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George Jacob Gershwin (/ˈɡɜːrʃ.wɪn/; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist.[1][2] Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known. Among his best-known works are the orchestral compositions Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928), as well as the contemporary opera Porgy and Bess (1935).
Gershwin studied piano under Charles Hambitzer and composition with Rubin Goldmark, Henry Cowell and Joseph Brody. He began his career as a song plugger, but soon started composing Broadway theatre works with his brother Ira Gershwin and Buddy DeSylva. He moved to Paris intending to study with Nadia Boulanger, who refused him, where he subsequently composed An American in Paris. After returning to New York City, he wrote Porgy and Bess, with Ira, and the author DuBose Heyward. Initially a commercial failure, Porgy and Bess later went on to be considered one of the most important American operas of the Twentieth century, and an American cultural classic.
Gershwin moved to Hollywood and composed numerous film scores until his death in 1937 from glioblastoma multiforme, a malignant brain tumor.[3]
Gershwin's compositions have been adapted for use in many films and for television, and several became jazz standards recorded and covered in many variations. Many celebrated singers and musicians have performed his songs.
Gershwin studied piano under Charles Hambitzer and composition with Rubin Goldmark, Henry Cowell and Joseph Brody. He began his career as a song plugger, but soon started composing Broadway theatre works with his brother Ira Gershwin and Buddy DeSylva. He moved to Paris intending to study with Nadia Boulanger, who refused him, where he subsequently composed An American in Paris. After returning to New York City, he wrote Porgy and Bess, with Ira, and the author DuBose Heyward. Initially a commercial failure, Porgy and Bess later went on to be considered one of the most important American operas of the Twentieth century, and an American cultural classic.
Gershwin moved to Hollywood and composed numerous film scores until his death in 1937 from glioblastoma multiforme, a malignant brain tumor.[3]
Gershwin's compositions have been adapted for use in many films and for television, and several became jazz standards recorded and covered in many variations. Many celebrated singers and musicians have performed his songs.
George Gershwin - Wikipedia
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George Jacob Gershwin (/ˈɡɜːrʃ.wɪn/; September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist.[1][2] Gershwin's compositions spanned both pop...
Thank you my friend Maj Marty Hogan for making us aware that September 26 is the anniversary of the birth of American composer and pianist George Jacob Gershwin whose musical compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known.
Background from pbs.org/newshour/health/george-gershwins-too-short-life-ended-on-a-blue-note
"George Gershwin’s too-short life ended on a blue note
Health Sep 26, 2018 3:20 PM EDT
Wednesday marks the 120th birthday of George Gershwin, the celebrated composer of “Rhapsody in Blue,” the opera “Porgy and Bess,” a long list of musical comedies, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning political satire, “Of Thee I Sing,” and hundreds of songs that continue to be sparkling examples of the Great American Songbook. During his short lifetime, Gershwin’s jazz-inspired melodies transcended the stages of vaudeville and Broadway to the concert halls of New York, Europe and beyond. As the New York Times opined in his 1937 obituary, Gershwin “was a child of the Twenties….he was to music what F. Scott Fitzgerald was to prose.”
The cause of his untimely death was most likely glioblastoma, the same type of brain cancer that killed Senators Edward M. Kennedy in 2009 and John McCain this September. Glioblastoma is one of the most common forms of brain cancer and its victims survive 15 to 18 months after their initial diagnosis and surgery.
Doctors were unable to find anything physically wrong with him and declared that George’s ennui was “in his head.”
In 1937, however, there were relatively few imaging technologies available to detect brain tumors early enough, let alone effective chemotherapeutic or radiation treatments to halt the tumor’s aggressive spread.
Gershwin’s medical history during much of this ordeal was vague and frustrating. Beginning in 1936, he complained of headaches, stomach pain, irritability, worries over losing his hair, and outright depression. One cause of his sadness, incidentally, was an unrequited love affair with the film star (and wife of Charlie Chaplin) Paulette Goddard.
Gershwin was said to have complained to one friend, “I am 38 years old, wealthy and famous, but I’m still deeply unhappy. How come?” His doctors were unable to find anything physically wrong with him and declared that George’s ennui was “in his head.”
On Feb. 11, 1937, however, Gershwin lost consciousness for a period of 10 to 20 seconds while performing with the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra. He was the solo pianist and the program featured his brilliant “Concerto in F.” While playing his part he experienced what neurologists now refer to as an absence seizure and missed playing several bars, as he sat erect at the grand piano. After the performance, he reported experiencing an olfactory hallucination — a doctor’s term for smelling something that is not there. In George’s case, it was the smell of burning rubber.
