Park West. Frances Godowsky
by cable in Vienna, where she was then
she received the message she had not
George was sick.
brother Arthur,
The
mother and
his
their telephone at
had
to
be reached
vacationing; until
even known that
what had happened was

Sunday morning to find
Jessel.
out how Gershwin was doing and was informed that he had
just died. Then the announcement came over the radio: "The
man who said he had more tunes in his head than he could
put down on paper in a hundred years is dead today in Hollywood. George Gershwin passed away today at the age of
thirty-eight." It was in this way that many of George's lifelong friends as well as the world of his admirers were told
of the tragedy. Harold Arlen and "Yip" Harburg heard the
news on their car radio as they were driving in New
York City; Harry Ruby, at breakfast aboard a ship from
first
outsider to learn
He
George
called the hospital
303
journey's end
Alaska;
Jules
Glaenzer,
during his dinner in Deauville,
France.
Kay Swift, who had been in continual touch with Calwhen George was in the hospital, and later Saturday
night when he was operated upon, said suddenly to her
ifornia
daughter at Sunday noon, "George

put through another call to Beverly
is
dead." Frantically she
Hills, and her worst fears

were confirmed. Sammy Lee, the dance director who had
been associated with so many Gershwin musicals, had a
lunch date of two weeks' standing with Gershwin at the
Brown Derby on the nth; he was waiting for George to
turn up when George Jessel stopped off at his table to tell
him Gershwin was dead.
Expressions of grief and tributes to his greatness came
from the many others who had been associated with him over
the years over the radio, in newspapers, by word of mouth,
by letter. Serge Koussevitzky wrote, "Like a rare flower which
blossoms forth once in a while, Gershwin represents a singularly original and rare phenomenon." George S. Kaufman
told Isaac Goldberg that Gershwin's death was "the greatest
tragedy I have ever known." Arnold Schoenberg said, "I know
he is an artist, and a composer; he expressed musical ideas,
and they were new." Eva Gauthier was convinced that
"George Gershwin will live as long as music lives. He will
never be forgotten and his place will never be filled." Paul
Whiteman described Gershwin's
art as
ment"; and Ferde Grofe said, "I
may
"an enduring monunever again meet the

like of Gershwin." Vernon Duke later wrote in his autobiography: "Death can be kind and it can be just; but it
had no business taking our George, who was in full flower
of his fine youth and who was unquestionably doing his best
work." John O'Hara remarked poignantly: "George Gershwin
304
died on July 11, but I don't have to believe

to." Irving Berlin spoke in verse:
it if I
don't
want
As a writer of serious music

He could dream for a while in the stars,
And step down from the heights of Grand Opera
To
a chorus of thirty-two bars.
Gershwin died without learning that he had
just re-
ceived the highest honor that Italy could bestow on a foreign
composer: an honorary membership in the
St.
Cecilia Acad-
Rome. He was the only American ever to be thus

honored. The announcement came while he was unconscious
emy
in
in the hospital.
There was no will. Besides his belongings, furnishings,

and precious collection of paintings, he left almost $350,000
in securities, cash, and insurance (after debts). It all went
by New York law to his mother.
On
July 13, the Mutual Broadcasting System broadcast a memorial concert to Gershwin, which included these
Lorenz Hart,
Cole Porter, Leopold Stokowski, Frances Langford, Merle
Armitage, Hoagy Carmichael, Arnold Schoenberg, and Fred
Waring. Conrad Nagel was the master of ceremonies. David
Broekman conducted the orchestra in Gershwin's music, and
Rabbi Edgar F. Magnin of Los Angeles delivered a brief
participants: Irving Berlin, Richard Rodgers,
eulogy.
This was but one of the
many
tributes to
Gershwin
heard over radio by way of giant networks and small local

stations, and on many different programs, as George Gershwin's body was brought by train from Los Angeles, where

journey's end
305
it
left
on Monday morning, July
12, to
New
York where
it
arrived on Thursday morning, the 15th. After a few hours at
the Riverside Memorial Chapel, Gershwin's body was taken

to
Temple Emanu-El on
Fifth
Avenue
for funeral services at
2:00 p.m. that day.

Despite a downpour, almost four thousand of Gershwin's friends, colleagues,
and admirers crowded the Tem-
while another thousand lined both sides of Fifth Avenue
ple,
The crowd
was so dense that traffic was

interrupted. Police lines had to be formed to keep the people
in check. Many of those who had tickets for the services were
outside.
in the street
unable to force their way through the crowd; one of these

was Al Jolson, and not until a few of his friends forced a path
for
him was he able to get through.

The services opened with Bach's
"Air" from the or-
chestral Suite No. 3, played on the organ by Gottfried H.

Federlein. After Dr. Nathan A. Perilman, the rabbi, read
two psalms, Ossip Giskin, cellist, played Schumann's "Traumerei." Then Rabbi Stephen S. Wise delivered a eulogy
to "the singer of the songs of America's soul.
There are
countries in Central Europe which would have flung out this
Jew. America welcomed him and he repaid it with the gusto
of a child and the filial tenderness of a son." More music
the slow movement from Beethoven's C-sharp minor String
Quartet played by the Perole Quartet and Handel's "Largo"
on the organ then a prayer by Dr. Perilman ended the serv.
ices.
To
the strains of the slow section of the Rhapsody in
Blue played on the organ, the flower-covered coffin was carThe honorary pallbearers included
ried out of the temple.
Mayor La Guardia, Walter Damrosch, George M. Cohan,

Edwin Franko Goldman, Gene Buck, Al Jolson, Vernon Duke,
306
former Mayor James J. Walker, and Sam H. Harris. Behind

the coffin came the immediate members of Gershwin's family.
The procession proceeded into the street where more
than a thousand of Gershwin's admirers waited patiently in
the rain to give
him
a last send-off.
The
funeral then
made
the journey to Hastings-on-Hudson where, to additional

prayers, the
body
George Gershwin was buried
of
in
Mount
Hope Cemetery.
While these
services
were going on
in
New
York,
another service was taking place at the B'nai B'rith Temple
Hollywood, where Dr. Edgar F. Magnin officiated. The

great of Hollywood came to pay their last respects, just as the
equally great of Broadway were performing the same sad
rite in New York. At the Hollywood service, Oscar Hammerstein read a poignant eulogy for his friend. It reads in
in
part:
Our
friend wrote music
And
in that
mold he created
Gaiety and sweetness and beauty
And
twenty-four hours after he had gone
His music
And
in
the air
filled
triumphant accents
Proclaimed to
this
world of
men
That gaiety and sweetness and beauty
Do
not
Some
He
die.
will
want a
statue erected for
him
deserves this
Some
will
In his
name
He
want
to
deserves this
endow
a school of music
307
journey's end
But
his friends could
add one more
tribute:
In his honor
They could
And be
try to appreciate
grateful for
The good
things in this world
In his honor
They could try to be kinder to one another.

And this would be the finest monument of
all.
on both coasts. The nowLewisohn Stadium became a memorial on the evening of August 8. Alexander
Smallens and Ferde Grofe conducted. The soloists included
Ethel Merman, Todd Duncan, Anne Brown, and Harry
Kaufman. During the intermission, Mrs. Charles S. Guggenheimer made a brief speech dedicating the concert to Gershwin's memory. The largest audience in the history of the
Stadium concerts (20,223) rose in silent tribute; among
them were George's mother and sister.
One month later, on September 8, a George Gershwin
Memorial Concert was given in the Hollywood Bowl. A galaxy of musicians and stars had been gathered for the program, largely through the unsparing and indefatigable
efforts of George Pallay. The conductors were Otto KlemThere were
also concerts
traditional all-Gershwin concert at the
perer, Nathaniel Shilkret, Victor Young, Nathaniel Finston,
Charles Previn, Alexander Steinert, and Jose Iturbi. The

soloists were Al Jolson (singing "Swanee"), Gladys Swar-
Fred Astaire, Oscar Levant, Lily Pons, Ruby Elzy,

Todd Duncan, Anne Brown, Jose Iturbi, and the Hall Johnson Choir. Those who paid homage to Gershwin through
words rather than music were Edward G. Robinson ( reading
the Oscar Hammerstein tribute ) and George Jessel. The conthout,
308
Gershwin
program or, for that matter, any other musical program.
For besides the capacity audience at the Hollywood Bowl
there was a world-wide audience listening through the facilities of the Columbia Broadcasting System, which transmitted the concert on seven short-wave stations, the first time
that any concert was broadcast on such an extensive netcert reached the largest audience ever to hear a
work.
Just before George's death, he and Ira had discussed
some length the idea of building a permanent home in
Beverly Hills. They delayed doing this because while Ira
was all for staying in California, George was eager to get
back to New York. They finally decided that Ira would build
his home in Beverly Hills and that its grounds would include
a small studio for George's use whenever he came to Hollywood to work or to visit.
These plans were frustrated by George's sudden
death. Instead of building himself a new home, Ira purchased the house next door to the one he and George had
rented on North Roxbury Drive 1021. It is the house he
at
still
occupies.
was almost as if, even

away from George.
It
too far
then, he did not
want
to get
309
postscript
SINCE 1937
The
last
piece of music Gershwin wrote was the song
The Goldwyn Follies. He was

able to complete only five numbers for that production, and
for some of these Vernon Duke, aided by Ira, had to provide
the verses. Since two of these Gershwin songs are among his
most beautiful "Love Walked In" and "Love Is Here To
Stay" it is apparent that even in his last troublesome months
there was no creative disintegration.
The Goldwyn Follies, a screen extravaganza with Andrea Leeds, Vera Zorina, Adolph Menjou, Kenny Baker, Ella
Logan, and Bobby Clark, was released after Gershwin's
"Love
Is
Here
to Stay" for
310
A'
death, in 1938. Since death kept George from writing the
music for the ballet sequences, Ira suggested to Goldwyn

that Gershwin's tone poem, An American in Paris, be adapted
for the ballet; Ira even prepared a suitable scenario.
Balanchine,
who was
was deBut one day
in charge of the choreography,
lighted with the idea
and went
to work.
Goldwyn called Balanchine into his office to tell him that An

American in Paris was too highbrow for a ballet. "What
would the miners of Harrisburg, Pa., think of it?" Goldwyn
asked. Balanchine answered firmly: "Mr. Goldwyn, I am not
President Roosevelt, and I am not interested in what the
miners of Harrisburg think." In any case, the American in
Paris ballet went out of The Goldwyn Follies. Two short
ballet sequences were substituted with new music by Vernon
Duke.
The Goldwyn Follies was not the last important
motion picture to contain Gershwin music. Two of his celebrated musicals were transferred to films in 1941 and 1943,
respectively. The first was Lady Be Good, with Eleanor Powell, Ann Sothern, and Robert Young. Here three Gershwin
songs from the original stage production were combined with
numbers by other composers, including Jerome Kern's "The
Last Time I Saw Paris" (lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II),
which won the Motion Picture Academy Award that year.
In 1943 a screen remake of Girl Crazy starred Judy Garland
and Mickey Rooney. In contrast to an earlier production
in 1932, with Wheeler and Woolsey, this new version had
virtually the complete Gershwin score.
Then Hollywood paid Gershwin the highest accolade
it could bestow on a composer. It filmed his biography,
Rhapsody in Blue. In telling the Gershwin story, the screen
play by Sonya Levien, Howard Koch, and Elliott Paul fol-
311
postscript: since 1937
lowing the practice of most screen biographies mixed some

truth with much fiction. The unifying theme in the story
was basically sound: the struggle in Gershwin to reconcile
with his ideal of writing serious music;

purpose in producing hits on the one hand and
his passion for jazz

his conflict of
good
on the other. Less convincing was the fabricated love

which was made out of whole cloth. "J une Adams"
was a soul mate whom Gershwin had met in his Tin Pan
Alley days and who became famous singing his songs. "Christine Gilbert" was a rich and cultured divorcee who finally
had to face the realization that Gershwin would never marry
her. No less fictitious were the picture of Gershwin's impoverished boyhood on the East Side; the portrait of his idealistic,
old-world music teacher, Prof. Frank, who wanted him to
remain true to his art; and the continual effort to ascribe
George's driving and indefatigable energy to an instinctive
awareness that he did not have long to live.
Robert Alda played George Gershwin; Herbert
Rudley, Ira; Morris Carnovsky, Papa Gershwin; Rosemary
de Camp, Mama; Charles Coburn, Max Dreyfus. Gershwin's
brother Arthur and his sister neither appeared nor were
mentioned. Paul Whiteman, Oscar Levant, Al Jolson, George
White, Rouben Mamoulian, Hazel Scott, and Anne Brown
portrayed themselves, while Maurice Ravel, Serge Rachmaninoff, Walter Damrosch, Igor Stravinsky, and Jascha Heifetz were played by others.
The crowning glory of the picture was, of course,
Gershwin's music the most ambitious attempt to encompass
art
interest,
within a single production his greatest works. Rhapsody in
Blue was a monumental cavalcade of twenty-nine Gershwin

numbers, including all of the major serious works ( some, of
course, in digest form); eighteen numbers were given fea-
312
There were two of Gershwin's earliest

songs, "Swanee" and "Yankee Doodle Blues," and one of
his last, "Love Walked In," together with most of the others
with which his name is always linked.
When Rhapsody in Blue was released in July 1945,
tured treatment.
the country "plunged," as
Newsweek
reported, "into a sea-
son of Gershwin such as no composer has had before." Theater and night clubs throughout the country played Gershwin.
All four radio networks dedicated special programs to him.
New
Gershwin music emerged in The Shocking Miss

Dick Haymes and Betty Grable, in 1947.
From completed or uncompleted manuscripts Gershwin had
Pilgrim, starring
Ira, with the assistance of Kay Swift as musical

prepared a score that included nine songs never before published or performed only one was a "find," "For
You, For Me, For Evermore."
In 1951
released the last major film with Gershleft
behind,
editor,
MGM
win music, and

Paris. This
in
some
respects the best:
An American
in
a love story about an American painter in Paris
is
(Gene Kelly) and a Parisian girl he meets in a cafe (Leslie

Caron, making her American screen debut ) The American,
however, is pursued by a wealthy socialite ( Nina Foch ) who
promotes his career; and the Parisian girl is sought by a
.
successful producer (Georges Guetary). True love
overcome
all
is
able to
misunderstandings and obstructions. The climax
of the picture
"the uncontested high
point," as Bosley
Crow-
ther described it in the New York Times was a twentyminute modernistic ballet conceived by Gene Kelly, with
swirling colors and lights and impressionistic settings, danced
by Kelly and Leslie Caron to the music of An American in
Paris. This tone poem was not the only Gershwin music in
the jewel-studded score. There were also extracts from the

313
Concerto
in F,
and seven songs, two of them relatively unfrom For Goodness Sake (1922), and
familiar: "Tra-la-la,"
"By
Strauss," originally interpolated in the Beatrice Lillie
Show Is On 1936) The score also had

Goldwyn Follies, "Love Is Here To
Stay," which now became a hit for the first time.
An American in Paris became the surprise selection
of the Motion Picture Academy as the best picture of 1951
Bert Lahr revue, The
a carry-over from The
either
A Streetcar Named Desire
or
A Place in the Sun were
expected to win the Oscar) This was the third time, since the
.
inception of the awards in 1927-1928, that a musical
was
thus honored.
Other motion pictures had Gershwin music. In 1949

Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers revived their hit from Shall
We Dance, "They Can't Take That Away from Me," in The
Barkleys of Broadway (which had Ira Gershwin's lyrics to
Harry Warren's music ) Three years later, the Gershwin song
"Somebody Loves Me" provided the title for and was used
in a Paramount musical starring Betty Hutton. Three later
musicals also reached far back into the past for Gershwin
favorites: A Star Is Born (Ira Gershwin here wrote the lyrics
for Harold Arlen's songs) used "Swanee" as a major production number; Three for the Money featured "Someone
To Watch Over Me" and "I've Got a Crush On You"; and
"Someone To Watch Over Me" was also heard in Young in
Heart. A Bob Hope musical, produced in 1956, was called
That Certain Feeling and used that song as its theme.
.
new
Since 1937 some of Gershwin's music has appeared in

and formats.
contexts
On
October
18, 1940, the Ballet
Russe de Monte Carlo

New York the world
presented at the 51st Street Theater in
314
new ballet, The New- Yorkers. Its music was

adapted and orchestrated by David Raksin from many of
Gershwin's best-known songs and excerpts from other works,
beginning with "Strike Up the Band" as an overture, and
embracing "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off," the dog-walking sequence in Damsel in Distress, "I Got Rhythm," "Fascinating Rhythm," "Love Is Sweeping the Country," and two
piano preludes. It was planned by Rea Irvin and Leonide
Massine to be a "dioramic view of New York's cafe society
in three scenes." The programmatic note goes on to expremiere of a
plain:
It
presents a nocturnal adventure of the animated
drawings made famous by Peter Arno, Helen E. Hokin-
William
son,
tions
To
Steig,
Otto Soglow and other
whose habitude
are the pages of the
Central Park's Plaza
come Arno's
artists'
New
Colonel,
crea-
Yorker.
Dowager
and Timid Man; Hokinson's clubwomen; boys and girls;

each intent on hotspotting. Venal headwaiters, babyfaced debutantes, keyhole columnists, Steig's "small fry,"
gullible gangsters, Thurber's introverts,
these with gentle madness people the parade of
King,
all
New
York
after dark.
The thread
of the story
dental to the portrayal of characters
when
Soglow's Little
whose
is
lives
inci-
begin
the city goes to bed.
The choreography was by Massine, his second attempt

to use Americana. Settings
and costumes were by Carl Kent.
In reviewing the performance, Irving Kolodin wrote in the
Sun that Gershwin's music "remained the principal glory,"

and described that music as "some of the most vital
ever created on this island or for that matter in the rest of
.
America."
315
Another posthumous ballet treatment of Gershwin's

music, given in Gothenburg, Sweden, in 1954, was an elaborate choreographic interpretation of the Concerto in F.
The Rhapsody in Blue emerged in a new, and not too
effective, symphonic dress on November 30, 1941, at a concert of the New York City Symphony, with Jean Morel conducting. This time the Rhapsody was adapted for violin and
orchestra by Gregory Stone, and it was introduced by the
violin virtuoso, Mishel Piastro.
Music from Porgy and Bess was also given fresh treatment. Beryl Rubinstein transcribed
five of its principal
songs
and Jascha Heifetz for violin and piano. The

most significant transcription, however, is A Symphonic Picture by Robert Russell Bennett. This work was commissioned
by the celebrated conductor, Fritz Reiner, who felt that an
excellent symphonic work might be built out of materials of
the opera. Reiner even pointed out the excerpts he wanted
included. In creating an integrated tone poem out of this
music, Bennett was faithful to Gershwin's harmonic and orchestral intentions. The Symphonic Picture is made up of the
following sequences, in the order of their appearance: Scene
of Catfish Row with the peddler's calls; Opening Act II;
"Summertime" and Opening of Act I; "I Got Plenty o' Nuttin'"; Storm Music; "Bess, You Is My Woman Now"; "It
Ain't Necessarily So"; and the finale, "Oh Lawd I'm on My
Way." Reiner conducted the world premiere with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in Pittsburgh on February 5,
for piano,
1942.
Individual Gershwin songs and medleys have been or-
by various
musicians including Nathan van Cleve, Fred von Epps,
Claude Thornhill, David Broekman, Irving Brodsky, George
chestrated since Gershwin's death at various times
316
Leeman, and Nathaniel Finston. One of the most significant of these new orchestrations was Morton Gould's symphonic adaptation of "I Got Rhythm," introduced by Gould
himself leading an orchestra over the Columbia Broadcasting
System, on March 22, 1944, and performed by the New
York Philharmonic-Symphony under Artur Rodzinski the
following October 9. The three piano preludes have also
been transcribed for orchestra several times, notably by Roy
Bargy, Gregory Stone, L. Raymond, and David Broekman;
Jascha Heifetz arranged them for violin and piano; and the
second prelude has been adapted for violin, cello and piano
and for trumpet and piano by Gregory Stone, and for saxophone and piano by Sigurd Rascher.
B.
Of the many performances

in this country since 1937,
for special attention.
of Gershwin's serious music

two events should be singled out
The all-Gershwin concert
at the
Lew-
isohn Stadium on July 11, 1938 one of many concerts commemorating the second anniversary of his death included
the last of the Gershwin premieres: Dawn of a New Day.
This was an adaptation by Ira Gershwin and Kay Swift of
two unpublished Gershwin songs the verse of one, and the
chorus of another as the official march for the New York
World's Fair, for which the payment of $3,000 was made by
Grover Whalen.
On November 1, 1942, Arturo Toscanini conducted
a work by Gershwin for the first time. For this occasion he
selected the Rhapsody in Blue, and it was performed over
the N.B.C. network by the N.B.C. Symphony Orchestra, with
Benny Goodman as clarinet soloist and Earl Wild as pianist.
Before undertaking
this
eral different recordings,
performance, Toscanini studied sev-
but the
final result of his
most pains-
317
taking study and preparation was, regrettably, neither good
Toscanini nor good Gershwin. Virgil
Thomson wrote
Herald Tribune the following morning:

ment. ...
It all
came
off like
"It got
rough
in the
treat-
a ton of bricks. It was the
Rhapsody in Blue, all right, as what rendition isn't? But it

was as far from George's own way of playing the piece as one
could imagine. ... I was a little sorry ... to hear this gay,
number treated
the bloom off it and
sweet, rhapsodical
in a routine glamorizing
that rubbed
left its
and
all
surface as shining
as glittery as a nickle plated Apollo Belvedere."
Most of the country's leading popular-orchestra conductors ( some two dozen ) wired congratulations to Toscanini
for finally playing Gershwin, and Gershwin's mother was in
the studio to thank the Maestro personally.
completely won over to Gershwin.

he performed An American in Paris,
1944, the Concerto in F with Oscar Levant
Toscanini was
On November
and on April
as soloist.
to
On
now
14, 1943,
2,
several different occasions Toscanini confided
Samuel Chotzinoff that
in his opinion Gershwin's
music
"is
the only real American music."

Since 1937 the name of George Gershwin has become
such a symbol of creative achievement in America that it
has been used by many different institutions, organizations,
competitions, and so forth.
On April 22, 1943, the S.S. George Gershwin was

christened at San Pedro, California, by Leonore Gershwin.
Among others who were present were Ira Gershwin, Paul
Whiteman, Marc Connolly, and Jesse Lasky.
In 1946 the Victory Lodge of B'nai B'rith established
the Gershwin Memorial Contest "to promote tolerance
through music."
A prize of $1,000plus
publication royalties
318
initial performance by the New York PhilharmonicSymphony was to be given each year for the best short
work submitted in a competition judged by Serge Koussevitzky (honorary member), Marc Blitzstein, Aaron Copland,
and an
William Schuman, Rabbi Judah Cahan, and Leonard Bernstein. The first winner was Peter Mennin for Symphonic
Allegro,
and the presentation
of the
award was made by
New York Philharmonic-Symphony, Leonard Bernstein conducting, at

the Metropolitan Opera House on March 27, 1945. Among
later winners were Harold Shapero, Earl George, Ulysses
Kay, Ned Rorem, Brian Dority, Robert Kurka, Ray Travis,
Ralph Sweeney, George Rochberg, Kenneth Gaburo, and
Ramiro Cortes.
A second competition, the George Gershwin Memorial Award, was instituted in Hollywood in 1947. Nick Bolin
of Los Angeles was awarded $1,000 for California Sketches
which was introduced at an otherwise all-Gershwin concert
conducted by Paul Whiteman at the Hollywood Bowl on
July 12, 1947. The curious fact about Bonn's winning this
award is that the Rhapsody in Blue was the motivating force
in his becoming a composer.
In 1946 the George Gershwin Memorial Collection of
Music and Musical Literature was founded by Carl van
Vechten at the Fisk University Library in Nashville, Tennessee. "The name of Gershwin was intended not only to honor a
personal friend," explained Arna Bontemps, the University
Gershwin's mother at a concert of the
librarian, in the inaugural catalogue, "but also to recall the
American belonged to a minority group, that as

a composer he worked successfully in both the popular and
the classical fields, and that much of his best music was inspired by Negro rhythms."
fact that this
319

The George Gershwin Theater Workshop Arena,
sponsored by a committee headed by Oscar Hammerstein
II,
was dedicated at Boston University on December 6, 1950.

Emil Ellis of New York, on behalf of the Gershwin family,
presented to the university two of Gershwin's paintings to be
hung in the arena: a self-portrait and a water-color of Folly
Beach, South Carolina. Two years later, on July 12, 1952, a
George Gershwin Practice Hut was opened at Chautauqua
Institute, at Chautauqua, New York. And on November 14,
1954, a George Gershwin Theater was dedicated at Brooklyn
College, New York; on this occasion a new portrait of Gershwin by Henry Botkin was unveiled.
On July
11, 1937, Ira lost
not only his brother but also
They had been inseparable for years; their

social and professional lives had been enmeshed. Nobody
could fill George's place in Ira's life. For two years after
George's death he was inconsolable. Work was out of the
his collaborator.
question
for the time being
at
any
rate.
In 1940 he returned to his typewriter, and wrote the

lyrics to Kurt Weill's music for the Moss Hart Broadway
A Lady
in the Dark, starring Gertrude Lawrence.

"The Saga of Jenny," "Tchaikovsky," and "Oh, Fabulous One in Your Ivory Tower" demonstrated that the master
of the lyric had lost none of his precision and skill. Two years
success
Songs
like
later, Ira
became
associated with the greatest song success
(from the point of view of sales) of his entire career in

"Long Ago and Far Away," one of several numbers in the
motion picture Cover Girl, starring Rita Hayworth, for which
Jerome Kern wrote the music. In the same year, 1943, he
wrote the lyrics to music by Aaron Copland for North Star.
Later efforts added to the skein of his successes: particu-
320
Where Do We Go from
"The Nina, the Pinta, and the
Santa Maria" one of the most brilliant protracted verse sequences the screen has known ) with Harry Warren for The
Barkleys of Broadway, with Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers;
and with Harold Arlen for A Star Is Born, with Judy Garland, and A Country Girl with Bing Crosby. One of the songs
from A Star Is Born, "The Man That Got Away," was one of
the five nominated for the Academy Award in 1955.
Thus, since 1937, Ira Gershwin has succeeded in reassuming that imperial position among the song lyricists of
this generation that he had previously occupied as George's
larly, his
songs with Kurt Weill for
Here (which contains
in
collaborator.
appendixes
323
THE PLOT OF
Porgy and Bess
The
setting
is
ton's waterfront in
Catfish
Row, a Negro tenement on Charles-
South Carolina.
brief orchestral prelude,
dissonant and brilliantly colored, suggests the pulse of activity,
movement of Catfish Row. In one corner of the court

a crap game is taking place. In another, there is dancing. In a
the restless
third, Clara
is
singing a tender lullaby to her child
"Summer-
time"). Serena entreats her husband, Robbins, not to join the
crap game, but he
is
deaf to her entreaty.
The
voices of the
gamblers, as they excitedly exhort the die to be kind to them,
becomes a contrapuntal background

husband, impatient that the child
is
to Clara's lullaby. Jake, her
not yet asleep, snatches
it
APPENDIX
324
to it a ditty of his own which laments

woman ("A Woman Is a Sometime Thing").
seething activity of Catfish Row comes the honey man
from her arms and sings

the fickleness of
Into the
selling his
ware with a
street cry. After the orchestra
makes a
brief reference to the opening prelude, Porgy, the cripple, arrives in his goat cart.
The men welcome him, but
him
also jeer at
on Crown's girl, Bess. In a poignant and highly

moving recitative, "When Gawd make cripple, He mean him to
be lonely," Porgy describes the bleakness of his life; but he also
insists he is soft on no woman. The appearance of Bess, on the
arm of Crown, makes Porgy refer briefly to Jake's ditty that "a
for being "soft"
woman
is
a sometime thing."
Crown
is
drunk. Soon he
further
is
When
stimulated by the "happy dust" Sportin' Life gives him.
Crown
joins the crap
game he
one of the shoots and
is
is
in
an ugly mood. Robbins wins
about to scoop up his winnings when
Crown seizes him by the wrist and

The people of Catfish Row cry out for
grows more and more furious. Finally
and kills his opponent. As Crown
prevents him.
them
to stop,
They
Crown
seizes a cotton
makes
his
is
hook
escape, Serena
throws herself on her dead husband's body. Shaking with

Bess
fight.
but the brawl
fright,
soothed by the "happy dust" Sportin' Life offers her; at
the same time, Sportin' Life suggests to her that they go off to
New York
together.
When
she
is
alone, Bess seeks protection
a temporary home, but the people of Catfish
Row
her and their doors are closed. Only the cripple, Porgy,
pathetic. "Bess, Bess,
The scene now
Porgy
will take you,"
shifts to Serena's
lament Robbins' death in a
he
is
sym-
calls to her.
room where the mourners
stirring threnody, "He's a-gone, gone,
gone." Porgy makes a dramatic appeal to the mourners to
saucer with burial money.
and
are hostile to
to
They comply
fill
the
the strains of an-
other moving spiritual, "Overflow, Overflow," which then be-
comes the background music
for a second dramatic appeal
by

325
APPENDIX
Porgy.
The proceedings
He
tective.
dents.
With the
will
it
arrival of a de-
one of the mourners,
widow
the murder, and warns Robbins'

the following day or
by the
are disturbed
arrests Peter,
to
as a witness to
have the body buried
be turned over
to the medical stu-
detective gone, the mourners return to their la-
ment, "Gone, gone, gone," and Serena gives voice to her terrible
("My Man's Gone Now"). When
grief
he generously consents
been collected and
to
the undertaker arrives,
bury Robbins for whatever money has
to trust Serena for the rest.
Descending chords
in the orchestra, like the implacable tread of Fate, lead to Bess*
exultant spiritual, "Oh, the train
is
at the station.
An'
it's
headin' for the Promised Lan\"
At the
men
rise of the
second-act curtain, Jake and other fisher-
are repairing their nets.
swaying
to its
"It take a
rhythms as
if
They
sing a vigorous
long pull to get there." Porgy
is
sitting at the
watching them. His new-found happiness with Bess

sion in the joyous refrain,
Catfish
Row
work song,
they were actually rowing a boat
"Oh
got plenty
o' nuttin'."
remark on Porgy's happiness and how
Others in
his love for
Bess has changed him into a kind and beaming man. As

firmation,
window
finds expres-
if
in con-
Porgy continues more joyfully than before with
his
Then the lawyer Frazier appears. For a dollar and a half

Bess a divorce from Crown the usual fee for divorce
is one dollar, but since the situation is complicated by the fact
that Bess and Crown have never married, a higher fee is resong.
he
sells
quired.
When
Mr. Archdale, a white lawyer,
arrives,
he scolds
Frazier for selling fake divorces, and he informs Porgy he has
arranged for Peter's release from
jail.
As Mr. Archdale
leaves,
Porgy notices a buzzard flying overhead. In the "Buzzard Song"

Porgy suggests it is an omen of impending disaster; the vivid
orchestral
doom
background
that seizes Porgy
to
his
song emphasizes the feeling of
and the
rest of the
crowd, which soon
APPENDIX
32G
disperses with fear.
Sportm Life
tries to
more
get Bess to take
"happy dust" and once again urges her to come to New

York. Porgy attacks Sportm' Life and drives him away. Porgy
of his
and Bess then speak of

duet, "Bess,
You
Is
their love for
My Woman
each other in a rhapsodic
Now"; a highly expressive pas-
sage in the cello points up the tenderness of their feelings. Porgy
then
insists that
Bess go
off
with the rest of Catfish
lodge picnic taking place that day. Bess
Row
to the
hesitant, for she does
is
not want to leave Porgy alone, but she finally yields to his persuasion. Catfish
plenty
Row
now
is
deserted, except for Porgy. "I got
nuttm'," he repeats triumphantly as the curtain
o'
ered. "I got
my
gal,
The lodge
got
My
picnic
is
Lawd, got
my
frenetic dancing
low-
song."
held on Kittiwah Island. Primitive
rhythms in the orchestra describe the abandoned

is
is
and uninhibited
singing. Several
gaiety.
There
Negroes make
music on mouth organs, combs, a washboard, and bones. Sportm

Life steps forward to give the crowd his cynical philosophy ("It
Ain't Necessarily So"),
The
picnic
is
much
to the
about over, and Serena
this
to her.
emerges
very island
She
tries to tell
Crown should
him
calls the
Crown
boat. Before Bess can join them,
on
amusement
furtively
that she
seek out a younger
people back to the
who has been
sistance,
But Crown
still
wants
calls
belongs to Porgy, that
"Oh what you want wid
Bess," she wails, against a strongly syncopated

orchestra.
hiding
from a thicket and
now
girl.
of his audience.
his girl.
rhythm
in the
down
her re-
Breaking
he drags her off into the woods.

few bars of atmospheric music depict early dawn
in
Catfish Row. The fishermen are getting ready to go off to sea.

