Rhapsody in Blue - 100th anniversary

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

One of the interesting thing about the Gershwin piano roll is that he plays in much stricter time than in most modern performances. The big lush romantic melody doesn't have an extended pause on every crotchet. He plays what he wrote. So When Michael Tilson Thomas adds the band notes (making the pauses, before the piano entry) Gershwin appears to ignore him in the time warp that follows.

[Pulcinella]

Can anyone clarify who orchestrated which version? I've heard conflicting tales, involving Gershwin himself and Ferde Grofe.

The Wiki entry is pretty informative:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhapsody_in_Blue

[smittims]

Thanks. That seems to simplify and clarify the matter.

[french frank]

Interesting article in the g about the context of black American music/jazz and contemporary music by white American composers, and the arguments about 'cultural appropriation' v cultural fusion, focusing on the Rhapsody.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/feb/18/century-on-from-rhapsody-in-blue-debates-about-cultural-theft-rage-still-gershwin

[Ein Heldenleben]

Interesting article in the g about the context of black American music/jazz and contemporary music by white American composers, and the arguments about 'cultural appropriation' v cultural fusion, focusing on the Rhapsody.

https://www.theguardian.com/commenti...still-gershwin

Interesting article - thanks for posting. Duke Ellington once famously said that there’s nothing of Black American music in Porgy and Bess - I reckon that comment applies more strongly to RIB. Summertime for example is a modified minor twelve bar blues. Rhapsody in Blue has “blue “ notes but I can’t see the shape of a classic twelve blues anywhere in it.
Interesting that many jazz musicians didn’t share Ellington’s reservations. Gershwins tunes have been endlessly improvised around : Charlie Parker’s My Old Flame taking a rather syrupy Gershwin ballad into the realms , in my view , of timeless art, They even borrowed Gershwin chord sequences so that if you refer to an I Got Rythmn middle eight jazz musicians know exactly what you mean - it’s used endlessly in 40’s bebop. In turn Gershwin was accused of lifting the four note melody of I got Rhythm from an earlier African American Composer. The truth is it’s almost impossible to work out who’s borrowed / stolen/ copied what from whom. In practice cultural appropriation is simply musicians doing what they’ve always done - I like the sound of that and I’m either going to borrow it, copy it or , in the case of Miles Davis / Gil Evans Porgy and Bess album transform it.