He experienced a second and equally brief loss of consciousness in April of 1937, accompanied by the smell of burning rubber and debilitating headaches. This constellation of symptoms was again misdiagnosed as psychosomatic and was felt to be caused by the stresses of overwork on his serious composing, performing, and the writing of film scores for the Hollywood “dream factory.” The spells continued to occur at unpredictable times, usually lasted about half a minute, and were all accompanied by the smell of burning rubber, dizziness, and worsening headaches. After consulting a psychiatrist in June of that year, Gershwin was finally referred to an internist to see if there was an organic cause for these problems.
Multiple visits to an internist failed to uncover physical abnormalities, even though the headaches worsened. Despite being admitted to the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital for a battery of tests on June 23, 1937, there still was no clear answer explaining his problems. On the list of possible diagnoses was some type of brain tumor but Gershwin refused a spinal tap, which might have revealed tumor cells in the cerebrospinal fluid, because he did not want to endure the pain of the procedure. He was discharged with a diagnosis of “hysteria.”
A male nurse was hired to care for Gershwin at his home in Beverly Hills, but he only grew more ill, with constant and severe headaches, a loss of balance and coordination of his hands (something that would be easily recognized by a skilled pianist), and protracted episodes of irrational behavior. For example, he once tried to push his chauffeur out of a moving car and, in another instance, smeared chocolates all over his body.
He had to take time off from his composing chores for a film called “The Goldwyn Follies” (not surprisingly produced by Hollywood legend Samuel Goldwyn). He also complained of intolerable pain along the sides of his head at a dinner with composer Irving Berlin and, again, at luncheon with a gaggle of movie stars that included Goddard.
On the early evening of July 9, 1937, Ira Gershwin, George’s brother and lyricist, came to visit him and discovered that George had been sleeping until 5:00 p.m. that day. When Ira tried to help George to the bathroom, he found his brother so feeble that he needed the help of the nurse in returning him to bed. George collapsed and lost consciousness. At the emergency room, doctors examined a comatose Gershwin, who was paralyzed on his left side and had swelling of the optic nerve (or papilledema, a sign of serious brain swelling).
“For a man as brilliant as he with a recurring tumor, life would have been terrible; it would have been a slow death.”
Famed neurosurgeon Walter Dandy of the Johns Hopkins Hospital was summoned from a cruise on Chesapeake Bay with the governor of Maryland, Harry Nice, to help with the procedure. After a long-distance telephone consultation with Dandy, the physicians at Cedars of Lebanon performed a ventriculogram, a painful procedure where air is introduced into the spinal column via lumbar puncture, followed by x-raying the skull using the air as a contrast to assess the size of the brain’s ventricles and space-occupying abnormalities, such as a tumor. The study revealed a large brain tumor in George’s right temporal lobe.
At 3:00 on the morning of July 10, he was rushed into the operating room. When Dandy arrived in Newark, New Jersey, he was turned back by a telegram that said the operation was already underway. Despite four hours of valiant efforts by the neurosurgeons to debulk the huge tumor, Gershwin never regained consciousness. He died a few hours later, at 10:30 am. He was only 38 years of age.
His final diagnosis was a malignant glioma. More recently, however, a few arm-chair diagnosticians have argued that the tumor was a pilocytic astrocytoma or even a benign tumor that was caught too late and far too big. Such cellular arguments are really all for naught. As Dandy concluded, given the aggressive growth of his malignancy, the late diagnosis, and the lack of any useful treatments beyond removing large parts of his brain meant that they would have only prolonged Gershwin’s misery by a few months: “For a man as brilliant as he with a recurring tumor,” Dandy said, “life would have been terrible; it would have been a slow death.”
Our collective grief over Gershwin’s tragically short life may be tempered by the rich melodic legacy he left behind. His operatic, symphonic and popular works continue to enrich the lives of the millions who listen to them. As but one lovely example of the lilting power of his songs, try to listen to his 1926 ballad, “Someone to Watch Over Me,” without humming it over and over again during the course of your day."
