George Gershwin

The celebration of his 125th birthday and the 100th anniversary of Rhapsody in Blue is a double occasion to reflect once again on a singular biography that began in precarious New York circumstances and gloriously realized the "American dream" of fame, success and fortune - and on the equally unique musical pluralism that Gershwin achieved in his short life. His elegantly striking songs from Broadway musicals provided generations of jazz and pop musicians with standards; his increasingly complex pieces for the concert hall and opera house were the result of irresistible lure from the "serious" districts and became hybrids of "lowbrow" and "highbrow", "symphonic jazz", with which he wanted to be taken seriously by his authoritative contemporaries.

As a 20th-century composer whose symphonic and operatic music ranges from blue notes to double counterpoint, bitonality, and the Tristan chord—who has synthesized influences from Debussy, Stravinsky, ragtime, and the Vienna School into a distinctive style that is performed worldwide—he certainly deserves it. The fact that Gershwin’s relationship with Schoenberg and Berg was more complex than is generally assumed is just as much a topic of discussion as his “Jewishness,” the debates surrounding *Porgy and Bess*, and his friendships with painters and musicians.

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