George Gershwin - Rhapsody in Blue; etc. (Earl Wild; Arthur Fiedler)

Information

Composer: George Gershwin

1. Rhapsody in Blue
2. Piano Concerto "Concerto in F": 1. Allegro
3. Piano Concerto "Concerto in F": 2. Adagio - Andante con moto
4. Piano Concerto "Concerto in F": 3. Allegro Agitato
5. An American in Paris
6. Variations on "I Got Rhythm"
7. Cuban Overture

Earl Wild, piano

Boston Pops Orchestra

Arthur Fiedler, conductor

Date: 1959, 1961

Label: RCA

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Review

In 1905, before the invention of sirens, my grandfather William Nickerson played bugle on a hook and ladder truck for the Seattle, Washington, City Fire Department when he couldn’t get paid for playing in a band. Truth is by that time traditional Sunday-in-the-park band music was already something of an anachronism in America, although Nickerson’s band did distinguish itself marching in the Bellingham, Washington, City parade in 1913. His nephew, my uncle, Dick Arant made good money playing trumpet for the Dorseys and Paul Whiteman in their big jazz bands during the ’twenties and ’thirties. Big band jazz dance music was the raunchy music of my parents’ generation and George Gershwin, the "man who made jazz respectable," was its high priest. Ironically, he was credited with being "...the link between the jazz camp and the intellectuals..." when today it is white-haired intellectuals who are the "jazz camp," who keep the corpse of jazz barely alive with corporate and government subsidies in an age much more excited by world music and rap. But in the mid-20th century so much did big band jazz come to represent "America" that it was only necessary for Hindemith to introduce a few notes of jazz trumpet into his 1943 Symphonic Metamorphosis to symbolise the victory of the American army (among others, of course) over the Nazis.

The story told me by a friend of a friend’s mother is that she met Gershwin at a party in Hollywood. They got to talking, and Gershwin reportedly said, "I’ve written a lot of really trashy music, but I’ve made a lot of money, and now I’m going to retire and write something really good." Six months later he was, tragically for all of us, dead of brain cancer at the age of 39.

Gershwin’s instrumental masterpiece is the brief Rhapsody in Blue, written first for solo piano (not by Gershwin, who reportedly could neither read nor write music notation) then orchestrated in several versions by its commissioner, band leader Paul Whiteman. The work is a brief and effective encyclopaedic showcase for the rhythmic and instrumental trademarks of the "jazz" style. Fiedler’s performance of the arrangement for symphony orchestra is one of the most effective. Pianist Wild played the work at least fifty times with Whiteman’s band and by the time of this 1959 recording his fingers had lost none of their firm, agile grasp of the music. Gershwin himself recorded the solo piano version on a piano roll, and therein hangs the tale of the first of the referenced alternative recordings above. By individually blocking out those notes on the piano roll that represented the accompaniment, Gershwin was able forty years after his death to be made to "play" the piano solo part in the Michael Tilson Thomas recording of what is at least the fastest and probably the most effective modern sound recording of the jazz band version, a four channel master which should appear on disk some day as a surround sound SACD.

By means of intensive lobbying in Congress, the Gershwin copyright owners have been able to get the American copyrights on Gershwin’s music, which would normally all have expired before 1993, extended to 2013. Hopefully after 2013 (2009 in Europe) this recording can be sold again; in the meantime, drop by my house anytime and I’ll be happy to play the AVCO recording for you.

The Concerto in F, considered to be too classical by most of Gershwin’s pop music contemporaries today sounds less adventuresome than the Ravel Concerto in g written five years later. It’s a fine classically structured work and is not played nearly often enough. The Levant/Ormandy recordings having been popular and in print continuously for over sixty years still have virtues to recommend them to serious collectors. Levant appears in person along with Gene Kelly in the 1953 MGM film "American in Paris" which features the full music to an exotic cinematic fantasy of the ballet as the finale.

Arthur Fiedler (1894-1979) "the best selling conductor in history" began as a violinist in the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1915. He founded first the Boston Sinfonietta, and later organised concerts which became the Boston "Pops" summer season which he conducted for fifty years. Fiedler was in every way a qualified and conscientious musician and never lowered his musical standards for cheap effect. Many if not most of his recordings stand beside, sometimes slightly ahead of, those by conductors of more serious reputation. He is reported to be the only conductor to have made recordings in all known formats — his first recordings were on wax cylinders, and just before his death he recorded the orchestra in digital sound.

To complete the catalogue of my personal involvement in this music, my high school classmate Max Hobart was playing in the second violins in this recording.

As in all these recent RCA/BMG SACDs of classic tapes, the sound is simply stupendous, wide range, low distortion, with all the excitement of being there. Most of these qualities are clearly audible even in the CD tracks of the hybrid disk. Even if you own a previous CD issue of this music, you will enjoy noticeably clearer sound on your CD player with the promise of even better sound when you upgrade to an SACD player.

In case you can’t figure out how to get the program booklet out of the jewelcase without tearing it to pieces, I will be delighted to share the secret with you. For full instructions, send one US dollar (cash only; no checks, please) and a self addressed stamped envelope to PO Box 124, Notus, ID 83656 USA.

— Paul Shoemaker

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George Gershwin (26 September 1898 – 11 July 1937) was a pivotal American composer who combined classical training with popular styles such as ragtime and jazz. Collaborating closely with his brother Ira, Gershwin produced enduring Broadway works and songs, including Lady, Be Good and I Got Rhythm. His concert pieces, Rhapsody in Blue, An American in Paris and Porgy and Bess, blended jazz idioms with classical forms and gained international acclaim. Though his classical status remains debated, Gershwin is widely regarded as a significant musical innovator whose influence crossed genres and continents.

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Earl Wild (November 26, 1915 – January 23, 2010) was an American pianist. He studied under Selmar Janson, Marguerite Long, Egon Petri and Helene Barere, among others. Throughout his career, Wild was renowned for his virtuoso recitals and master classes held around the world, from Seoul, Beijing, and Tokyo to Argentina, England and throughout the United States. He created numerous virtuoso solo piano transcriptions, including 14 songs by Rachmaninoff (1981), and several works on themes by Gershwin, as well as transcriptions of Berlioz, Buxtehude, Chopin, Fauré, Saint-Saëns, and Tchaikovsky.

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Arthur Fiedler (17 December 1894 – 10 July 1979) was an American conductor best known for his 50-year tenure leading the Boston Pops Orchestra, during which he became the best-selling classical conductor of all time, with recordings selling approximately 50 million copies. Trained in Europe and initially a violinist and violist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, Fiedler brought broad instrumental skills and showmanship to his work. As conductor, he emphasized accessible, light-hearted programming that blended popular music, show tunes, and classical works, greatly expanding the orchestra's public appeal.

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