Gershwin Documentary
https://youtu.be/FHmu7tUhRVA?t=33s
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs LTC Orlando Illi Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. Maj William W. "Bill" Price CPT Jack Durish Capt Tom Brown CMSgt (Join to see) MSG Andrew White SFC William Farrell SGT (Join to see) Sgt Albert Castro SSG David Andrews Sgt Randy Wilber Sgt John H. SGT Charles H. Hawes SGT Mark Halmrast PO1 William "Chip" Nagel CPT Gabe SnellLTC Greg Henning
Background from pbs.org/newshour/health/george-gershwins-too-short-life-ended-on-a-blue-note
"George Gershwin’s too-short life ended on a blue note
Health Sep 26, 2018 3:20 PM EDT
Wednesday marks the 120th birthday of George Gershwin, the celebrated composer of “Rhapsody in Blue,” the opera “Porgy and Bess,” a long list of musical comedies, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning political satire, “Of Thee I Sing,” and hundreds of songs that continue to be sparkling examples of the Great American Songbook. During his short lifetime, Gershwin’s jazz-inspired melodies transcended the stages of vaudeville and Broadway to the concert halls of New York, Europe and beyond. As the New York Times opined in his 1937 obituary, Gershwin “was a child of the Twenties….he was to music what F. Scott Fitzgerald was to prose.”
The cause of his untimely death was most likely glioblastoma, the same type of brain cancer that killed Senators Edward M. Kennedy in 2009 and John McCain this September. Glioblastoma is one of the most common forms of brain cancer and its victims survive 15 to 18 months after their initial diagnosis and surgery.
Doctors were unable to find anything physically wrong with him and declared that George’s ennui was “in his head.”
In 1937, however, there were relatively few imaging technologies available to detect brain tumors early enough, let alone effective chemotherapeutic or radiation treatments to halt the tumor’s aggressive spread.
Gershwin’s medical history during much of this ordeal was vague and frustrating. Beginning in 1936, he complained of headaches, stomach pain, irritability, worries over losing his hair, and outright depression. One cause of his sadness, incidentally, was an unrequited love affair with the film star (and wife of Charlie Chaplin) Paulette Goddard.
Gershwin was said to have complained to one friend, “I am 38 years old, wealthy and famous, but I’m still deeply unhappy. How come?” His doctors were unable to find anything physically wrong with him and declared that George’s ennui was “in his head.”
On Feb. 11, 1937, however, Gershwin lost consciousness for a period of 10 to 20 seconds while performing with the Los Angeles Symphony Orchestra. He was the solo pianist and the program featured his brilliant “Concerto in F.” While playing his part he experienced what neurologists now refer to as an absence seizure and missed playing several bars, as he sat erect at the grand piano. After the performance, he reported experiencing an olfactory hallucination — a doctor’s term for smelling something that is not there. In George’s case, it was the smell of burning rubber.
He experienced a second and equally brief loss of consciousness in April of 1937, accompanied by the smell of burning rubber and debilitating headaches. This constellation of symptoms was again misdiagnosed as psychosomatic and was felt to be caused by the stresses of overwork on his serious composing, performing, and the writing of film scores for the Hollywood “dream factory.” The spells continued to occur at unpredictable times, usually lasted about half a minute, and were all accompanied by the smell of burning rubber, dizziness, and worsening headaches. After consulting a psychiatrist in June of that year, Gershwin was finally referred to an internist to see if there was an organic cause for these problems.
Multiple visits to an internist failed to uncover physical abnormalities, even though the headaches worsened. Despite being admitted to the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital for a battery of tests on June 23, 1937, there still was no clear answer explaining his problems. On the list of possible diagnoses was some type of brain tumor but Gershwin refused a spinal tap, which might have revealed tumor cells in the cerebrospinal fluid, because he did not want to endure the pain of the procedure. He was discharged with a diagnosis of “hysteria.”
A male nurse was hired to care for Gershwin at his home in Beverly Hills, but he only grew more ill, with constant and severe headaches, a loss of balance and coordination of his hands (something that would be easily recognized by a skilled pianist), and protracted episodes of irrational behavior. For example, he once tried to push his chauffeur out of a moving car and, in another instance, smeared chocolates all over his body.
He had to take time off from his composing chores for a film called “The Goldwyn Follies” (not surprisingly produced by Hollywood legend Samuel Goldwyn). He also complained of intolerable pain along the sides of his head at a dinner with composer Irving Berlin and, again, at luncheon with a gaggle of movie stars that included Goddard.
On the early evening of July 9, 1937, Ira Gershwin, George’s brother and lyricist, came to visit him and discovered that George had been sleeping until 5:00 p.m. that day. When Ira tried to help George to the bathroom, he found his brother so feeble that he needed the help of the nurse in returning him to bed. George collapsed and lost consciousness. At the emergency room, doctors examined a comatose Gershwin, who was paralyzed on his left side and had swelling of the optic nerve (or papilledema, a sign of serious brain swelling).