As they depart, they repeat their work song, "It take a long pull
to get there." After they leave, the court begins to resume its
normal daily pulse. The strawberry woman and the crab man
APPENDIX
327
stroll in
and
out, shouting their street cries as they try to sell their
wares. Peter, released from prison, arrives, bewildered
happened
that has
on Kittiwah
to him. Bess,
Island,
is
feverish
who
and
by
all
has returned after two days
ill,
and
is
being gently nursed
to health by Porgy. Serena prays for Bess' recovery with a

dynamic "shout" that is punctuated with cries and exclamations
from the rest of the women. The prayer is efficacious. Pale and
weary, Bess comes out of her room to sit with Porgy outside their
door. She confesses to Porgy that she has been with Crown and
that she promised Crown to return to him. Porgy is ready to
forget and forgive. When she tells him she is really in love with
him alone, Porgy promises to protect her. A duet, "I Loves You
back
Porgy," reaffirms the love each has for the other.

of their song die out
when
The
last strains
the hurricane bells sound an ominous
warning.
In the scene that follows, Serena's terrorized friends are
in her
room praying
for their
men
out at sea. Porgy urges Clara
is oblivious to what is happening;

baby a strain from "Summertime." In
a sudden outburst of thunder and lightning, the door swings
open, and Crown enters. He has come for Bess (the orchestra
gently recalls a phrase from "Bess, You Is My Woman Now").
She insists she belongs to Porgy alone. Crown mocks the cripple,
then becomes blasphemous. The shocked women continue their
prayers more fervently than before, while Crown introduces a
sacrilegious note into the praying by singing a vulgar blues melody ("A Red-Headed Woman Makes a Choochoo Jump Its
to join in the singing,
she
is
but Clara
singing softly to her
Track" ) The storm

.
window
now
erupts in full fury.
From her
seat at the
Bess sees that Jake's boat has overturned. Clara turns
her baby over to Bess and rushes out to save her drowning hus-
band. Bess
cries
out for a
man
to follow Clara
and help
her.
APPENDIX
328
"Porgy, what you
dere
sittin*
Crown. Then Crown
for," jeers
rushes to Clara's aid, but as he leaves he warns Bess he will
come back
The
is filled
for her.
third act opens in Catfish
with the poignant voices of
spiritual for their dead.
is
lulling Clara's
will
at
women
come
all.
baby
"Summertime." Suddenly Catfish

dark,
It is night;
the court
singing a plangent
He
Sportin' Life appears.
Crown is still alive and that he

who has two men has no man
room, Bess
Row.
hints that
for Bess, that a
woman
At the window of Porgy's

with a few bars of
to sleep
Row
becomes empty. In the

stealthily makes his way to Porgy's
Bess. From the window emerges Porgy's
Crown appears and
room. Quietly he
calls to
hand with a long

the knife in his
Crown
As Crown approaches, Porgy plunges
knife.
rival's
With
back; then Porgy strangles him.
dead, Porgy exclaims jubilantly to Bess: "You got a
man
now. You got Porgy."
The next morning

invade Catfish
Row
a detective, a coroner, and the police
to question its inhabitants in order to
cover Crown's murderer.
The coroner
insists that
un-
Porgy be taken
dead man. Horrified that he

Porgy refuses to go and has to be
to the police station to identify the
must look at Crown's face,

dragged off. Once Porgy is gone, Sportin' Life tries to convince
Bess that Porgy will be in jail a long, long time. He gives her
some "happy dust" which she refuses. Then more ardently than
ever and with more extravagant promises of the bountiful life
awaiting her he tries to get her to go with him to New York
("There's a Boat That's Leavin' Soon for
New
York").
When
Bess spurns him, he leaves a package of his "happy dust" outside
her door in case she changes her mind. Bess' struggle with her
will finally proves hopeless; she
suddenly emerges from her room
to snatch the package.
A week goes by. Porgy returns from jail in a
jubilant
mood.
APPENDIX
329
He
and
has finally been freed, and he
calls "Bess,
strings
He
As he
his friends.
for
calls to
You
is
more deeply
to
Bess,
loaded with
gifts for
Bess
as a
in love
rhapsodic song for
with Bess than ever.
The embarrassment and dissuspicions and fears. He wails,
Bess but gets no answer.
comfort of his friends arouse his
"Oh
is
experiences, the orchestra re-
My Woman Now"
Is
Porgy
tells of his
oh where's
my
Bess." In a
moving
trio,
Porgy continues
beseech his friends for information about Bess, while Serena
and Maria
try to
convince him that he
is
well rid of her.
then that Porgy learns that Bess has gone to

Sportin' Life. Defiantly
follow Bess to
New
he
calls for his
goat
only
York with
He
intends to
cart.
York; he cannot live without her.
friends realize they cannot dissuade him, they bid
The
It is
New
When
him
his
farewell.
orchestra brings back a fragment from the opening prelude
of the
first act.
With
I'm on
my way
to a
journey by
cart.
a dolorous spiritual
on
Heavenly Land," Porgy
his lips,
sets forth
His friends join him in his song.
"Oh Lawd,
on
his
long
330
if
CONCERT WORKS BY GERSHWIN
1Q22
135th Street, one-act opera, with libretto by B. G.
De
Sylva.
Monday. Premiere: Scandals of 1922,

Globe Theater, August 29, 1922 (one performance).
Originally entitled Blue

the
1924
Rhapsody in Blue, for piano and orchestra. Premiere: Paul

Whiteman and Orchestra, with the composer as soloist, Aeolian
Hall,
New
York, February 12, 1924.
Concerto in F, for piano and orchestra. Premiere: New

York Symphony Society, Walter Damrosch conducting, with the
composer
as soloist, Carnegie Hall,
New York, December
3,
1925.
APPENDIX
331
1Q26
Three Preludes, for piano

soloist,
Hotel Roosevelt,
New
solo.
York,
Premiere:
November
The composer
as
4, 1926.
1Q28
An American
New
in Paris, tone
poem
York Philharmonic-Symphony
New
conducting, Carnegie Hall,
for orchestra. Premiere:
Society,
York,
Walter Damrosch
December
13, 1928.
"In the Mandarin's Orchid Garden," concert song, with

lyrics
by
Ira Gershwin. Premiere:
Theater, Chicago,
November
Eleanor Marum, Blackstone
10, 1929.
1931
Second Rhapsody, for piano and orchestra. Premiere: Bos-
Symphony
ton
Orchestra, Serge Koussevitzky conducting, with
the composer as soloist,
Symphony
Hall, Boston, January 29, 1932.
1932
Piano Transcriptions of 18 Songs. Published by Simon
New
and Schuster,
You;
I'll
York,
1932.
Swanee; Nobody But
songs:
Build a Stairway to Paradise;
Do
It
Again; Fascinating
Rhythm; Oh, Lady Be Good; Somebody Loves Me; Sweet and

Low Down; That Certain Feeling; The Man I Love; Clap Yo'
Hands; Do, Do, Do; My One and Only; 'S Wonderful Strike Up
the Band; Liza; I Got Rhythm.
Cuban
Cuban perRhumba. Premiere: LewAlbert Coates conducting, Lewisohn
Overture, for
symphony
cussion instruments. Originally entitled
isohn Stadium Orchestra,
Stadium,
New
York, August 16, 1&32.
orchestra and
332
APPENDIX
*934
Variations on I Got Rhythm, for piano
and
orchestra.
Premiere: Leo Reisman Orchestra, Charles Previn conducting,
with the composer as
soloist,
Boston, January 14, 1934.
1935
Porgy and Bess, grand opera in three acts, with libretto by

DuBose Heyward, based on the play Porgy, by Dorothy and
DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by DuBose Heyward and Ira Gershwin. Premiere: Colonial Theater, Boston, September 30, 1935.
333
in
stage productions with
gershwin's music
Half-Past Eight. Lyrics
by Arthur
Jackson.
Opened and
closed out-of-town, songs: There's Magic in the Air; Hong-Kong;
The Ten Commandments
of Love.
Capitol Revue, a revue staged at the Capitol Theater,
by Ned Wayburn
Swanee (Caesar); Come
York, and produced

theater, songs:
Wayburn).
for the
to the
New
opening of the
Moon
(Paley and
334
APPENDIX
La
Book by Fred Jackson. Lyrics by Arthur

by B. G. De Sylva. Produced by
Alex A. Aarons at the Henry Miller Theater on May 26, 1919 (104
performances). With Jack Hazard and Janet Velie. songs: Nobody But You; When You Live in a Furnished Flat; The Best of
Everything; Money, Money, Money; From Now on; Tee-OodleUm-Bum-Bo; I Love To Be Loved by You; It's Great To Be in
Love; There's More to the Kiss Than X-X-X (Caesar); Somehow
It Seldom Comes True; The Ten Commandments of Love; The
Love of a Wife.
La,
Lucille.
Jackson, with additional lyrics
The Morris Gest Midnight Whirl. Book and lyrics by

B. G. De Sylva and John Henry Mears. Produced by Morris Gest
at the Century Theater on December 27, 1919 (no performances). With Bessie McCoy, Helen Shipman, and the Rath
Brothers, songs: I'll Show You a Wonderful World; The League
of Nations Depend on Beautiful Clothes; Baby Dolls; Let Cutie
Cut Your Cuticle; Doughnut Song; Limehouse Nights; Poppyland.
1920
Broadway
Brevities of 1920.
Book by
Blair Traynor
and
Archie Gottlier. Lyrics by Arthur Jackson. Produced by George
LeMaire
at the
Winter Garden on September
29, 1920
105 per-
formances ) With George LeMaire, Eddie Cantor, and Bert Wil.
liams, songs:
Lu
Lu; Snow Flakes; Spanish Love (Caesar).
The Scandals
of 1920.
Book by Andy Rice and George
White. Lyrics by Arthur Jackson. Produced by George White at

the Globe Theater on June
Ann
Pennington,
Lou
7,
1920 (318 performances). With
Holtz, Ethel Delmar, George White, Lester
Allen, Doctor Rockwell, songs:
My
Lady; Idle Dreams; Every-
APPENDIX
335
body Swat the

Scandal Walk;
Profiteer;
On My Mind
Come on and
Kiss
Me;
the
Whole Night Long;
Love the Old Songs.
Dangerous Maid. Book by Charles W.
Bell. Lyrics
by
Arthur Francis (Ira Gershwin). Opened and closed out-of-town.
Boy Wanted; Dancing Shoes; Just To Know You Are Mine;

The Simple Life; Some Rain Must Fall.
songs:
1Q21
The Scandals of 1Q21. Book by Bugs Baer and George

White. Lyrics by Arthur Jackson. Produced by George White at
the Liberty Theater on July 11, 1921 (97 performances). With
George White, Ann Pennington, Lester Allen, Charles King, Lou
Holtz. songs: I Love You; South Sea Isles; Where East Meets
West; Drifting Along With the Tide; Just a Baby; Mother Eve
(MacDonald and Hanley).
1Q22
George White's Scandals of 1Q22. Book by George White,

and Andy Rice. Lyrics of E. Ray Goetz and B. G.
Sylva. Produced by George White at the Globe Theater on
August 28, 1922 (88 performances). With W. C. Fields, Lester
Allen, Winnie Lightner, Jack MacGowan, Ed Wynn, Paul Whiteman and Orchestra, songs: She Hangs out in Our Alley; Little
W.
De
C. Fields,
Cinderelatives;
They're from
Found a Four-Leaf
When They
Dance;
I'll
Clover;
Can
Tell
Where
Build a Stairway to Paradise
and Arthur Francis); Just a Tiny Cup of Tea; Where

of My Dreams; My Heart Will Sail Across the Sea;
The Moth for My Flame; The Grab Bag; Argentina. The one-act
opera, Blue Monday (135th Street) was given a single performance, on opening night.
(De
Silva
Is the
Man
336
APPENDIX
Our Nell, "a. musical mellow drayma." Book and lyrics by

Thomas and Brian Hooker. Music by Gershwin and William
Daly. Produced by The Hayseed Productions, Inc., at the Nora
Bayes Theater on December 4, 1922 (40 performances). GershA. E.
win's songs: Innocent Ingenue Baby; Walking

line;
Bye and Bye;
My
Old
New
Home
with Ange-
England Home.
George White's Scandals of 1923. Book by George White

and William K. Wells. Lyrics by E. Ray Goetz, B. G. De Sylva,
and Ballard MacDonald. Produced by George White at the Globe
Theater on June 18, 1923 (168 performances). With Johnny
Dooley, Lester Allen, Tom Patricola, Winnie Lightner. songs:
Little Scandal Dolls; You and I in Old Versailles; Katinka; LoLa-Lo; There Is Nothing Too Good for You; Let's Be Lonesome
Together; Life of a Rose; Look in the Looking Glass; Where Is
She?; Laugh Your Cares Away; Throw Her in High; On the
Beach at How've You Been.
The Rainbow Revue ( London ) Book by Albert de Courville, Noel Scott, and Edgar Wallace. Lyrics by Clifford Grey.
songs: Innocent Lonesome Blue Baby; Sweetheart I'm So Glad
I Met You; Moonlight in Versailles; Goodnight My Dear; Sunday
in London Town; Yankee Doodle Blues (Caesar and De Sylva);
In the Rain; Oh Nina; Eastern Moon; Any Little Tune; Lady
with Me; Give Me My Mammy; All Over Town.
.
1924
George White's Scandals of 1924. Book by George White

and William K. Wells. Lyrics by B. G. De Sylva. Produced by
George White at the Globe Theater on June 18, 1924 ( 192 performances ) With Lester Allen, Tom Patricola, Winnie Lightner,
.
APPENDIX
337
Need
Will Mahoney. songs: I
a Garden; Night
Year After Year; Somebody Loves
Tune
in to Station J-O-Y;
Me
Time in Araby;
MacDonald);
(Ballard
Rose of Madrid; Kongo Kate; I'm Going
Back.
Lady Be Good. Book by Guy Bolton and Fred Thompson.

by Ira Gershwin. Produced by Aarons and Freedley at
the Liberty Theater on December 1, 1924 (184 performances).
With Fred and Adele Astaire, Walter Catlett, Cliff Edwards, and
Ohman and Arden. songs: Hang on to Me; A Wonderful Party;
The End of a String; Were Here Because; So Am I; Fascinating
Rhythm; Oh, Lady Be Good; Linger in the Lobby; The Half of
Lyrics
It
Dearie Blues; Little Jazz Bird; Carnival; Swiss Miss.

Primrose (London). Book by
Guy Bolton and George

Desmond Carter, songs:
Grossmith. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin and
Meet Someone Like You; Isn't It Wonderful; This Is the

Life for a Man; When Toby Is out of Town; Some Far Away
Someone; The Mophams; Four Little Sirens; Berkeley Square and
Kew; Boy Wanted; Wait a Bit Susie; Naughty Baby; I Make Hay
When the Moon Shines; Beau Brummel.
Till I
Sweet
Little Devil.
Schwab. Lyrics by B. G.
Book by Frank Mandel and Laurence

Sylva. Produced by Laurence Schwab
De
on January 21, 1924 (120 performances).

With Constance Binney and Irving Beebe. songs: Strike, Strike,
at the Astor Theater
Strike;
You;
Lucky; Virginia, Don't
Jijibo;
Go Too Far; Someone Believes In

One-Man Top; Hey, Hey,
Quite a Party; Under a
Let 'Er Go; Hooray for the U.S.A.; Sweet

monial Handicap; Pepita.
Little Devil;
The Matri-
Song of the Flame. Book and lyrics by Otto Harbach and

Oscar Hammerstein II. Music by Herbert Stothart and Gershwin.
APPENDIX
338
Produced by Arthur Hammerstein
December
at the 44th Street Theater
on
With Tessa Kosta and

Guy Robertson, gershwin's songs: Far Away; Song of the Flame;
Woman's Work Is Never Done; Great Big Bear; Cossack Love
Song; Midnight Bells; Tartar; You May Wander Away; You Are
30, 1925 (194 performances).
You.
Tell
Me
Wells. Lyrics
More. Book by Fred Thompson and William K.
by
B. G.
De
Sylva and Ira Gershwin. Produced
by
Alex A. Aarons at the Gaiety Theater on April 13, 1925 (32

performances). With Alexander Gray and Phyllis Cleveland.
songs: Mr. and Mrs. Sipkin; Three Times a Day;
Go
By;
Is in
When
Debbies
Why Do I Love You?; Kickin' the Clouds Away; Love

My Fair Lady; Tell Me More; In Sardinia; Baby;
the Air;
Ukelele Lorelei.
Tip Toes. Book by
by
Ira Gershwin.
erty Theater
Guy
Bolton and Fred Thompson. Lyrics
Produced by Aarons and Freedley
on December
at the Lib-
28, 1925 (194 performances).
With
Queenie Smith, Allen Kearns, Robert Halliday, Andrew Tombes,
and Jeanette MacDonald

Train; Nice Baby,
Come
in a
to
minor
role,
songs: Waiting for the
Papa; Looking for a Boy; Lady Luck;
When Do We Dance; These Charming People; That Certain Feeling; Sweet and Low Down; Our Little Captain; Tip Toes; It's a
Great Little World; Nightie Night.
IQ26
Oh Kay. Book by Guy Bolton and P.

by
Ira Gershwin.
G. Wodehouse. Lyrics
at the
Im-
on November 8, 1926 (256 performances). With

Gertrude Lawrence, Oscar Shaw, Victor Moore, and Harland
perial Theater
Dixon, songs: The Woman's Touch; Don't Ask; Dear Little Girl;
Maybe; Clap Yo' Hands; Do, Do, Do; Bride and Groom; Some*-
339
APPENDIX
one To Watch Over Me; Fidgety Feet; Heaven on Earth;
Oh Kay.
1927
Funny Face. Book by Paul Gerard and Fred Thompson.

by Ira Gershwin. Produced by Aarons and Freedley at the
Alvin Theater on November 22, 1927 ( 244 performances ) With
Lyrics
Fred and Adele
Astaire, Victor
Birthday Party; Once;
'S
Moore, and Allen Kearns. songs:
Wonderful; Funny Face; High Hat; Let's
and Make Up; In the Swim; He Loves and She Loves; Tell
the Doc; My One and Only; Sing a Little Song; The Babbitt and
Kiss
the Bromide;
Dance Alone with You; The World
Is
Mine.
1928
Book by Guy Bolton and William Anthony Mcby Ira Gershwin and P. G. Wodehouse. Additional
songs by Sigmund Romberg. Produced by Florenz Ziegfeld at
the Ziegfeld Theater on January 10, 1928 (335 performances).
With Marilyn Miller, Bobbe Arnst, Frank Morgan, Jack Donahue.
Gershwin's songs: Show Me the Town; Say So; Let Me Be a
Friend to You; Yankee Doodle Rhythms; Oh Gee, Oh Joy; New
York Serenade; How Long Has This Been Going on?
Rosalie.
Guire. Lyrics
Book by Vincent Lawrence and Fred

