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Full articleGeorge Gershwin (September 26, 1898 – July 11, 1937) was an American composer and pianist renowned for fusing elements of jazz, popular song, and classical music into innovative works that defined much of the Golden Age of Broadway and American concert music.
Born Jacob Gershwin in Brooklyn, New York, to Russian Jewish immigrant parents Morris (originally Moishe Gershovitz) and Rose Bruskin, he was the second of four children, including his older brother and frequent collaborator Ira Gershwin. The family moved frequently around Manhattan's Lower East Side and Harlem during his childhood, where Gershwin showed early interest in music despite his parents' initial reluctance to invest in formal training. He attended public schools and briefly the High School of Commerce before dropping out in 1914 at age 15 to pursue music full-time.
Gershwin's career began in Tin Pan Alley as a song plugger and pianist for Remick's music publishing firm, where he honed his skills in popular songwriting. His first major hit came in 1919 with "Swanee," interpolated into a Broadway show and selling over a million copies of sheet music. By his early twenties, he had achieved celebrity status, composing scores for Broadway musicals such as Lady, Be Good! (1924), Funny Face (1927), and Of Thee I Sing (1931), the latter becoming the first musical to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
In parallel with his theatrical success, Gershwin ventured into orchestral music, premiering his breakthrough jazz-influenced concerto Rhapsody in Blue in 1924 with Paul Whiteman’s orchestra, which captured the energy of 1920s New York City. Subsequent concert works included the tone poem An American in Paris (1928) and Concerto in F (1925), blending symphonic forms with ragtime and blues idioms. His crowning achievement was the folk opera Porgy and Bess (1935), adapted from DuBose Heyward's novel and play, featuring iconic songs like "Summertime" and "I Got Plenty o' Nuttin'"; though initially met with mixed reviews due to its portrayal of African American life, it has since become a cornerstone of the American operatic repertoire.
Throughout his oeuvre, Gershwin collaborated closely with Ira on lyrics for hundreds of songs, including standards like "Fascinating Rhythm," "'S Wonderful," and "I Got Rhythm," which remain staples of the Great American Songbook. Influenced by composers like Ravel and Stravinsky as well as African American jazz artists, he sought to create a distinctly American musical idiom that bridged popular and "serious" genres.
In brief
Jacob Gershwine grew up in Brooklyn and became George Gershwin, a songwriter who let jazz into the concert hall without leaving Tin Pan Alley. Rhapsody in Blue, An American in Paris, and Porgy and Bess are still the argument for what American music can sound like.
He wrote with his brother Ira, a lyricist of perfect American speech. Together they made songs that singers still treat as home.
He died at 38 of a brain tumor, in 1937, with too much left on the desk. The catalog is already a country’s second folk music.
The accomplishment is a sound. A Jewish kid from Brooklyn stitched popular song to orchestral form and made the stitch hold.
Photographs
Hero photograph: Carl Van Vechten, via Library of Congress / Wikimedia Commons