“For a man as brilliant as he with a recurring tumor, life would have been terrible; it would have been a slow death.”
Famed neurosurgeon Walter Dandy of the Johns Hopkins Hospital was summoned from a cruise on Chesapeake Bay with the governor of Maryland, Harry Nice, to help with the procedure. After a long-distance telephone consultation with Dandy, the physicians at Cedars of Lebanon performed a ventriculogram, a painful procedure where air is introduced into the spinal column via lumbar puncture, followed by x-raying the skull using the air as a contrast to assess the size of the brain’s ventricles and space-occupying abnormalities, such as a tumor. The study revealed a large brain tumor in George’s right temporal lobe.
At 3:00 on the morning of July 10, he was rushed into the operating room. When Dandy arrived in Newark, New Jersey, he was turned back by a telegram that said the operation was already underway. Despite four hours of valiant efforts by the neurosurgeons to debulk the huge tumor, Gershwin never regained consciousness. He died a few hours later, at 10:30 am. He was only 38 years of age.
His final diagnosis was a malignant glioma. More recently, however, a few arm-chair diagnosticians have argued that the tumor was a pilocytic astrocytoma or even a benign tumor that was caught too late and far too big. Such cellular arguments are really all for naught. As Dandy concluded, given the aggressive growth of his malignancy, the late diagnosis, and the lack of any useful treatments beyond removing large parts of his brain meant that they would have only prolonged Gershwin’s misery by a few months: “For a man as brilliant as he with a recurring tumor,” Dandy said, “life would have been terrible; it would have been a slow death.”
Our collective grief over Gershwin’s tragically short life may be tempered by the rich melodic legacy he left behind. His operatic, symphonic and popular works continue to enrich the lives of the millions who listen to them. As but one lovely example of the lilting power of his songs, try to listen to his 1926 ballad, “Someone to Watch Over Me,” without humming it over and over again during the course of your day."
Gershwin Documentary
https://youtu.be/FHmu7tUhRVA?t=33s
FYI COL Mikel J. Burroughs LTC Orlando Illi Maj Bill Smith, Ph.D. Maj William W. "Bill" Price CPT Jack Durish Capt Tom Brown CMSgt (Join to see) MSG Andrew White SFC William Farrell SGT (Join to see) Sgt Albert Castro SSG David Andrews Sgt Randy Wilber Sgt John H. SGT Charles H. Hawes SGT Mark Halmrast PO1 William "Chip" Nagel CPT Gabe SnellLTC Greg Henning
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Lola Astanova performs Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue with the All-Star Orchestra (2016 Emmy Award)
INSTAGRAM.COM/LolaAstanova This performance film, originally aired on PBS, received the 2016 Emmy Award
Since you bring up Gershwin, let's listen to one of my favorites compositions by him played by one of my favorite concert pianists, Lola Astanova
https://youtu.be/Fpsku1TwQ7E
https://youtu.be/Fpsku1TwQ7E
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LTC Stephen C.
Rhapsody in Blue is one of my all time Gershwin favorites, CPT Jack Durish! I’ve never heard this rendition before, and I must say that I really like it. It has a rather raw feeling to it, which is apparently in keeping with the way it was first performed. I like the theater orchestra sound of this piece as opposed to most of the symphony orchestra versions I’ve heard previously.
Although I would have enjoyed hearing Gershwin play the inaugural performance in 1924, having Lola Astanova as the pianist didn’t distract me from the composition in the least!
Maj Marty Hogan
Although I would have enjoyed hearing Gershwin play the inaugural performance in 1924, having Lola Astanova as the pianist didn’t distract me from the composition in the least!
Maj Marty Hogan
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LTC Stephen C.
Gershwin - Leonard Pennario, 1959: Rhapsody in Blue - Felix Slatkin
Digitized from the LP shown above, released in 1960 on the Capitol label. Leonard Pennario (July 9, 1924 – June 27, 2008) was an American classical pianist a...
CPT Jack Durish, this is the first rendition of Rhapsody in Blue I ever heard (early sixties). My father had just purchased a Fischer console stereo (similar to the photo). My mother bought the Capitol recording of Felix Slatkin conducting the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra with Leonard Pennario on piano.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1gNkwpWxr8
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1gNkwpWxr8
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