Thompson. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Produced by Aarons and
Freedley at the Alvin Theater on November 8, 1928 (68 performances ) With Gertrude Lawrence, Clifton Webb, Walter CatTreasure
Girl.
lett,
Paul Frawley. songs: Skull and Bones;
ing to Mr. Grimes;
Oh
So Nice; Accord-
Place in the Country; K-ra-zy for You;
Love Today; Got a Rainbow; I've Got

Fallm What Causes That; What Are We Here for;
Where's the Boy? Here's the Girl.
I
Don't Think
a Feelin' I'm
I'll
Fall in
;
340
APPENDIX
*9*9
Show
Book by William Anthony McGuire based on

P. McEvoy's novel of the same name. Additional songs by JimJ.
mie Durante. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin and Gus Kahn. Produced
by Florenz Ziegfeld at the Ziegfeld Theater on July 2, 1929 (111
performances ) With Ruby Keeler, Clayton, Jackson and Durante,
Joseph McCauley, Harriet Hoctor, and Duke Ellington. Gershwin's songs: Happy Birthday; My Sunday Fella; How Could I
Forget; Lolita; Do What You Do; Spain; One Man; So Are You;
I Must be Home by Twelve O'Clock; Black and White; Harlem
Girl.
Serenade;
Home
American
in Paris
Strike
Up
Blues; Following the Minstrel Band; Liza.
was used
the Band.
An
for a ballet sequence.
Book by Morrie Ryskind and George

Gershwin. Produced by Edgar Selwyn
Kaufman. Lyrics by Ira

Times Square Theater on January 14, 1930 ( 191 performances). With Clark and McCullough. songs: I Mean to Say; A
Typical Self-Made American; Soon; A Man of High Degree;
S.
at the
Three Cheers
for the Union; This
Could Go on
for Years; If I
Became President; What's the Use of Hanging Around with You;

He Knows Milk; Strike Up the Band; In the Rattle of Battle;
New Rochelle; I've Got

Me; Ring a Ding a DingDong Bell; I Want To Be a War Bride; Yankee Doodle Rhythm;
Seventeen and Twenty-One; Nobody.
Military Dancing Drill; Mademoiselle in
a Crush on You;
How About a Boy Like
1930
Book by Guy Bolton and John McGowan.

by Aarons and Freedley at the
Alvin Theater on October 14, 1930 (272 performances). With
Ethel Merman, Ginger Rogers, Allen Kearns, and Willie Howard.
songs: Bidin' My Time; The Lonesome Cowboy; Could You Use
Girl Crazy.
Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Produced
APPENDIX
341
Me?; Broncho Busters; Barbary Coast; Embraceable You; Sam
and Delilah;
for
Me; Treat
tus
Time
Got Rhythm; Land of the Gay Cabailero; But Not

Rough; Boy What Love Has Done to Me; Cac-
Me
in Arizona.
Of Thee I Sing. Book by Morrie Ryskind and George S.

Kaufman. Lyrics by Ira Gershwin. Produced by Sam H. Harris
at the Music Box Theater on December 26, 1931 (441 performances). With William Gaxton, Victor Moore, Lois Moran, June
O'Dea, George Murphy. The first musical to win a Pulitzer Prize
Wintergreen for President; Who Is the Lucky
The Dimple on My Knee; Because, Because; Never
Was There a Girl So Fair; Some Girls Can Bake a Pie; Love Is
Sweeping the Country; Of Thee I Sing; Here's a Kiss for Cinderella; I Was the Most Beautiful Blossom; Hello, Good Morning;
Who Cares; Garcon, S'il Vous Plait; The Illegitimate Daughter;
The Roll Call; Jilted; Posterity Is Just Around the Corner; Trumpeter Blow Your Horn.
for drama, songs:
Girl
To
Be;
revival:
Ben Segal
May
5,
1952.
Produced by Chandler Cowles and
at the Ziegfeld Theater.
With Jack Carson, Paul Hart-
mann, Betty Oakes, and Lenore Lonergan.

1933
Let 'Em Eat Cake. Book by Morrie Ryskind and George
Kaufman. Lyrics by
Ira Gershwin.
at the Imperial Theater
on October
S.
Produced by Sam H. Harris

21, 1933 (90
performances).
With William Gaxton, Victor Moore, Lois Moran, and Philip

Loeb. songs: Wintergreen for President; Tweedledee for President; Union Square; Shirts by Millions; Comes the Revolution;
Mine; Cloistered from the Noisy City; On and On and On; Let
APPENDIX
342
'Em Eat Cake;

prenez,
No
No ComI Know
Blue, Blue, Blue; Who's the Greatest;
Capish;
Up
He
and At 'Em; That's What
a Foul Ball; Throttle Throttlebottom;
Did;
Hell of a Fix; Let
'Em
Eat Caviar; Hanging Throttlebottom in the Morning.
My
Pardon
Ira Gershwin.
English.
Book by Herbert
Fields. Lyrics
by
at the Majestic
Theater on January 20, 1933 ( 46 performances ) With Lyda Robert!, Jack Pearl, George Givot. songs: Three-Quarter Time; The
Lorelei; Pardon My English; Dancing in the Streets; So What;
.
Isn't It a Pity;
My
Cousin from Milwaukee; Hail the Happy
Couple; The Dresden Northwest Mounted; Luckiest
World;
Want
Not Himself.
to
Be There; Tonight; Where You Go,
Man
I
in the
Go; He's
343
IV)
STAGE PRODUCTIONS WITH
INTERPOLATED GERSHWIN SONGS
1916
The Passing Show of igi6. Book and lyrics by Harold

Music by Sigmund Romberg and Otto Motzaw. Produced by the Shuberts at the Winter Garden on June 22, 1916
(140 performances). With Ed Wynn, Fred Walton, Stella Horban, Herman Timberg, and the Ford Sisters, song: The Making
Atteridge.
of a Girl.
1918
Hitchy Koo of 1918. Book and lyrics by Glen MacDonough.

Music by Raymond Hubbell. Produced by Raymond Hitchcock
APPENDIX
344
at the
Leon
Globe Theater on June 6, 1918 (68 performances). With

and Raymond Hitchcock, song: You
Errol, Irene Bordoni,
00 Just You
(Caesar).
Book and lyrics by Harold Atteridge. Music by

Sigmund Romberg and Al Jolson. Produced by the Shuberts at
the Winter Garden on February 14, 1918 (164 performances).
With Al Jolson. songs: Swanee (Caesar); Dixie Rose (Caesar and
Sinbad.
De
Sylva).
1919
Good Morning
Judge. Book by Fred Thompson based on

The Magistrate. Music by Lionel Monckton and Howard
Talbott. Produced by the Shuberts at the Shubert Theater on
February 6, 1919 (140 performances). With Molly and Charles
King, songs: I Was So Young (Caesar and Bryan); There's More
to the Kiss Than X-X-X (Caesar).
Pinero's
Lady in Red. Book and lyrics by Anne Caldwell. Music

by Robert Winterberg. Produced by John J. Slocum at the Lyric
Theater on May 12, 1919 (48 performances). With Adele Rowland, song: Something about Love (Paley).
1Q20
Dere Mabel, song: Were Pals (Caesar).
Ed Wynn
Book and songs by Ed Wynn. ProNew Amsterdam Theater on April

J.
performances).
With
Ed Wynn. song: Oh How I
5, 1920 (64
Love to Be Loved By You (Paley).
duced by
C.
Carnival.
Whitney
at the
Look Who's Here. Book by Frank Mandel. Lyrics by Edward Paulson, with additional lyrics by Cecil Lean. Music by
Silvio Hein. Produced by the Spiegels, Inc., at the 44th Street
APPENDIX
345
Theater on March
field
2, 1920 (87 performances). With Cleo Mayand George Mack, song: Some Wonderful Sort of Someone
(Green )
Sweetheart Shop. Book and lyrics by Anne Caldwell. Music
by Hugo Felix. Produced by Edgar J. MacGregor and William
Moore Patch at the Knickerbocker Theater on August 31, 1920
(55 performances). With Helen Ford, song: Waiting for the Sun
to Come Out (Caesar).
1Q21
The
Perfect Fool. Book, lyrics, and music
Produced by A. L. Erlanger
at the
by Ed Wynn.
George M. Cohan Theater on
November 7, 1921 (256 performances). With Ed Wynn. song:

My Log Cabin Home ( Caesar and De Sylva )
1Q22
For Goodness Sake. Book by Fred Jackson. Lyrics by

Arthur Jackson. Music by William Daly and Paul Lannin. Pro-
duced by Alex A. Aarons
on February 20,
1922 (103 performances). With Fred and Adele Astaire. songs:
Someone; Tra-la-la.
The French
Doll.
at the Lyric Theater
Book and
lyrics
by A. E. Thomas,
adapted from a French play by Armont and Gerbidion. Pro-
duced by E. Ray Goetz

1922
(De
at the
120 performances).
Lyceum Theater on February
With Irene Bordoni. song: Do
It
20,
Again
Sylva).
Spice of 1922. Book and lyrics
Annan
Kaliz at the Winter
by Jack
Garden on July
6,
formances). With George Price, Valeska Suratt,

song: Yankee Doodle Blues (Caesar and
De
Produced by
Lait.
1922 (73 per-
Arman
Sylva).
Kaliz.
APPENDIX
346
The Dancing Girl. Book and lyrics by Harold Atteridge

and Irving Caesar. Music by Sigmund Romberg. Produced by
the Shuberts at the Winter Garden on January 24, 1923
Tom
formances). With Marie Dressier, Trini, and
The American Boy

I
of Mine;
Cuddle
Me
as
We
126 per-
Burke, songs:
Dance;
Why Am
Sad?; Pango Pango.
Little Miss Bluebeard. Book and lyrics by Avery Hopwood.

Music by various composers. Produced by Charles Frohman and
E. Ray Goetz at the Lyceum Theater on August 28, 1923 (175
performances). With Irene Bordoni. song:

(
De
Won't Say
Will
Sylva and Jackson )
Book and lyrics by Sam Bernard and

William Collier. Produced by Charles Dillingham at the Fulton
Theater on September 25, 1923 (47 performances). With Bernard
Collier, Van and Schenck, Ray Dooley, Frank Crumit, and Helen
Broderick. songs Nashville Nightingale (Caesar); At Half -Past
Nifties of 1923.
Seven
De
Sylva )
1926
lyrics by J. P. McEvoy. Music by
by Richard Herndon at the Belmont
Theater on July 26, 1926 (224 performances). With Lew Brice,
Roy Atwell, Charles Butterworth, and Helen Morgan, song: That
Lost Barber-Shop Chord (Ira Gershwin).
Americana. Book and
various composers. Produced
m6
The Show Is On. Book by David Freedman and Moss
by various composers, song: By Strauss (Ira Gersh-
Hart. Music
win).
347
v
GERSHWIN SCORES FOR
MOTION PICTURES
Delicious.
Fox Production
starring Janet
Gaynor and
Charles Farrell. Directed by David Butler, songs: Delishious;
Somebody from Somewhere; Katinkitschka.

interlude was the basis of the Second Rhapsody.
Blah, Blah, Blah;
An
orchestral
1937
Damsel in Distress. An RKO Production starring Fred

Astaire and Joan Fontaine. Directed by George Stevens, songs:
Foggy Day; Things Are Looking Up; I Cant Be Bothered Now;
Nice Work If You Can Get It.
348
APPENDIX
Shall
We Dance. An RKO Production starring Fred Astaire
and Ginger Rogers. Directed by Mark Sandrich. songs: Slap That

Bass; Let's Call the
Away from Me;
Whole Thing
We
Shall
They Can't Take That

I've Got
Off;
Dance; They All Laughed;
Beginner's Luck.
The Goldwyn
Follies.
United
Production with
Artists
Vera Zorina, Adolphe Menjou, Andrea Leeds, and
Here to Stay; I Love To Rhyme;

Doing All Right.
Just
Walked
others. Di-
Our Love Is
Another Rhumba; I Was
rected by George Marshall, songs: Love
In;
1945
Rhapsody
in Blue.
A Warner
Brothers Production.
The
screen biography of George Gershwin, starring Robert Alda as
the composer, and with Joan Leslie, Alexis Smith, Charles Co-
burn, Oscar Levant, and
many
others. Directed
songs: Swanee; Yankee Doodle Blues;
Loves Me; The
Man
Ain't Necessarily So;
Walked
In;
'S
by Irving Rapper.
Wonderful; Somebody
Love; Embraceable You; Summertime;
Oh, Lady Be Good;
Clap Yo* Hands;
Do
Again;
It
I'll
It
Got Rhythm; Love

Build a Stairway to
Someone To Watch Over Me; Bidin' My Time;

Got Plenty o' Nuttin. also: Rhapsody in Blue; An
Paradise; Liza;
Delishious;
American
in Paris; Concerto in F.
1947
The Shocking Miss

tion, starring
Pilgrim.
20th Century Fox Produc-
Betty Grable and Dick Haymes. Directed by George
Sea ton. songs: Aren't You Kinda Glad
For Evermore; But Not
in Boston;
We
Stand
Did; For You, For Me,
Up and
Fight;
Changing
349
My
APPENDIX
Tune; One, Two, Three; Sweet Backward; Waltz
Waltzes; Waltzing
Is
Better
Than
Sitting
Me No
Down; Back Bay
Polka.
1951
An American
in Paris.
An
MGM Production starring Gene
Kelly and Leslie Caron, with Oscar Levant and Nina Foch. Directed by Vincent Minnelli. It
won
best picture of the year, songs:
'S
the
Academy Award
Got Rhythm; Embraceable You;
Wonderful; By Strauss; Tra-la-la; Our Love
I'll
Is
Here To
Build a Stairway to Paradise, also: Concerto in F;
can in
Paris.
as the
An
Stay;
Ameri-
350
n
MOTION PICTURES ADAPTED
FROM GERSHWIN MUSICALS
(with Gershwin Music)
1932
Girl Crazy.
An RKO
Production starring Wheeler and
Woolsey. Directed by William A.
Not
for
Could You Use

Got Rhythm; But
Seiter. songs:
Me?; Embraceable You; Sam and Delilah;
Me.
1940
Strike
Up
the Band.
An
MGM Production starring Mickey
Rooney, Judy Garland, and Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra.

Up the Band.
Gershwin's songs: Strike
351
APPENDIX
1Q41
Lady Be Good. An
MGM
Production starring Eleanor
Ann Sothern. Directed by Norman Z.

McLeod. Gershwin's songs: Hang on to Me; Fascinating Rhythm;
Oh, Lady Be Good. Jerome Kern's The Last Time I Saw Paris
(Oscar Hammerstein II), introduced in this picture, won the
Academy Award.
Powell, Robert Young, and
1943
MGM
Production, starring Mickey Rooney

Girl Crazy. An
and Judy Garland. Directed by Norman Taurog. songs: Treat Me
Rough; Sam and Delilah; Bidin' My Time; Embraceable You;
Fascinating Rhythm; I Got Rhythm; But Not for Me; Barbary
Coast; Cactus
Time
in Arizona.
352
rii
THE GREATEST SONGS OF
GEORGE GERSHWIN
(and the
stars
who
introduced them)
A Woman Is a Sometime Thing.

in
Introduced by
Edward Matthews
Porgy and Bess.
The Babbitt and the Bromide. Introduced by Adele Astaire in

Funny Face.
Bess, You Is My Woman Now. Introduced by Todd Duncan and
Anne Brown in Porgy and Bess.
Bidin My Time. Introduced by The Foursome in Girl Crazy.
Boy, What Love Has Done to Me. Introduced by Ethel Merman
in Girl Crazy.
But Not For Me. Introduced by Ginger Rogers and Willie
Howard
in Girl Crazy.
APPENDIX
353
Clap Yo' Hands. Introduced by Betty Cooper and Harland Dixon

in
Oh
Kay.
Do. Do. Do. Introduced by Gertrude Lawrence in
Do
Oh
Kay.
Again. Introduced by Irene Bordoni in The French Doll.
It
Embraceable You.
Kearns
Introduced
by Ginger Rogers and Allen
in Girl Crazy.
Fascinating Rhythm. Introduced by Fred and Adele Astaire in
Lady Be Good.
I
Got
Plenty- o" Xuttin'.
Introduced by Todd Duncan in Porgy and
Bess.
I
Got Rhvthm. Introduced bv Ethel Merman
I'll
Build a Stairway to Paradise.
in Girl Crazy.
production number in the
Scandals of 1922.
Necessarily So. Introduced
It Ain't
by John W. Bubbles
in
Porgy
arid Bess.
I've
Got
Crush on You. Introduced by Gordon Smith and Doris
Up
Carson in Strike
the Band.
Lady Be Good: see Oh. Ladv Be Good.

