MUSIC-US: Celebrating 100 Years of George Gershwin

By Farhan Haq Reprint | | Print |

NEW YORK, Oct 27 1998 (IPS) - U.S. musicians – rappers, classical orchestras, jazz chanteuses and rock stars – all appear to have one thing on their mind this fall: the music of George Gershwin.

Gershwin, born in Russia in 1898, died in 1937. Despite his relatively short lifespan, he is regarded as one of the top U.S. composers and songwriters of the past century – attracting praise for everything from his pop songs (‘The Man I Love’, ‘Someone To Watch Over Me’) to his semi-classical compositions (‘Rhapsody in Blue’) and operatic musicals (‘Porgy and Bess’).

Along the way, he became known for a jazzy sophistication and for charming, catchy melodies which appealed to mass audiences and music instructors alike.

To celebrate Gershwin’s centennial, many different types of singers and musicians have been playing his work in many different styles, ranging from classical to hip-hop.

New York’s Carnegie Hall this month opened with a tribute to Gershwin’s orchestral pieces, including several songs from the semi-opera ‘Porgy and Bess’ sung by Audra MacDonald, a promising Broadway diva who currently appears in the musical ‘Ragtime’.

Earlier in the year, ‘Porgy and Bess’ also was the focus of an album on Verve Records by jazz musician Joe Henderson, who teased out the blues influences underpinning the work and brought pop singers Sting and Chaka Khan to sing on two of the musical’s most enduring numbers (‘It Ain’t Necessarily So’ and ‘Summertime’ respectively).

This month, Antilles Records and the Red Hot Foundation – the latter of which sponsors musical projects to raise money and awareness for AIDS prevention – have come out with their own Gershwin tribute, ‘Red Hot and Rhapsody’. Like an earlier tribute to Cole Porter, the album takes Gershwin’s compositions on a dizzy ride through the world of modern-day rock, rap and dance music.

‘Summertime’, for example, is offered in not one but two versions: an eerie, slow dance groove featuring vocals by Britain’s Morcheeba and flute by jazz musician Hubert Laws, and a funkier rendition by the rap group The Roots and singer Bobby Womack.

Each version has its own charm, with Morcheeba’s singing of “Summertime, and the livin’ is easy/ fish are jumpin’ and the cotton is high…” sounding more like a threat that good times will end, while Womack’s grittier style embraces the vision of a happy summer.

Other prominent singers take the occasion to present fairly straightforward renditions of Gershwin’s pop classics. Irish singer Sinead O’Connor brings a piercing, sorrowful lilt to the wistful ‘Someone To Watch Over Me’, while pop star Natalie Merchant turns in a melancholy ‘But Not for Me’.

Many of those songs are now indelibly linked to great jazz singers like Billie Holiday and Sarah Vaughan, which is itself a testament to Gershwin’s wide-ranging influence.

Although Gershwin mostly wrote pop standards with lyrics by his brother Ira (or, as in the case of the ‘Porgy and Bess’ songs, with Dubose Heyward), jazz musicians loved to use his chord changes and melodies for their own compositions.

In fact, one perky Gershwin tune, ‘I Got Rhythm’, itself spawned dozens of jazz variations during the swing era – so much so that chord changes based on that tune were often referred to by jazz performers as “rhythm changes”.

Of course, not every style and every singer is adaptable to Gershwin’s songs. Rock star David Bowie, who appears on ‘Red Hot and Rhapsody’ singing ‘A Foggy Day in London Town’, sounds confused and overly mannered trying to work his way through Gershwin’s fluttering melody.

For the most part, howver, the new tributes to Gershwin offer the pleasant illusion that for once, a composer wrote songs that everyone could sing and enjoy.