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On the afternoon of February 12, 1924,musical New York gathered at the citysAeolian Hall on 42nd Street to witness aconcert that the bandleader Paul Whiteman

was presenting under the intriguing rubric

An Experiment in Modern Music. White-

man believed that the future of American

concert music would involve a fusion of Eu-

ropean symphonic traditions with the

uniquely American style known as jazz. Most

of the program he presented that day was farfrom what could honestly be described as

experimental in 1924, but it did include

the premiere of one work that perfectly ex-

emplified his vision: George Gershwins

Rhapsody in Bluefor Piano and Orchestra.

Among the musicians in the audience was

the conductor Walter Damrosch, who had in-

herited the directorship of the New York

Symphony Society when his uncle Leopold

died, in 1885, and held the post with only brief

respite until that orchestra merged with the

New York Philharmonic in 1928. Damrosch

was so impressed with Rhapsody in Bluethat he

immediately commissioned a concerto he

could introduce with the New York Sym-

phony. Gershwin happily accepted the com-

mission and then the questionable legend

goes did a bit of study to find out just what

a concerto was. In truth, the niceties of or-

chestral composition were still uncharted

ground for Gershwin when he came to the

concerto. In his Broadway work, Gershwin had

always followed the customary practice of sim-

ply writing the tunes and leaving the orches-

tration to an arranger. Even Rhapsody in Bluewas not entirely his creation; the instrumenta-

tion had been carried out by Whitemans staff

orchestrator, Ferde Grof, who worked from

Concerto in F for Piano and Orchestra

George Gershwin

IN SHORT

Born: September 26, 1898, in Brooklyn,

New York

Died: July 11, 1937, in Hollywood, California

Work composed: May to November 10, 1925

World premiere: December 3, 1925, with Walter

Damrosch conducting the New York Symphony

(which merged with the New York Philharmonic

in 1928), the composer as soloist

Most recent New York Philharmonic

performance: December 31, 2011, Alan Gilbert,

conductor, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, soloist

Estimated duration: ca. 31 minutes

Gershwins piano score. Gershwin therefore ac-

quired a copy of Cecil Forsyths Orchestration, a

standard textbook at that time, and learnedenough from it to write the whole orchestral

score of the Concerto in F on his own, though

possibly with some pointers from colleagues.

Broadway obligations prevented Gershwin

from diving into the concerto immediately,

and he didnt buckle down to serious work

on it until May 1925, while he was in London

updating material for the English productionof his musical Tell Me More. On July 22, back

in New York, he started turning his sketches

into a manageable score, at the head of which

he inscribed the title New York Concerto. He

worked on it every day during a stay at Chau-

tauqua in August, and he appears to have let

the movements flow in order, from start to

finish. Notations in the piano manuscript in-

dicate that the first movement was written in

July, the second in August and September, and

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the third later in September. After that he bus-

ied himself for another five or six weeks with

the orchestration for full symphony orchestra.

By the time he completed the project, the ini-

tial title had been replaced by simply Con-

certo in F not F major or F minor (though

the former would be accurate) and it hasbeen so identified ever since. Eliminating the

referential title was an essential step toward the

composers goal. He later remarked:

Many persons had thought that the Rhap-

sody was only a happy accident. Well, I

went out, for one thing, to show them that

there was plenty more where that hadcome from. I made up my mind to do a

piece of absolute music. The Rhapsody, as

its title implies, was a blues impression. The

concerto would be unrelated to any pro-

gram. And that is exactly how I wrote it.

Gershwin wisely organized a run-through

in November he hired the 60-piece or-

chestra himself and Damrosch wisely at-

tended. Everybody was delighted with what

they heard, but Damrosch, drawing on his years

of orchestral experience, seems to have offered

some well-chosen advice. As a result, Gersh-win cut expanses from each of the movements

(in addition to making a number of smaller

changes), yielding a tighter work for the im-

minent premiere. The concert was completely

sold out and the audience cheered rapturously

at the conclusion of the Concerto in F.

Instrumentation:two flutes and piccolo,

two oboes and English horn, two clarinets

and bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns,

three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, tim-

pani, cymbals, bass drum, snare drum, and

strings, in addition to the solo piano.

From the Digital Archives: Gershwin for the First Time

There would not have been as much excitement if Brahms had come to town, although Brahms also wrote piano

concertos. But then, he did not employ jazz, wrote Olin Downes, music critic for The New York Times. The oc-

casion was the premiere of George Gershwins Concerto in F, commis-

sioned by Walter Damrosch and the New York Symphony Society, and

premiered with Gershwin himself at the piano, in December 1925.

The extraordinary anticipation leading up to this premiere resulted from

the fact that Damrosch, principal conductor of the Symphony, (which

would merge with the New York Philharmonic in 1928 to become todays

Orchestra) had commissioned a popular musician with no orchestral ex-

perience to write a piano concerto; that the composer was George Gersh-

win one of New Yorks most heralded jazz musicians only increased

the stakes. Damrosch had taken a chance after hearing the premiere of

Rhapsody in Blue (orchestrated by Ferde Grof) the previous season.

Three years later, as Damrosch and Gershwin prepared to perform the

work for the first time with the New York Philharmonic, reports surfaced

that the touchy Philharmonikers did not take kindly to the composer,

who wore a derby hat and smoked a cigar throughout the entire rehearsal.

The Concerto in F received mixed reviews, but it was clear to some that

Damrosch had done something groundbreaking. Olin Downes shared

this opinion, adding that the writer of these lines believes strongly, seriously in jazz. He

thinks it has a future as well as a past, and marked possibilities for the serious composer.

To find out more about Walter Damrosch and his programming,

scan here, or visit the New York Philharmonic Leon Levy

Digital Archives at archives.nyphil.org

George Gershwin with Walter

Damrosch, who commissioned

the Concerto in F