Let's Call the Whole Thing Off. Introduced by Fred
Ginger Rogers in Shall
Astaire and
Dance.
bv Rubv Keeler and Xick Lucas in Show Girl.

by Queenie Smith in Tip Toes.
Liza. Introduced
Looking
We
for a Boy. Introduced
(The) Lost Barber-Shop Chord: see That Lost Barber-Shop

Chord.
Love
Is
Here To
Goldwyn
Love
Is
Stay.
Introduced by Kenny Baker in The
Follies.
Sweeping the Country. Introduced by George Murphy

in Of Thee I Sing.
and June O'Dea
Love Walked
In.
Introduced by Kenny Baker in The Goldwyn
Follies.
(The)
Man
Love. Originally intended for Lady Be Good, and
then for the
first
version of Strike
Up
the Band, but deleted
354
APPENDIX
from both productions. Introduced by Adele Astaire
Philadelphia tryout of
Lady Be Good
in 1924.
at the
Sung by Eva
Gauthier at a recital in Derby, Connecticut, 1925.
Mine. Introduced by William Gaxton in Let 'Em Eat Cake.
Nobody But You. Introduced by Helen Clark, Lorin Baker, and

chorus in La, La Lucille.
Of Thee I Sing. Introduced by William Gaxton and Lois Moran
in Of Thee I Sing.
Oh, Lady Be Good. Introduced by Walter Catlett in Lady Be
Good.
Our Love Is Here To Stay: see Love Is Here To Stay.

Sam and Delilah. Introduced by Ethel Merman in Girl Crazy.
So Am I. Introduced by Fred and Adele Astaire in Lady Be
Good.
So Are You. Introduced by Eddie Foy,
Jr.,
and Kathryn Hereford
Show Girl.
Somebody Loves Me. Introduced by Winnie Lightner
in
in
George
White's Scandals of 1924.
Someone To Watch Over Me. Introduced by Gertrude Lawrence

in
Oh
Kay.
Soon. Introduced
by Margaret
Stairway to Paradise: see

Strike
Up the Band.
Up the Band.
I'll
Schilling in Strike
Up
the Band.
Introduced by Jim Goff and chorus in Strike
Summertime. Introduced by Abbie Mitchell in Porgy and Bess.

Swanee. Introduced as a production number at the Capitol
Theater Revue, but made famous by Al Jolson in Sinbad.
Sweet and
Low Down.
McDonald, and
'S
Introduced by Andrew Tombes, Gertrude
Amy
Revere in Tip Toes.
Wonderful. Introduced by Adele Astaire and Allen Kearns in
Funny Face.
355
APPENDIX
That Certain Feeling. Introduced by Queenie Smith and Allen

Kearns in Tip Toes.
That Lost Barber-Shop Chord. Introduced by Louis Lazarin and
the Pan American Quartet in Americana.
There's a Boat That's Leavin' Soon for New York. Introduced by
John W. Bubbles in Porgy and Bess.
They Can't Take That Away From Me. Introduced by Fred
Astaire in Shall
We Dance.
(A) Typical Self-Made American. Introduced by Dudley Clements, Jerry Goff, and chorus in Strike Up the Band.
Who
Cares. Introduced
Of Thee
by William Gaxton and Lois Moran
in
I Sing.
Wintergreen for President. Introduced by the ensemble in Of
Thee
1 Sing.
356
iii
recommended recordings
of gershwin's music
CONCERT WORKS
I.
An American in Paris
New York Philharmonic-Symphony
under Artur Rodzinski
(Columbia ML-4026); Andre Kostelanetz and His Orchestra

(Columbia ML-4458); NBC Symphony under Toscanini (Victor
LM-9020); RCA Victor Symphony under Leonard Bernstein

(Victor LM-1031).
See
also:
Concerto in
Omnibus Albums
The
Serious Gershwin.
Pittsburgh
Symphony under William
Steinberg, with Leon-
ard Pennario as soloist (Capitol P-8219);
New
York Philhar-
357
APPENDIX
monic- Symphony under Andre Kostelanetz, with Oscar Levant as

soloist
(Columbia ML-4879); Cincinnati Symphony under Tor
Johnson with Alec Templeton as
Montovani and Orchestra, with
soloist
Julius
(Remington 199-184)
as soloist (Lon-
Katchen
don LL-1262).
See also: Omnibus Albums
The
Serious Gershwin.
Cuban Overture
Andre Kostelanetz and His Orchestra (Columbia ML4481).
Porgy and Bess

complete opera: Lawrence Winters, Camilla Williams,
Inez Matthews, Avon Long, J. Rosamund Johnson Chorus, with
Lehman Engel conducting. (Columbia SL-162).
excerpts:
Todd Duncan, Anne Brown,
Jessye Choir,
etc.,
with Alexander Smallens conducting (Decca 7006-8042); Rise
Shaw Chorale, etc. (Victor LM-1124);

Cab Calloway, Helen Thigpen, and others (Victor LPM-3158).
Stevens, Robert Merrill,
A Symphonic Picture, by Robert Russell Bennett: Pittsburgh Symphony under Fritz Reiner (Columbia ML-2019); Indianapolis
1059);
Symphony under Fabien
New
Sevitzky
(Bluebird
LBC-
York Philharmonic-Symphony under Andre Koste-
lanetz (Columbia ML-4804); Minneapolis
Symphony under Antal
Dorati (Mercury 50016).
See
also:
Omnibus Albums
Preludes for Piano

Oscar Levant,
soloist
The
Serious Gershwin.
(Columbia ML-2073).
Transcribed for violin and piano: Jascha Heifetz, soloist
(Decca DL-7003).
See
also:
Omnibus Albums
The Serious Gershwin.
358
APPENDIX
Rhapsody in Blue
Philadelphia Orchestra, under Eugene Ormandy,
with
(Columbia ML-4026); Andre Kostelanetz

and His Orchestra, with Alec Templeton as soloist (Columbia
ML-4455); Paul Whiteman and His Orchestra, with Leonard
Oscar Levant as
soloist
Pennario as soloist (Capitol H-302); Montovani and Orchestra,
(London LL-1262).
Omnibus Albums The Serious Gershwin.
with Julius Katchen as

See
also:
soloist
Second Rhapsody
Morton Gould and His
soloist
Variations on I
soloist
Orchestra, with Oscar Levant as
(Columbia ML-2073).
Got Rhythm
Morton Gould and His Orchestra, with Oscar Levant

(Columbia ML-2073).
II.
as
MUSICAL COMEDY SCORES
Girl Crazy
complete score. Mary Martin, Louise Carlyle, Eddie

Chappell, with orchestra and chorus directed by Lehman Engel.
(Columbia ML-4475).
Of Thee
I Sing
principal excerpts. Jack Carson, Hartman, and the original 1952
Broadway
cast.
(Capitol S-350).
III.
An American
Gene
MOTION-PICTURE SCORES
in Paris
Kelly, Leslie Caron,
and Oscar Levant
(MGM E-93).
Girl Crazy
Judy Garland, Mickey Rooney, and others (Decca 5412).
APPENDIX
359
IV.
SONG COLLECTIONS
Bing Crosby Sings Songs by George Gershwin

Bing Crosby and Orchestra (Decca DL-5081). contents:
Embraceable You; They Can't Take That Away from Me; Love
Walked in; Summertime; It Ain't Necessarily So; I Got Plenty o'
Nuttin'; Somebody Loves Me; Maybe.
Dorothy Kirsten Sings Songs of George Gershwin

Dorothy Kirsten with Percy Faith and his orchestra and
(Columbia ML-2129). contents: Embraceable You;
chorus.
Soon; Do, Do, Do; Mine; Love
Watch Over Me; Love Walked
Here To Stay; Someone To

I've Got a Crush on You.
Is
In;
Ella Sings Gershwin

Ella Fitzgerald
Watch Over Me;
(Decca DL-5300). contents: Someone to

and Only; But Not for Me; Looking
My One
Got a Crush
Going On?; Maybe; Soon.
for a Boy; I've
Embraceable You:
Wally
On
You;
How Long
Has This Been
Tribute to George Gershwin

(Epic LG-1009). contents:
Stotts Orchestra
Em-
Up the Band; Someone To Watch Over

Me; Somebody Loves Me; Liza; Summertime; Love Is Here To
braceable You; Strike
Stay;
The Man
Love.
Gems from Gershwin

Jane From an, Felix Knight, Sunny Skylar, and orchestra
under Nathaniel Shilkret (Victor LPT-3055). contents: Excerpts
from Of Thee I Sing, Girl Crazy, Lady Be Good, Tip Toes, Porgy
and Bess, and other songs.
Gershwin Jazz Concert

Eddie Condon and his orchestra, with Lee Wiley, Jack
Teagarden, Bobby Hackett, and others (Decca DL-5137). con-
APPENDIX
3G0
Somebody Loves Me; 'S Wonderful; My One and Only; Oh,

Lady Be Good; Someone To Watch Over Me; The Man I Love;
tents:
Swanee;
I'll
Gershwin Plays Gershwin

George Gershwin
at the piano,
with Fred Astaire (Heri-
tage 0073). contents: Clap Yo' Hands; Do, Do, Do; Fascinating
Low Down; Hang
Rhythm; Sweet and

Feeling; I'd
Half of
It
Me; That Certain

Rather Charleston; Someone To Watch Over Me; The
on
to
Dearie Blues.
Gershwin Rarities, Vol. 1

Kaye Ballard, David
by
David Baker and John Morris (Walden 302). contents: They
All Laughed; Things Are Looking Up; Isn't It a Pity; Funny Face;
Aren't You Kind of Glad We Did; Soon; Shall We Dance; Stiff
Upper Lip; Seventeen and Twenty-One; Kickin' the Clouds.
Gershwin
Rarities, Vol.
Craig, Betty Gillet, accompanied
Louise Carlyle, Warren Galjour, accompanied by the John

Morris Trio (Walden 303). contents: Where's the Boy; That
Make Up; Oh, So Nice; I Want

Nice Work If You Can Get It; Foggy Day;
Certain Feeling; Let's Kiss and
To Be a War Bride;
How Long Has This Been Going On; Nightie
Low Down.
Night; Sweet and
Heifetz Plays the Music of Gershwin

Transcribed for violin and piano by Jascha Heifetz. Jascha
Heifetz, with
Emanuel Bay
tents: Summertime;
Gone Now;
It Ain't
My Woman Now;
( Decca DL-7003 )
conSometime Thing; My Man's
at the piano
A Woman
Is a
Necessarily So;
3 Preludes.
Tempo
di Blues; Bess,
You
Is
361
APPENDIX
of George Gershwin
Andre Kostelanetz and His Orchestra (Columbia ML2026). contents: Embraceable You; Fascinating Rhythm; The
Man I Love; 'S Wonderful; Maybe; Someone To Watch Over Me;
Oh, Lady Be Good; Soon.
Music
Music of George Gershwin

George Gershwin, Fred Astaire, Hildegarde, Larry Adler,
and others (Columbia AAL-39). contents: The Man I Love; Do,
Do, Do; My One and Only; 'S Wonderful; Half of It Dearie
Blues; Fascinating Rhythm; Sweet and Low Down; Summertime;
Bess, You Is My Woman Now; It Ain't Necessarily So; I Got
Plenty o' Nuttin'; There's a Boat That's Leavin Soon for New
York.
Oscar Peterson and Buddy de Franco Play Gershwin

Oscar Peterson, Buddy de Franco, and orchestra conducted
by Russ Garcia. Supervised by Norman Granz (Norgren MGM1016). contents: I Got Rhythm; I Was Doing All Right; The
Man I Love; It Ain't Necessarily So; Bess, You Is My Woman
Now; Someone to Watch Over Me; 'S Wonderful; Strike Up the
Band; They Cant Take That Away From Me.
The Popular Gershwin

Eddie Fisher, Eartha Kitt, June Valli, Lou Monte, Jaye P.
Morgan, Dinah Shore, Sauter-Finegan Orchestra, Hugo Winterhalter
Miller
and His Orchestra, Henri Rene and His Orchestra, Glenn

and His Orchestra, and others (Victor LPM-6000). con-
tents: 29 songs.
Songs of George Gershwin (transcribed for piano)

Eddy Duchin (Columbia CL-6103). contents: The Man
I Love; Someone to Watch Over Me; Love Walked In; Embrace-
302
APPENDIX
able You; 'S Wonderful; Somebody Loves Me; Summertime;

They Can't Take That Away From Me.
Transcriptions of 18 Songs
Piano transcriptions by George Gershwin. Leonid
bro, soloist
(Walden 200). contents: See page
OMNIBUS ALBUMS
V.
The
Life
and Music
of
Ham-
331.
George Gershwin
Produced by David Ewen. This

tation of Gershwin's works,
is
a chronological presen-
which includes
all his serious
music,
and over 60 songs (Columbia FL-230).
The Serious Gershwin

Morton Gould and His Orchestra, and Morton Gould
as
piano soloist (Victor LM-6033). contents: Rhapsody in Blue; 3

Piano Preludes; Concerto in F; An American in Paris; Porgy and
Piano Solo from Act
Bess
I,
Scene
(arranged by Morton Gould).
I;
Suite
from Porgy and Bess
363
x
BIBLIOGRAPHY
books on George Gershwin

(American)
Armitage, Merle (editor). George Gershwin. New York:
Longmans, Green & Co., 1938. A memorial volume to which
thirty-eight of Gershwin's friends
and tributes.
Ewen, David. The Story
and colleagues contributed rem-
iniscences
Henry Holt &
Co., 1943.
of
George Gershwin. New York:

for young people.
A biography
Goldberg, Isaac. George Gershwin.
work
to come. It
nally published in
York: Simon and
was still alive, and with

was an extension of three articles origiLadies Home Journal, based exclusively on
Schuster, 1931. Written while Gershwin

his best
New
APPENDIX
3G4
material derived from conversations with George and Ira Gersh-
win.
(foreign)
le musicien de la RhapDumant, 1948.
Ewen, David. George Gershwin; Leben und Werk. Zurich,
Leipzig, Wien: Amalthea Verlag, 1955. A translation of the
young people's biography listed above.
Pool, Rosey E. Een Nieuw lied voor America; het leven
van George Gershwin. Amsterdam: Tilburg-Nederlands Boekhus,
Chalupt, Rene. George Gershwin;
sody in Blue.
Paris: Amiot,
1951.
Pugliaro, M. Rapsodia in blue; Yarte e Yamore

George Gershwin. Turin: S.A.S., 1951.
Schipke, Brigitte. George Gershwin
und
nella vita di
Welt seiner
Musik. Freiburg: Drei Ringe Musikverlag, 1955. A monograph.
Schoorl, Bob. George Gershwin: van Broadway tot Carnegie Hall. Amsterdam: A. J. G. Strengholt, 1952.
some books
in
which George Gershwin
is
die
discussed
Bagar, Robert, and Biancolli, Louis. The Concert

panion.
New
York:
McGraw
Hill
&
Co., 1947.
Com-
Program notes of
the major serious works.
Wodehouse, P. G. Bring On the Girls.

Simon and Schuster, 1953. Behind-the-scenes glimpses
of the writing and production of several early Gershwin musicals.
Cerf, Bennett. Try and Stop Me. New York: Simon and
Schuster, 1944. A chapter on Gershwin filled with anecdotes.
Cross, Milton, and Ewen, David. The Milton Cross EnBolton, Guy, and
New York:
cyclopedia
of
Great Composers.
Two
volumes.
New
York:
365
APPENDIX
Doubleday and
The section on Gershwin includes his

comment on his music, and analytical notes
Co., 1953.
biography, a general
of his most important serious works.
Duke, Vernon. Passport
George and
Co., 1955. Intimate glimpses of
who was
Ira
a friend of both.
Ewen, David
New
Brown &
Gershwin by one
to Paris. Boston: Little,
(editor).
The Book
Modern Composers.
of
York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. Second Edition, Revised and
The book contains a brief biography, a Personal

Note by Isaac Goldberg, an extract from an article by Gershwin
expounding his esthetic theories, and an essay on Gershwin by
Enlarged, 1950.
John Tasker Howard.
Ewen, David. The Complete Book
New
York: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1952.
of 20th
Century Music.
brief biography, a critical
and program notes for his major serious works.

Ewen, David. Men of Popular Music. New York: Prentice-
evaluation,
Hall, Inc. Revised Edition, 1952.
A profile on Gershwin.
Howard, John Tasker. Our Contemporary Composers. New

A brief biography and criticism of
York: Thos. Y. Crowell, 1941.

principal works.
Jessel,
George. This
Way,
Miss.
New
York: Henry Holt
&
Co., 1955. Includes a brief tribute to Gershwin.
Smattering of Ignorance. New York:

Co., 1940. The last chapter is an informal portrait
Levant, Oscar.
Doubleday &
of Gershwin by one
of his closest friends
and most famous
in-
terpreters.
Are They the Same at Home.

George H. Doran, 1927. Includes an early personal
Nichols, Beverly.
New
York:
portrait of
Gershwin.
O'Connell, Charles. Victor Book of Overtures, Tone Poems.
New
York: Simon and Schuster, 1950. Contains an analysis of
An American in
Paris.
APPENDIX
366
Osgood, Henry O. So This
&
Co.,
1926.
Many
Is Jazz. Boston: Little,
Brown
an evaluation of
sections are devoted to
Gershwin's place in jazz.
New
Rosenfeld, Paul. Discoveries of a Music Critic.
Harcourt, Brace
&
One
Co., 1936.
of the chapters
is
York:
a critical
evaluation of Gershwin's music.

Schillinger, Frances.
Wife.
New York:
Joseph Schillinger:
A Memoir
by His
Greenberg, 1949. Includes an account of Gersh-
win's study with Joseph Schillinger.

