Rhapsody in Blue, Reimagined

Switched on Pop

Vox Media Podcast Network

Music Interviews, Music History, Music, Music Commentary

4.6 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 22 March 2024

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What do Duke Ellington, United Airlines, and the K Pop group Red Velvet share in common? They've all covered George Gershwin's piano concerto, Rhapsody in Blue. First premiered in 1924, the piece became an immediate hit for the way it blended American jazz with the European symphonic tradition. Gershwin had a number of successes as a composer in his day—his aria "Summertime" from the opera Porgy and Bess is by some measures the most covered song ever—but the staying power of the Rhapsody make it a rare instrumental piece that's instantly familiar. Maybe too familiar. In 2024, there will be many centennial performances of this iconic piece, but pianist Lara Downes wanted to do something more than just the sound the notes of Gershwin's score for the umpteenth time. Downes commissioned Puerto Rican musician Edmar Colon to create a new version of Gershwin's composition, one that brought in the full spectrum of American life in 1924: fiery improvisation, Latin percussion, and dance rhythms. The resultant piece both pays tribute to an American icon while adding a new set of modern counterpoint. Nate sat down with Lara to ask her if she was nervous to rewrite such a canonic piece, why a concerto is like a musical kaleidoscope, and the surprising family connection to Gershwin's musical world she discovered while researching Rhapsody in Blue. Songs Discussed George Gershwin, Lara Downes, Edmar Colon - Rhapsody in Blue Reimagined Gershwin - Rhapsody in Blue Gershwin - 3 Preludes: II. Andante con moto e poco rubato Sarah Vaughan - Nice Work if You can Get It Sam Cooke - Summertime Chet Baker - But not For ME Louis Armstrong - Aint Misbehavin Ella Fitzgerald - Blue Skies Red Velvet - Birthday Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're at a place you just discovered and being an American Express Platinum card member with Global Dining Access by Resi
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0:26.0	at American Express.com slash with Amex.
0:29.0	Terms apply. Welcome to Switched on Pop. I'm musicologist Nate Sloane. This episode we're going to try something a little different.
0:49.3	We're going to talk about a piece of pop music that's a hundred years old and we're going to do it with me
0:55.0	flying solo because I'm going to be talking about one of the most important
0:59.3	artists in American music and one of my earliest musical memories. I'm talking about the composer George Gershwin.
1:06.9	My grandma, Sally Sandfield, is an incredibly talented pianist and at 94 she still plays every single day.
1:16.6	When I was younger I was constantly exposed to her playing some of the great classical composer, Chopin, Grieg, Bach,
1:30.0	but the music that I always gravitated towards was whenever she would play the Gershwin piano
1:38.9	preludes. These compositions really imprinted on my brain and as I grew older the music of George Gershwin really stayed with me.
1:56.2	When I was playing jazz in high school I would try and learn his brilliantly harmonically complex pop songs like nice work if you can get it and but not for me all with lyrics by his brother Ira and then later I got to see his
2:19.2	opera porgi and best which features classic songs like Summertime, and was one of the first productions
2:27.3	to feature an entirely African American cast. But of all Gershwin's works, I think the one.
2:37.0	But of all Gershwin's works, I think the one that has most embedded itself in
2:47.2	culture is his piano concerto Rhapsody in Blue which premiered a
2:52.4	hundred years ago in February
	...

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