George Gershwin's Music

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George Gershwin was born in Brooklyn, New York, on September 26 1898. He began playing piano when he was 11 after his parents bought a piano for their other son Ira. Gershwin, realizing his own talent, took it upon himself to find a mentor so he could hone his own skills. He found a mentor in Charles Hambitzer, who was a popular piano instructor in his time. Hambitzer was extremely impressed with his pupil and in a letter to his sister Hambitzer wrote “I have a new pupil who will make his mark if anybody will. The boy is a genius.” Throughout his life Gershwin would study under other noted teachers such as Henry Cowell, Wallingford Riegger, Edward Kilenyi, and Joseph Schillinger.
Gershwin dropped out of school when he was 15 to pursue a career …show more content…

His varied music background came from the many people he studied under and his own studies which allowed him to mix and blend styles together seamlessly. I’m going to look at Summertime from Porgy and Bess and I’ve Got Rhythm from the Girl Crazy.

Summertime - Porgy and Bess (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVUOtLLGv2w)
Summertime fits under the category of jazz and is actually considered a lullaby and aria. The melody of the song is rather slow, although there are phrases that accelerando and crescendo are featured. Originally, the singer was a high soprano but now there are many different versions of the song. The soprano is accompanied with a standard orchestra. A homophonic texture is present throughout the piece with the instrumental music almost “singing” a chorus itself. In the latter part of the song a chorus is introduced, but not singing words but more of just vowel …show more content…

After hearing the cover I decided to look for the original and found the video of Gershwin himself playing it which was amazing and then I looked up versions from the actual musical which were all great as well. From there I found interest in other works by Gershwin most I mentioned earlier, my favorite would be Summertime. If I wanted to get my family interested the best way would be to play Summertime myself, which I have the sheet music for but the rhythm has been tricky for me to play. So after playing a shoddy version of summertime I would show them the video of Gershwin playing it. I would then move on and show them some of Gershwin’s more accessible works like I’ve Got Rhythm and Rhapsody in

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