Seldes, Gilbert.
&
The Seven Lively
Bros., 1924. Includes
one of the
Arts.
New
York: Harper
earliest tributes to
Gershwin's
significance.
Slonimsky, Nicolas. Lexicon of Musical Invective.
New
York: Coleman-Ross Co., 1953. Includes interesting derogatory

criticisms of several serious
Gershwin works.
Smith, Cecil. Musical
Theater Arts Books, 1950.
Comedy
New
in America.
York:
source for Gershwin's major musical
comedies.
Spaeth, Sigmund.
New
York:
History of Popular Music in America.
Random House,
Inc., 1948.
source for Gershwin's
songs and musical comedies.
Thomson,
Virgil.
The Musical Scene.
New
York: Alfred
A. Knopf, 1945. Excellent critiques of the 1941 revival of Porgy
and Bess and the Toscanini performance of the Rhapsody in Blue.

Veinus, Abraham. Victor Book of Concertos. New York:
Simon and Schuster, 1948. Analyses of the Rhapsody in Blue and
Concerto in F.
Whiteman, Paul, and McBride, Margaret.

J.
Jazz.
New York:
H. Sears & Co., 1926. Contains a first-hand account of the
premiere of the Rhapsody in Blue.
367
APPENDIX
selected magazine articles
Behrman,
S.
N. 'Troubadour."
New
Yorker,
May
1929.
"Profile."
Bernstein, Leonard.
"A Nice Gershwin Tune."
Atlantic
Monthly, April 1955. The author enters into an imaginary collothe professional manager of a music-publishing firm,
quy with
and offers
his personal
Braggioti,
views about Gershwin's serious works.
M. "Gershwin
Is
Here To
Stay." Etude, Febru-
ary 1953.
Duke, Vernon. "Gershwin,
Schillinger,
and Dukelsky."
Musical Quarterly, January 1947.

Ewen, David. "Gershwin Would Be Surprised." Harpers
Magazine,
May
1955.
study of the growth of Gershwin's fame
since his death.
Ewen, David. "The Stature of George Gershwin." American Mercury, January 1950.
Goldberg, Isaac. "Gebruder Gershwin." Vanity Fair, June
1932.
Goldberg, Isaac. "George Gershwin and Jazz." Theatre
Guild Magazine, March 1930.

Jacobi, Frederick. "The Future of Gershwin."
Modem
Music, November-December 1937.
Edward. "George Gershwin as I Knew Him."

Etude, January 1951. Reminiscences by Gershwin's teacher.
Marek, George. "Rhapsody in Blue after Twenty-Five
Years." Good Housekeeping, February 1949.
O'Hara, John. "American in Memoriam." Newsweek, July
Kilenyi,
1&
1940.
Pollak, R. "Gershwin."
ber 1937.
American Magazine of
Art,
Septem-
368
APPENDIX
Taubman, Howard. "Why Gershwin Tunes Live
on."
New
York Times Magazine, September 28, 1952.

Thomson, Virgil. "George Gershwin." Modern Music,
November-December
1935.
Woollcott, Alexander. "George the Ingenuous." Cosmopolitan,
November
1933.
index
369
index
Aarons, Alex A., 79-80, 121-23, 128,

181-82, 240-41
Aarons, Alfred E., 80, 122
Aarons and Freedley, 121-22, 137,
139,
151, 153, 203, 240-41
Abramson, Max,
54, 71-72,
77
Achron, Joseph, 243
Adams,
F. P., cited, 149
Ager, Milton, 188
Agony
of Modern Music, The, 22

Alda, Robert, 311
"Alexander's Ragtime Band," 49, 56,
57, 96
Allen, Lester,
American in
Paris, An, 22, 23, 35,

162, 164-71, 190, 203, 208, 231,
232-33, 247, 3io, 312, 317, 331,
340, 348, 349, 356, 362
American in Paris, An (movie), 170,
312-13, 349, 358

American Spectator, 232
Americana ( 1926), 151, 346
Americana II, 32
Anderson, Franz, 279
Ansky, S., 209
Antheil, George, cited, 116, 182
Anything Goes, 241
92
Alvarez, Marguerite d\ 147, 156
"Aren't
360
You Kind
of
Glad
We
Did,"
370
INDEX
Arlen, Harold, 134, 250, 292, 302,

313, 320; cited, 180-81
Armitage, Merle, 277, 304

Armstrong, Louis, 218
Arndt, Felix, 60
Askin, Harry, 68, 74-75, 247
Berlin, Irving, 18, 20, 22, 49, 55-58,

60, 72-74, 78, 85, 96, 180, 242,
Astaire, Adele, 54, 122-24, 134, 139,
153, 187, 352, 353, 354

Astaire, Fred, 54, 156, 184, 290, 307,
313, 320, 353, 354, 355
At
Home
Abroad, 261
Babbitt and the Bromide," "The,

154-56, 199, 352
"Baby, It's Cold Outside," 242
Bad Boy of Music, 166
Bainter, Fay, 202
Baker, Kenny, 309, 353
Baker, Lorin, 354
Balanchine, George, 294, 310
de Monte Carlo, 114,
294, 313-M
Bargy, Roy, 157, 3 16
Barkleys of Broadway,
The,
291,
313, 320
Barnes, Howard, cited, 291
Barnes, Irving, 282
Bayes, Nora, 53, 76-78, 86, 188
Be
Yourself, 126,
267 290 298, 304

Bernie, Ben, 188
Bernstein, Leonard, 17, 27, 318
Woman Now,"
"Bess, You Is
My
269, 275, 315, 326, 352, 360, 361
Atkinson, Brooks, cited, 153, 225-26,

243, 268, 282-83
Atteridge, Harold, 59
Auer, Leopold, 236
Auric, Georges, 162
Ayers, Catherine, 282
Ballet Russe
Benvenuti, Giuseppe, 114

Berg, Alban, 26, 163
"Berkeley Square and Kew," 128
Berlin, Ellen, 195-96
205
Bech, Holger, 279

"Bedelia," 53
Beggar on Horseback, 205
Behrman, S. N., 100-101, 188; cited,
130, 267
Belle Paree, La, 57
Bellows, George, 131
Benatzsky, Dr. Ralph, 281
Benchley, Robert, 154
Bennett, Robert Russell, 315
Bennison, Louis, 94
Bettis, Valerie,
"Bidin'
My
"Billy,"
71
94
Time," 199, 220, 352
Binney, Constance, 121

Birth of the Blues," "The, 121
Black, Frank, 189
Blitzstein, Marc, 318
Bloch, Ernest, 150
Bloom, Ben, 50
Bloom, Rube, 182, 250

"Blowing the Blues Away," 151
Blue Monday, 91-93, 102, 140, 335.
See also 135th Street
"Blue Monday Blues," 92
"Blues" Sonata (Ravel), 27
Bohm, Adolph, 69
Bohm, Andreas, 281
Bold, Richard, 92
Bolin, Nick, 318
Bolitho, William, cited, 206
Bolton, Guy, 68-69, *22, 128, 137,
152, 217
Bontemps, Arna, cited, 318
Bordoni, Irene, 94, 99, 353
Boris Godunov, 273
Boston Evening Transcript, 98, 214,
267
Boston Herald, 214, 268
Botkin, Henry, 190, 257, 301, 319;
cited, 191-92, 266
"Boy, What Love Has Done to Me,"
220, 352
Braggioti, Mario, 162
Breen, Robert, 282
Brems, Else, 279
INDEX
371
Brice,
Fanny, 195
Briggs, Hedley, 170

Broadway Brevities of 1920, 94,
334
Catlett, Walter, 123, 354

Cerf, Bennett, cited, 236-37
Chaplin, Charles, 99, 293-94
Broder and Schlam, 51
Charig,
Brodsky, Irving, 315

Broekman, David, 304, 315, 316
Brown, Anne, 263, 266, 280, 307,
311, 352
Brown, John Mason, cited, 203, 268
Bruskin, Rose. See Gershwin, Rose
Bruskin
Bubbles, John W., 263-64, 266, 277,
159, 189
Chariot's Revue, 99, 151
Chevalier, Maurice, 99
353, 355
Buchanan, Jack, 240-41
Buck, Ford L., 266
Buck, Gene, 305
Burke, Billie, 89
Burke, Georgia, 282
"But Not for Me," 221, 352, 359
Butterworth, Charles, 151

"Buzzard Song," 266, 282, 325
"By Strauss," 313

"By the Light of the
Silvery
Moon,"
70-71,
81-83,
52
Caesar,
Irving,
54,
134-35
Cahan, Rabbi Judah, 318
California Sketches,
318
Calloway, Cab, 282
Camp, Rosemary
de,
311
Canisbrooke, Lord and Lady, 134

"Can't We Be Friends," 177
Capitol Revue, 79, 81-82, 333
Carmichael, Hoagy, 180, 304
Carnovsky, Morris, 311
"Carolina in the Morning," 96
Caron, Leslie, 312
Carpenter, John Alden, 27
Carpentier, Georges, 99
Carson, Doris, 353
Carson, Jack, 227
Carter,
Desmond, 128
Casella, Alfredo, 170

Castle, Irene, 56, 69
Castle, Vernon, 56
Phil,
101,
134,
142,
151,
"Chinatown, My Chinatown," 52
Chopin, Frederic, 47, 117
Chotzinoff, Samuel, 101, 133, 188,
213, 317; cited, 143, 169, 269
Christian Science Monitor, 214, 268
"Clap Yo' Hands," 153, 353, 360
Clark, Bobby, 309
Clark, Dorothy, 98
Clark, Helen, 354
Clements, Dudley, 355

Cleve, Nathan van, 315
Cliff,
Laddy, 84
Clipper, The, 54, 86

Coates, Albert, 147, 230-31, 331
Coburn, Charles, 311
Coconuts, The, 205

Cohan, George M., 53, 305
Colbert, Helen, 282
Coleman, Warren, 266

Collier, Constance, 298
Collier's, 182
"Come
to the Moon," 81-82

"Comes the Revolution," 242
Compton, Betty, 152
Concerto for Piano and Orchestra

(Copland), 27
Concerto for the Left Hand (Ravel),
27
Concerto in F, 23, 24, 97-98, 116,
141-48, 151, 160, 169, 189, 208,
231, 232, 247, 296, 313, 315, 317,
330, 348, 349, 356-57, 362
Confrey, Zez, 107, 110
Connelly, Marc, 126, 317
Cook, Joe, 75
Cooper, Betty, 353
Copland, Aaron, 27, 318, 319
Cordy, Claire, 281
Cortes, Ramiro, 318
372
INDEX
Cotton, Will, 131
"Could You Use Me/' 199, 221

Countess Maritza, The, 163
Country Girl, A, 320
Cover
Girl,
319
Cowell, Henry, cited, 150, 237

Crawford, Cheryl, 278
Crawford, Joseph, 282
Creation du Monde, La (Milhaud),
Diari de Barcelona, 286

Dietz, Howard, 71, 188, 261
Dillingham, Charles, 69, 100
Discoveries of a Music Critic, 269
Dixon, Harland, 353
"Do, Do, Do," 153, 160, 197, 353,

359, 360, 361
"Do
It
Again," 94, 96-97, 99, 189,
353
Dolin, Anton, 160
27
"Creole Belles," 51
Crosby, Bing, 320
Crowther, Bosley, 312
Csaby, Laslo, 281
Cuban Overture, 24, 25, 230-32, 331,
357
Cugat, Xavier, 182
Cutter, Benjamin, 24
Donahue, Jack, 114

Donaldson, Walter, 96
Donaldson, Will, 20, 59
"Don't Forget Me," 137
Dooley, Johnny, 152
Dority, Brian, 318
Dowdy, Helen, 266, 282
Downes,
Olin, 144, 215; cited, 112-
13, 141, 170, 268,
278
Dale, Alan, cited, 124

Dallas Times Herald, 283
Daly, William Merigan, 99-100, 122,
135, 142, 187, 189, 231-33, 294
Damrosch, Dr. Walter, 98, 105, 107,
141, 143, 148-49, 163, 169, 187,
250, 305, 311, 330, 331; cited, 146
Damsel in Distress, A, 291, 314, 347
Dancing Girl, The, 94, 346
"Dancing Shoes," 58, 94
Dandy, Dr. Walter E., 300-301
Dangerous Maid, A, 58, 94, 122,
126, 335
Darnton, Charles, cited, 93
Davies, Marion, 69
Davis, Blevins, 282, 285
Davis, Henry, 266
Davis, Owen, 39
Dreigroschenoper, Die, 27
Dresser, Louise, 74-75, 101
of a New Day, 316

Debussy, Claude, 26, 27, 47, 62, 117,
144, 164, 165, 168
Ed Wynn
Delicious, 211,
Ellington,
Dawn
Dere Mabel,
347
Dresser, Paul, 74
Dreyfus, Max, 56-57, 69, 74-76, 83,
135, 181, 187, 247, 288-89, 302
"Drifting Along with the Tide," 58
Duke, Vernon, 27, 134, 162, 180,
181, 188, 303, 305, 309-10; cited,
84, 195-97
Dulcy, 205
Duncan, Todd, 263, 266, 280, 307,

352, 353; cited, 265
Durante, Jimmie, 203
Dushkin, Samuel, 157
Dvorak, Antonin, 41
Earl and the Girl, The, 57
East Is West, 202, 221
Carnival, 94, 344
Edens, Robert, 219

Eisenhower, Dwight D., cited, 285
Duke, 203
344
De Sylva, B. G. (Bud), 65-66, 71,
81, 90-92, 121, 127-28, 134, 330
Emil, 319
Elman, Mischa, 107
Elzy, Ruby, 265, 266, 307
Diaghilev, Serge, cited, 161
"Embraceable You," 22, 199, 202,

221, 353, 359, 361-62
Dial, The,
96
94, 121,
Ellis,
INDEX
373
"Entrance of the Swiss Army," 207

Epps, Fred von, 315
Ernst, Hugh C, cited, 109
Europe, Jim, 41, 75
Eva
Jessye Choir, 266, 282

"Everybody Stop," 56
"Everybody's Doin' It," 56

Everybody's Magazine, 99
Foursome, The, 352

Foy, Eddie, Jr., 354
Fray, Jacques, 162
Freedley, Vinton, 121-22, 125, 137,
152, 218, 240-41
French Doll, The, 94, 345
Friml, Rudolf, 74, 136-37
Frohman, Charles, 65
Fuller, Lorenzo, 282
Funk,
Fairbanks, Douglas, 99
Manuel
Falla,
de, 179
210
"Fascinating Rhythm," 123-24, 127,
184, 231, 314, 353, 360, 361
Federlein, Gottfried H., 305
"Feeling I'm Falling," 203
Emmy, 281
"Funny Face," 360

Funny Face, 153-55,
162, 289, 339
Farrell, Charles,
Feist,
Leo, 51
Gabriel, Gilbert W., cited, 112

Gaburo Kenneth, 318
Ganny, Countess de, 173-74
Garland, Judy, 84, 310, 320
Ferber, Edna, 100

"Fidgety Feet," 153
Field, Marshall, 290
Gauthier, Eva, 96-98, 134, 156, 161,

187, 267, 303, 354
Gaxton, William, 222, 242, 354, 355
Benny, 93, 141

Fields, Herbert, 240-41
Gensler, Lewis, 126
Fields,
Lew, 69
Henry T., cited, 112
Fine and Dandy, 177
Finston, Nathaniel, 307, 316
Fields,
Finck,
Firefly,
The, 74
Fish, Sidney, 133

Fish, Mrs. Sidney,
98
Harry Harkness, 141
Fledermaus, Die, 163
Foch, Nina, 312
Foggy Day," "A, 291, 360
Follow the Fleet, 290
Fontaine, Joan, 291
For Goodness Sake, 94, 122, 128,
313, 345
"For You, For Me, For Evermore,"
312
Ford, Edsel, 133
Ford, Helen, 94
Ford, Henry, 70
Forsyth, Cecil, 24
Foster, Stephen, 82
"Four Little Sirens We," 128
Flagler,
Gaynor, Janet, 211

George, Earl, 318
George Gershwin,
S. S., 317
George Gershwin Memorial Award,
318
George Gershwin Memorial Collection, 318
George Gershwin Theater, 319
George Gershwin Theater Workshop
Arena, 319
George Gershwin's Song Book, 209
George White's Scandals. See Scandals, George White's
Gershwin, Arthur, 32, 101, 129, 302
Gershwin, Frances. See Godowsky,
Frances Gershwin
Gershwin, George: art collection of,

190; awards and honors, 304, 31719; birth and childhood, 31-50;
character and personality, 98-99,
179-87, 194-95, 261-64; as collaborator with Ira, 126, 128, 138-39,
151, 153, 155, 194-95, 197-200;
as
composer
for
motion pictures,
INDEX
374
210-11, 290-94; as conductor, 2089; final illness and death, 296-303;

funeral
and
memorial
services,
119, 304-8; health, 185-86, 248;

and musicians, 179-83, 250; and
Negro jazz, 20, 41, 102-4, 146,
275-76; as painter, 190-93, 319; as
pianist, 235-39, 247-48; piano rolls
made
by, 236; posthumous repu-
tation, 15-19, 309-20; psychoanalysis of, 34, 185, 289, 298-99; as

radio broadcaster, 249-50; recordings made by, 236, 360-62; residences of, 129-31, 187-90, 234-35;
social life, 98-101, 133-36, 234-39,
292-93; as song plugger, 50-56;
study of music, 43-48, 61-63, 14950, 243-46; travels in Europe, 12728, 158-64; and Paul Whiteman,
101-19; and women, 173-78, 29394; working habits, 131-32
Gershwin, Ira, 30-35, 38-40, 43, 49,
64, 71, 104-5, 119, 137, 149, 15859, 176, 187-88, 191, 205, 234-35,
246, 247, 259-60, 270, 282, 292,
294, 299-302, 308, 312, 316, 317;
career as librettist, 85-86, 90, 101,
126, 128, 138-39, 151, 153, 155,
194-95, 197-200, 207, 210, 220,
222, 241, 253, 272-73, 309-10,
313, 319-20, 331, 332; character
and
personality, 194-97
Gershwin, Judy, 32
Gershwin, Leonore
Strunsky, 72,
129, 158, 187, 195-96, 234, 259,
282, 287, 292, 298-302, 317
Gershwin, Mark George, 32

