George Gershwin

Tin Pan Alley took George Gershwin on as a song plugger at fifteen. Born in Brooklyn to parents who had emigrated from Russia, he came late to the keyboard and quickly to the theatre. With his brother Ira as lyricist he supplied Broadway with scores whose songs — The Man I Love, 'S Wonderful, I Got Rhythm, Embraceable You — became part of the song repertory. Rhapsody in Blue was written at speed in 1924 for Paul Whiteman's concert of modern American music; the Concerto in F, An American in Paris and the Second Rhapsody pursued larger forms. Porgy and Bess in 1935 drew opera, spiritual, blues and popular song into a single work. He died in 1937, aged thirty-eight. He was born Jacob Gershwine, the son of Moishe and Rosa, who had come to America from St Petersburg. The 1932 Pulitzer Prize for Of Thee I Sing was awarded to its writers George S. Kaufman, Morrie Ryskind and Ira Gershwin, rather than to George; George received a posthumous special Pulitzer citation in 1998. The Cuban Overture joined his orchestral works.