Gershwin, Morris, 29-37, 50, 82, 132
Gershwin, Rose Bruskin, 29-34, 37,
39-40, 43, 50, 298, 302, 304, 307,
317, 3i8
Gershwin Memorial Concerts, 307-8,
316,
Gershwin Memorial Contest, 317-18

Gershwin Myth," "The, 232
Gershwin Publishing Co., 288-89
Gest, Morris,
334
"Get Happy," 181
Gilman, Lawrence, cited, 113, 143,
169-70, 214-15, 268-69
Girl Crazy, 137, 217-21, 340-41, 358,
359
Crazy (movie), 310, 350, 351,
358
Girl from Utah, The, 56-57
Giskin, Ossip, 305
Givot, George, 241
Girl
Glaenzer, Jules, 98-99, 107, 127, 133,

148, 161, 171, 212, 303
"God Send You Back
to Me," 53
Goddard, Paulette, 293-94, 298
Godowsky, Frances Gershwin, 30-33,
119, 129, 158, 160, 302, 307
Godowsky, Georgia, 33
Godowsky, Leopold, 32, 48, 107, 236
Godowsky, Leopold, Jr., 32-33, 119
Goetschius, Percy, 24
Goetz, E. Ray, 90
Goff, Jerry, 354, 355
Goldberg, Isaac, 303
Golden, John, 85
Goldman, Edwin Franko, 305
Goldmark, Rubin, 85, 150
Goldwyn, Samuel, 294, 299, 310
Goldwyn
Follies,
The, 294, 309-10,
313, 348
Golschmann, Vladimir, 147, 160

Judge, 70, 79, 344
Goodman, Benny, 221, 316
Gorman, Ross, 23, 111
Gorn, Isadore, 156
Gould, Morton, 316
Grable, Betty, 312
Green, Johnny, 180, 182
Green Grow the Lilacs, 293
Good Morning,
Grofe, Ferde, 91, 93, 101-2, 105,

115-16, 140, 187, 232, 303, 307
Grossmith, George, 128
Guetary, Georges, 312
Guggenheimer, Mrs. Charles S., 307
Gullah Negroes, 257-58
Gumble, Mose,
50, 53-54, 58,
67
375
INDEX
Hadley, Henry, 208-209

Haig, Emma, 136
Hale, Philip, cited, 214
Half of It Dearie Blues," "The, 360,
361
Half-Past Eight, 76, 81, 333
Hall Johnson Choir, 307
Hambitzer, Charles, 20, 44-50, 57,
61-62, 71, 149
Hambitzer, Mitzi, 47
Hambro, Leonid, 209
Hamilton, Cosmo, 122
Hammerstein, Oscar,
252, 293,
II,
136,
19,
307, 310, 319;
cited,
306-7
Hammond,
Percy, cited, 136-37, 153
Henderson, William
J.,
105; cited,
112, 143, 169, 215

Henson, Leslie, 128, 139
Herbert, Victor, 26, 68-69, 80, 106,
108-109, 111, 122

Hereford, Kathryn, 354
"He's a-gone, gone, gone," 274, 324,
325
Heyward, Dorothy, 210, 252, 270,
287, 332
Heyward, DuBose, 210, 251-58, 270,
^ 272-73, 276, 278, 332
"Hiawatha," 51
Hindemith, Paul, 26, 27
"Hindustan," 82
Hitchy-Koo of 1918, 70, 343-44
Hands Up, 100

"Hang on to Me," 360
Hoctor, Harriet, 203

Hoeree, Arthur, cited, 160-61
Harbach, Otto, 136

Harburg, Erwin "Yip," 64, 292, 299,
302
Harlem River Chantey," "The, 139
Harmati, Sandor, 232
Hofmann, Josef, 236

Holman, Libby, 177
Harmonic Analysis, 24
Harms, T. B., 56, 74-75,
Hope, Bob, 313

81,
116,
134-35, 288-89
Harris, Charles K., 51
Harris, Sam H., 241, 306
Hart, Charles, 93, 141
Hart, Edward, 156
Hart, Lorenz, 304; cited, 138
Hart, Moss, 198, 239, 259, 292, 301,
319
Hart, Vivian, 205
Hartman, Paul, 227
Harty, Sir Hamilton, 215
Harvey, Katherine, 281
"Has Anybody Seen My Joe," 85, 92

Hayes, Roland, 267
Haymes, Dick, 312
Hayworth, Rita, 319
Hazard, John E. (Jack), 81
Hegobourn, Loulou, 91
Heifetz, Jascha, 99, 107, 133,
236, 311, 315, 3i6
Hellman, Lillian, 188, 292
157,
Holtz, Lou, 88, 136

Honegger, Arthur, 168
Hoogstraten, Willem van, 208
Hopkins, Peggy, 69
Hornblow, Arthur, cited, 89

"How About a Man Like Me
Girl Like You," 207
for a
"How Long Has
This Been Going

On?" 202, 359, 360
Howard, Willie, 217, 221, 352
Howley and Haviland, 74
Hughes, Edwin, 17; cited, 106

Hughes, Elinor, cited, 268
Humoresque, 41
Hutcherson, LaVern, 282
Hutcheson, Ernest, 106, 142, 149
Hutton, Betty, 313
Hye-Knudsen, Johan, 279
T Can Do Without Broadway," 204

Can Hear the Ukeleles Calling
Me," 71
T Got Plenty o' Nuttm " 276, 315,
325, 353, 359, 361
'I
INDEX
576
Got Rhythm," 218-20, 231, 248-
"I
49, 314, 316, 353, 361
"I Loves
You Porgy," 275, 327
Make
"I
Hay When
Moon
the
Jolson, Al, 83-84, 204, 252, 305, 307,
3ii, 354
Jolson Story, The, 84
Jonny spielt auf, 27, 163
Shines," 128
Joplin, Scott,
Want To Be a War Bride," 360

Was Doing All Right," 361
Was So Young, You Were So
Jubilee,
"I
"I
"I
Beautiful," 70, 80
"I'd Rather Charleston,"
360
Build a Stairway to Paradise,"

90, 96-97, 189, 353, 360
"I'll Show You a Wonderful World,"
60
239
June Moon, 216
Jungwirth, Manfred, 281
"Just Tell Them That You Saw Me,"
74
"I'll
<
334
"I'm About
To Become a Mother,"
225
"I'm
,
a Typical Self-Made American,"

See
Typical
Self-Made
American," "A,
"I'm Going To See My Mother," 92

"In the Mandarin's Orchid Garden,"
202, 331
"In the Shade of the Old Apple
^ Tree," 52, 53
"Innocent Ingenue Baby," 94, 96
"Isn't It a Pity,"
"Isn't It Terrible
Mary Queen
360
What They Did
to
of Scots," 128
"It Ain't Necessarily So," 264, 276,
^79, 315, 326, 353, 359, 360, 361
"It take a long pull to get there,"
274, 325
307
Got a Crush on You,"
313, 353, 359
Iturbi, Jose,
"I've
19, 207,
Jackson, Arthur, 81, 88-90

Jackson, Fred, 80
Jaffe,
Max, 96
Jahn, Julius Albert, 44

James, Joseph, 282
Jazz, 108
Jessel, George, 302-3, 307
Johnson, J. Rosamond, 266, 267
Jolly Tar and the Milkmaid," "The,
291
Kahn, Otto H., 125, 133, 256;
cited,
171-72
Kaleidophone, 244
Kalman, Emerich, 163
Kalmar, Bert, 134, 292
Kanneworff, Paul, 279
Kartum, Leon, 114
Kaufman, George
S., 126, 205, 216,

236, 238-39, 241, 303
Kaufman, Harry, 147, 307
Kaun, Hugo, 45
Kay, Ulysses, 318
Kearns, Allen, 137, 153, 217, 353,
354, 355
Keeler, Ruby, 203, 204, 353
Kelly, Gene, 156,
312
Kennedy, John, 182
Kent, Carl, 314
Kent, Duke, 134, 159
Kern, Jerome, 22, 26, 55, 56-57, 60,
68, 69, 71, 72, 74, 77-78, 84, 96,
180, 182, 191, 252, 290, 310, 319
Khessin, Prof. A., 280
"Kickin' the Clouds," 360
Kilenyi, Edward, 61-63, 71, n6,
150, 208
Kilenyi, Edward,
King of
61
115
Jr.,
Jazz, The,
Kisch, Josef, 281

Klemperer, Otto, 307
Knecht, Joseph, 45
Kober, Arthur, 188, 292, 301
Koch, Howard, 310

Kochanski, Paul, 133
Kolisch, Rudolf, 163
377
INDEX
Kolodin, Irving, cited, 314

Kosta, Tessa, 136
Koussevitsky, Serge, 147,
213-14,
267, 318, 331; cited, 236, 238, 303
Kovacs, Desider, 280-81
Kreisler, Fritz, 107,
236
Krenek, Ernst, 27, 163

Kronenberger, Louis, 155
Krupa, Gene, 221
Kurka, Robert, 318
Ladies
First, 77,
86
"Lady Be Good." See "Oh, Lady Be

Good"
Lady Be Good, 122-26, 137-39, 153
184, 337, 359
Lady Be Good (movie), 310, 351

Lady in Red, The 79, 344
Lady in the Dark, A, 198, 319
Lady Says Yes, The, 32
La Guardia, Fiorello, 305
Lahr, Bert, 313
Lake, Harriet, 227
La, La Lucille, 70, 80-81, 83, 121,
247, 334
Lambert, Constant, 27
Langford, Frances, 304
Langley, William Lincoln, cited,
232-33
Lannin, Paul, 122, 126
Lardner, Ring, 216
Lasky, Jesse, 317
Last Time I Saw Paris," "The, 310
Laughter in the Next Room, 133
Lawrence, Gertrude, 99, 151-53,
159, 203, 319, 353, 354
Lawson, John Howard, 127
Lazarin, Louis, 355
Lee, Sammy, 125, 303
Leeds, Andrea, 309
Leeman, George B., 315-16
Lehar, Franz, 163

Leonardos, Urylee, 282
Let 'Em Eat Cake, 241-43, 341-42
"Let's Call the Whole Thing Off,"
314, 353
and Make Up," 154, 360
"Let's Kiss
Levant, Oscar, 77, 182, 188-89, 213,

231, 237, 250, 292, 301, 307, 311,
317
Levien, Sonya, 310
Levitzki, Mischa, 188
Levy, Paul, 299

Library of Congress, 117, 235
Liebling, Leonard, cited, 106
Life, 85
Lightner, Winnie, 90, 354
Lights of Leamy, The, 293
Lillie, Beatrice, 99,
List,
261, 313
Eugene, 17
Liszt, Franz, 47, 73, 117

Little Miss Bluebeard, 346
Little
Show, 177
"Liza," 204, 231, 353, 359
Loeb, Philip, 242

Loesser, Frank, 242
Logan, Ella, 309
London Daily Herald, 284
London Morning Post, 215

"Long Ago and Far Away," 319
Long, Avon, 277
Look Who's Here, 79, 344-45
"Looking for a Boy," 138, 353, 359
Lopez, Vincent, 60
"Love
Is
Here To Stay,"
19,
309,
313, 353, 359

t
"Love
Is
Sweeping the Country,"
314, 353
Love Wager, The, 46

"Love Walked In," 309, 312, 353,
359, 361
Lucas, Nick, 353
"Lullaby" (string quartet), 85
Lyons, Arthur, 297, 301
Lyric Suite (Berg), 163
Mace, Jed, 282

Magnin, Rabbi Edgar F., 304, 306
Mahagonny, 17
Makers of the Modern World, 26
Making of a Girl," "The, 59
INDEX
378
Mamoulian,
Rouben, 262-65, 267,

277, 278, 311; cited, 237-38, 259-
Miller, Glenn,
61
201
"Mine," 242-43, 354, 359
Man
Love," "The, 19, 22, 124-25,

231, 249, 353-54, 359, 360, 361
Man That Got Away," "The, 320
Mandel, Frank, 120
Mannes, Leopold, 33
Maple Leaf Rag," "The, 60
"Marie from Sunny Italy," 56
Marum, Eleonor, 202, 331
Marx
Brothers, 68, 71,
205
Mascagni, Pietro, 61
Massine, Leonide, 314
Material Used in Musical Composition,
24
Mattheus, Edward, 266, 352

Maxwell, Elsa, 173, 239
"Maybe," 153, 359, 361

McBride, Henry, cited, 193
McBride, Margaret, 108
McCormack, John,
85, 107
McCurry, John, 282

McDonald, Ballard, 90
McDonald, Gertrude, 354
McEvoy, J. P., 151, 203
McGowan,
Jack, 92-93, 141, 217

McGuire, Anthony, 202, 203
Meek, Donald, 227
Melton, James, 247
Melvin, Edwin F., cited 267-68
Mencken, H. L., 65-66
Menjou, Adolph, 309
Mennin, Peter, 318
Merman,
cited,
Ethel, 307, 352, 353, 354;
218-20
We Roll Along, 239

Merry-Go-Round, 32
Merry Widow, The, 163
Merton of the Movies, 205
Merrily
Metropolitan Opera, 209, 231, 256,
318
Meyer, Elizabeth, 301
Meyer, Joe, 71, 134
Michaelson, Nick, 56
Milhaud, Darius, 27, 162, 168
221
Miller, Jack, 44
Miller, Marilyn,
Minick, 205
1917, 68-69, 89, 247
Mississippi Suite (Grofe), 140
Mm
Mistinguette, 99
Mitchell, Abbie, 266,
354
Modern Music, 269

Moore, Victor, 151-52, 154, 222, 224,
242
Moran, Lois, 242, 354, 355
Morel, Jean, 315
Morgan, Helen, 151
Morris Gest Midnight Whirl, The,
79, 334
Mosbacher, Emil, 48, 259, 300
Mountbatten, Lord Louis, 99, 134,
159
Mountbatten, Lady Louis, 99, 125,
134, 159
Muir, Louis, 58
Munson, Ona, 88
Murphy, George, 353
Music Critics Circle, 278
Musical America, 16, 106, 147, 164,
277
Musical Courier, 106, 230
Mussorgsky, Modest, 273
"My Man's Gone Now," 275, 325,
360
"My One and Only," 359, 360, 361
Nafziger, Dr. Howard, 300-301
Nagel, Conrad, 304
Nast, Conde, 133, 269
Nathan, George Jean, 65-66, 232;
cited, 226-27
Neamchinova, Mme. Vera, 160
Neues vom Tage, 27

Moon, 201
New
New
Poor, The, 122
"New
New
New
Step Everyday," 90
York American, 85
York Evening Mail, 73
INDEX
379
New
York Herald Tribune, 73, 104,
278, 287, 291, 317
New
New
New
York Post, 93
York Sun, 85, 124, 141
York Times, 45, 100, 233, 271-
73, 277, 280, 281, 284, 285-86,

290, 312
New York World, 93, 97, 133, 149,
206
New
New
Yorker, The, 130, 215, 314

Yorkers, The (ballet), 314
Newsweek, 243, 246, 312

"Nice Work If You Can Get
It,"
291,
360
"Oh, You Beautiful Doll," 52, 53

O'Hara, John, 303
Oklahoma, 293
135th Street, 25, 41, 85, 93-94, 14041, 330. See also Blue Monday
Opdycke, Mary, 98
Opera News, 98
Orchestration, 24
Ornstein, Leo, 48
Osgood, H. O., 106; cited, 112
Out Madame, 122
Our Nell, 94, 100, 336
Ouwerx, John, 114
"Overflow, Overflow," 274, 324
Nichols, Red, 221

Nifties of 1923, 346
"Nightie Night," 360
9:15 Revue, 181
Nina, the Pinta, and
Maria," "The, 320
Paderewski, Ignace, 100

Paley, Emily Strunsky, 71-72, 301
Paley, Herman, 71
the
Santa
"No One Else," 94

"Nobody But You," 81, 354
"Nobody Wants Me," 151
301-2, 307
My English, 174-75, 240-41,
Pardon
342
Noguchi, Isamu, 190

"Nola," 60
Norby, Einar, 279
North Star, 319

Nugent, Frank S.,
cited,
Parker, H. T., cited, 98, 214, 225
Passing Show of 1914, The, 88

Passing Show of 1916, The, 59, 343
Passport to Paris, 84, 195-97
290
Paul, Elliot, 310

Pearl, Jack, 241
"O Land of Mine," 84-85

"O So La Mi," 136
Pennington, Ann, 69, 88-89
O'Dea, June, 353
"Of Thee
Of Thee I
Sing," 225,
Perfect Fool, The, 94, 345

Perfect Lady, The. See Sweet Little
354
Sing, 217, 221-28, 241-42,
341, 358, 359
"Oh, Fabulous One in Your Ivory

Tower," 319
Oh Kay, 151-53, 159, 197, 338-39
"Oh, Lady Be Good," 124, 354, 360,
36i
"Oh Lawd, I'm on My Way to a

Heavenly Land," 274, 315, 329
"Oh Lawd, Oh My Jesus, Rise Up

An' Follow Him Home," 274
"Oh So Nice," 203, 360
"Oh, the train
is
Paley, Lou, 71-72, 82, 104, 301

Paley, William, 212
Pallay, George, 72, 292, 298, 299,
at the station,"
325
Devil
Perilman, Dr. Nathan A., 305
Peyser, Herbert F., 170
Piano
rolls,
made by Gershwin,
60,
236
Piano Transcriptions of 18 Songs,
33i
Piastro, Mishel,
315
Picasso, Pablo, 190

Pickford, Mary, 99
Pilcer, Harry,
84
281
Pleasants, Henry, cited, 22
Pistorius, Karl,
380
INDEX
Pons, Lily, 307

Popov, Konstanin, 280
Porgy, 210, 251-52, 259, 332
Porgy and Bess, 19, 23-26, 41, 96,
172, 245-46, 250-88, 315, 332,
357, 359, 362; plot synopsis, 323-
Reiner, Fritz, 147, 315
Reinshagen, Victor, 281

Reisman, Leo, 246-47, 332
Remick, Jerome K., 50-51, 53, 59,
Primrose, 128, 337
66-68, 69-70, 100, 289

Revere, Amy, 354
Reynolds,
Herbert.
See Rourke,
Michael E.
Rhapsody in Blue, 17, 22-25, 27, 35,
104-6, 109, 111-19, 121, 135, 141,
143-47, 156, 159-60, 163, 183,
189, 208, 212, 213, 215, 231, 236,
247, 257, 270, 315-18, 33o, 348,
358, 362
Rhapsody in Blue (movie), 93, 115,
241, 310-12, 348
Rhene-Baton, M., 159, 162
Rialto Ripples, 20, 59-60
Riggs, Lynn, 293
Processional, 127
Prokofiev, Serge, 161-62
Pryor, Arthur, 83
Rivera, Diego, 290

Roberti, Lyda, 240-41
29
Porter, Cole, 18, 133, 160, 239, 241,
267, 304
"Posterity Is Just
ner," 225
Potter, Paul,
Around the Cor-
65
Poulenc, Francis, 162, 168, 170

Powell, Eleanor, 310
Preludes for Piano, 156-57, 316, 331,
357, 360, 362
Previn, Charles, 83, 246-47, 307, 332
Price, Leontyne,
282
Rio Grande (Lambert), 27
"Put on Your Old Gray Bonnet," 52

"Put Your Arms Around Me, Honey,"
40
Rachmaninoff, Sergei, 107, 311
Ragtime (Stravinsky), 27
Ragtime and piano rags, 20, 56-57,
59-6o
Rainbow Revue, The,
127,
336
Raksin, David, 314

Rand, Dr. Carl A., 300, 301
Rasch, Albertina, 162, 203
Rascher, Sigurd, 157, 316
Ravel, Maurice, 26, 27, 47, 154, 16162, 183, 231, 236, 311
Raymond, Jack, 284

Raymond, Lewis, 157, 316
Real American Folk Song," "The,
77, 86-87, 126
"Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm," 52
Red-Headed Woman Makes a Choochoo Jump Its Tracks," "A, 276,
327
Reich, Willi, 281
Robertson, Grey, 136

Robinson, Edward G., 292, 307
Rocca, Lodovico, 210
Rochberg, George, 318
Rodgers, Richard, 19, 27, 138, 226,
238, 293, 304
Rodzinski, Artur, 316
Rogers, Ginger, 217,
313, 320, 352, 353
Romberg,
Sigmund,
221, 290-91,
59,
201-2
Rovell, Ann, 181
Rooney, Mickey, 310

Rorem, Ned, 318
Rosalie, 201-2,
339
Rosanoff, Marie, 178
Rosen, Max, 42, 48

Rosenfeld, Paul, cited, 269
Rosenthal, Moriz, 107
Roth, Murray, 58-59
Roth, Wolfgang, 282
Rouault, Georges, 191
Rourke, Michael E., 84
Rowland, Adele, 70
94,
136,
381
INDEX
R.S.V.P., i 73
Rubinstein, Beryl, 315; cited, 95-96
Ruby, Harry, 54-55, 134, 183-84,
292, 302
Rudley, Herbert, 311

Rugel, Yvette, 88
Runaway Girl," "The, 59
Ryan, Coletta, 92
Ryskind, Morrie, 71, 206, 241
Go Home," 56
"Sadie Salome
Saga of Jimmy," "The, 319

St. Cecilia
Academy, Rome, 304
"Sam and
Delilah," 218, 220, 354

Sanborn, Pitts, 231; cited, 106, 113,
143
163
Sari,
Satie, Erik,
27
Savo, Jimmie, 205

Sawyer, Charles Pike, cited, 93
Scandals, George White's, 69, 88-90,
102; of 1919, 88-89; of 1920, 334;
of 1921, 58, 335; of 1922, 90, 92330, 335; of 1923,
1924, 90, 121, 336
Schacht, Al, 183
93,
Scheff, Fritzi,
of
354
Schillinger, Joseph, 243-46,
Arnold,
26,
259
46,
182,
183, 191, 292, 303, 304
Schuman, William, 318

Schwab, Laurence, 120
Schwartz, Arthur, 135-36, 180, 261
Schwartzwald, Milton, 126
Scott, Hazel, 311
282
Second Man, The, 101
Second Rhapsody, 23, 25, 35, 21115, 331, 347, 358
Scott, Leslie,
Seely, Blossom, 93, 141

Segal, Vivienne, 69
Segall, Dr. Gabriel, 297, 300,
Seldes, Gilbert, 107; cited, 96
We Dance," 360
We Dance, 290-91,
313, 348
Shapero, Harold, 318
Shaw, Artie, 182

Shaw, Oscar, 152, 227
Shilkret, Nathaniel, 307
"Shine on, Harvest Moon," 52
Shocking Miss Pilgrim, The, 178.
312, 348-49
Short Story, 157
Shostakovich, Dimitri, 280
"Shouting," 258, 274, 276, 327
Show Girl, 170, 187, 202-4, 340
Show Is On, The, 313, 346
Shrine," "The, 65
Siegel, Al, 219
Simmel, Dr. Ernest, 298, 299
Sinbad, 79, 83, 344
"Since I Found You," 48
Sigueiros, David Alfaro, 232
Siren's Song," "The, 96
Sirmay, Dr. Albert, 135, 179, 289
Sitwell, Sir Osbert, cited,
133-34
The, 165, 168
Skyscrapers (Carpenter), 27
"Slap That Bass," 291
Sloane, Baldwin, 77-78
Six,
Sloper, L. A., cited, 214, 268

Smallens, Alexander, 263, 267, 281,
282, 307
46
Schilling, Margaret,
Schoenberg,
336;
"Shall
Shall
301
"Seventeen and Twenty-One," 360
Smart
Set, 65,
85
Smattering of Ignorance, A, 77
Smith, Gerald Oliver, 152
Smith, Gordon, 353
Smith, Moses, cited, 267
Smith, Paul Gerard, 154
Smith, Queenie, 137, 353, 355
Snyder, Ted, 56
"So Am I," 124, 354
"So Are You," 204, 354
"So I Ups to Him," 203-4
Solow, Eugene, 301
"Some Far-Away Someone," 128
"Some Rain Must Fall," 58, 94
"Some Wonderful
74, 77, 80
Sort of Someone,"
382
INDEX
"Somebody Loves Me,"
36, 90-91
313, 354, 359, 360, 362
"Someone To Watch Over Me,"
153,
313, 354, 359, 360, 361
"Something About Love," 80

Song of the Cossacks," "The, 137
Song of the Flame, 136-37, 337-38
Sonnerstedt, Bernhard, 280
"Soon," 207, 354, 359, 361
Sothern, Ann, 227, 310
Soudekeine, Serge, 263
Sousa, John Philip, 85, 107
Spaeth, Sigmund, 267; cited, 73
Spearman, Raun, 94
Spice of 1922, 94, 345
"Stairway to Paradise." See "111
Build a Stairway to Paradise"
Star Is Born, A, 84, 313, 320
Steinert, Alexander, 263, 264, 270,
277, 292, 294, 301, 307
Stern, Joseph W., 51
Sterne, Maurice, 190
"Stiff Upper Lip," 360
Stokowski, Leopold, 107, 162-63, 304

Stone, Gregory, 157, 315, 316
Stop Flirting, 122, 128

Stothart, Herbert, 137
Stransky, Joseph, 85
Straton, John Roach, 147
Strauss, Mme. Johann, 163
Stravinsky, Igor, 26, 27, 107, 133,
183, 311
"Strike Up the Band," 231, 314, 354,
359, 361
Strike Up the Band, 125, 205-7, 209,
217, 222, 340
Strike Up the Band (movie), 350
Strunsky, Emily. See Paley, Emily
Strunsky
Leonore. See Gershwin,
Leonore Strunsky
Stuckenschmidt, H. H., 284
Suesse, Dana, 182, 250
Strunsky,
Suite
of Serenades,
109, 111
(Herbert),
"Summertime," 23, 260-61, 276, 315,

323, 354, 359-62
(<
"Sunny Disposish," 151
Sutton, Horace, 281
"Swanee," 22, 82-84, 9 1 96, 307,
312, 313, 354, 360
Swarthout, Gladys, 307
Sweeney, Ralph, 318
"Sweet and Low Down," 138, 19798, 354, 360, 361
Sweet Little Devil, 103-4, 120-21,
337
Sweetheart Shop, The, 94, 126, 345
Swift, Kay, 177-79, 180, 188, 258,
259, 289, 303, 312, 316; cited, 24
Swingtime, 290
" 'S Wonderful,"
154, 354, 360-62
Symphonic Allegro, 318
Symphonic Picture, A, 315, 357
,
Tag, Der, 284

Tansman, Alexandre, 162
Tashman, Lilyan, 69
Taylor, Deems, 159; cited, 96-97,
112, 165-68
"Tchaikovsky," 319
Tedeschi, Rubens, 287
"Tee-Oodle-Um-Bum-Bo," 81
Tell Me More, 136, 137, 338
"Tempo di Blues," 360
Ten Commandments
of Love," "The,
81
"That Certain Feeling," 138, 355,
360
That Certain Feeling (movie), 313
"That Lost Barber-Shop Chord,"
151,
355
"That Mysterious Rag," 56

Thatcher, Heather, 128, 139
That's a Good Girl, 159
Theater Magazine, 89
"There's a Boat That's Leavin' Soon
for
New
355, 361
York," 273,
276,
328,
INDEX
383
"There's
More
to
the
Kiss
than
X-X-X," 69-70, 80, 81

"They All Laughed," 291, 360
"They Can't Take That Away from
Me," 291, 313, 355, 359, 361, 362
"They Didn't Believe Me," 56-57
Thigpen, Helen, 282
"Things Are Looking Up," 360
This World of Ours, 170-71
Thompson, Fred, 122, 137, 154
Thompson, Oscar, 170
Thomson, Virgil, cited, 269, 278,
317
Thornhill, Claude,
315
Three for the Money, 207, 313
Tibell, Evy, 280
"Till I Meet Someone Like You," 128
Tilzer, Harry von, 51, 55, 58
Tiomkin, Dimitri, 146, 160, 162
Tip Toes, 137-39, 153, 338, 359
To
the Ladies, 205
Tombes, Andrew, 354

Top Hat, 290
Toscanini, Arturo, 170, 212-13, 316-
17
Toye, Francis, 138, 215
"Tra-la-la,"
Travis, Ray,
313
318
Treasure Girl, 203, 207, 339

Trilby,
65
Tucker, Sophie, 58
Two
Little Girls in Blue, 126, 181,
"Wait a Bit Susie," 128

"Wait Till the Sun Shines, Nellie,"
39
"Waiting for the Robert E. Lee," 58
"Waiting for the Sun To Come Out,"
126
Walker, Mayor James
Wallace, Edgar, 127
Walton, William, 162
J.,
152,
Typical Self-Made American," "A,

207, 355
"Union Square," 199, 242

Unita, V, 287
Unofficial Spokesman," "The, 207
Untermeyer, Louis, 26
Urban, Joseph, 69
Rudy, 249
Variations on I Got Rhythm, 25, 246,

247-48, 332, 358
306
Warburg, Edward, 290

Warfield, William, 282
Waring, Fred, 304
Warren, Elta, 94
Warren, Harry, 313, 320
Wasserman, Herman, 149
Watch Your Step, 56
Waterson, Berlin and Snyder, 58
Wayburn, Ned, 69, 81-82
Weber, Max, 190
Weems, Ted, 249-50
Weill, Kurt, 27, 198, 319, 320
"We're Here Because," 124
"We're Pals," 94, 121-22
^When I Lost You," 56
"When Toby Is out of Town," 128
"When You Want 'Em You
247
Vallee,
Vechten, Carl van, 318; cited, 90, 97,

113-14
Velie, Janet, 81
Vodery, Will, 68, 92
Vuillermez, Emile, cited, 161
Can't
Get 'Em," 58
We Go from Here, 320

"Where's the Boy," 203, 360
"Whispering," 101
White, George, 69, 88-90, 93, 121,
311
Where Do
Whiteman, Paul, 23,
91, 93, 101-16,

118, 140, 187, 236, 269-70, 303,
311, 317, 318, 330; cited, 108
Whiting, Richard, 89
Whitney, J. H., 190
"Who
Cares," 355
INDEX
384
Who
Could Ask
for
Anything More,
218-19
Will Be with You When I'm
Far Away," 204
Wiborg, Mary Hoyt, 98, 133
Wiedemann, Paul, 279
Wiener and Doucet, 159-60
Wiener Kurier, 284
Wild, Earl, 316
Williams, Frances, 119
Winchell, Walter, 117, 174, 298
Windsor, Duke of, 134
"Wintergreen for President," 355
Wise, Rabbi Stephen S., cited, 305
Witmark, M. and Sons, 51, 289
Wodehouse, P. G., 68-69, !52, 291
Wolpin, Harry, 34, 129
Wolpin, Kate, 43
Woman Is A Sometime Thing," "A,
275, 324, 352, 360
"Woman to Lady," 276
Woollcott, Alexander, cited, 138, 202
Wozzeck, 26
Wynn, Ed, 94
"Who
"Yankee Doodle Blues," 127, 312

282
Youmans, Vincent, 98, 126, 134-35,
Yeates, Ray,
180, 181-82
Young, Robert, 310

Young, Victor, 307
Young in Heart, 313
Young Man of Manhattan, 217
"You-00 Just You," 69-70
"You're Here and I'm Here," 57
"You're Just in Love," 242
Ziegfeld, Florenz, 68-69, 88-89, 151.

186, 201-4
Ziegfeld Follies, 77, 88-89, 102, 195

Ziegfeld Follies, The (movie), 156
Zilboorg, Dr. Gregory, 34, 185, 289-
90
Zimbalist, Efrem,
236
Ziskind, Dr. Eugene, 301

Zoltai,
Stephan, 259
Zorina, Vera,
309

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OTHER BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR:

Milton Cross' Encyclopedia of the Great Composers and Their

The Complete Book

Music for the Millions

Dictators of the Baton

has also written a young people's biography of

George Gershwin, The Story of George Gershwin (Holt, 1944).

The Story of Arturo Tosca-

THE LIFE AND

1956 by David Ewen.

All rights reserved, including the right

book or portions thereof

In Canada, George J. McLeod, Ltd.

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 56-6192

Without the cooperation of George Gershwin's relatives,

the materials at their disposal to help

complete and definitive biography of a

they loved and will never forget. They gave

diaries, guest books,

a special debt to Ira Gershwin, with

two extended periods

in Beverly Hills. His formi-

dable memory, and his equally formidable archives gathered over

more than three decades, served me well, and are

Irving Caesar, Phil Charig, Vinton Freedley, Frances

Max Dreyfus, Dr.

Samuel Chotzinoff, Harry Ruby, Emily

about the foreign tours of Porgy

Bess; to the Congressional Library in Washington, D.C., for

the opportunity of inspecting Gershwin's manuscripts and sketch-

Drama and Music

Library for their clipping

in all parts of the country

avalanche of inquiries sub-

telephone, and telegram.

For permission to use

were so patient and responsive

Mischa Portnoff, who spent

at the piano playing for

ticularly all of the early songs,

New York Public

or excerpts from lyrics,

sources to the Gershwin Publish:

Company, New York, for "Love Is Here to Stay" and "Love

copyrighted in 1932; "Mine" and "Union Square/' both copyrighted in 1933.

Brown & Company,

from Vernon Duke's Passport

Osbert Sitwell's Laughter in the Next Room, and Doubleday

an extract from Ethel Merman's

TIN PAN ALLEY,

10 THE CONCERTO IN F, 140

Porgy and Bess,

the plot of Porgy and Bess, 323

MOTION PICTURES ADAPTED FROM GERSHWIN MUSICALS (with