Cole Plays Gershwin

George Gershwin (Composer), Piano Kevin Cole (Performer) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Performer: Piano Kevin Cole
• Composer: George Gershwin
• Audio CD (July 4, 2004)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Musicole Recordings
• ASIN: B0002JSBX2
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #211,515 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. I'll Build a Stairway to Paradise

2. Somebody Loves Me

3. Rialto Ripples / Fascinating Rhythm

4. Tra-La-La

5. Liza

6. Feeling Sentimental / Love Is Here To Stay

7. Gershwin Medley

8. Allegro ben ritmato e deciso

9. Andante con moto e poco rubato

10. Gershwin Melody No. 17

11. Agitato

12. Things Are Looking Up / A Foggy Day

13. Wake Up Brother, and Dance

14. They Can't Take That Away From Me

15. RHAPSODY IN BLUE

Editorial Reviews

Howard Reich, Chicago Tribune

"...the Best Gershwin Pianist in America Today."

Product Description

The world has celebrated the centennial of George Gershwin’s birth, and, despite the incessant pommeling his music undergoes with regularity, he and his works will be around for a second hundred.

Among the reasons: performances such as these by Kevin Cole-Gershwinesque, vibrant, twinkling with humor and richly romantic. Years ago, Kevin, barely twenty, attended a party in the Greenwich Village apartment of Emily Paley, a lifelong friend of Gershwin. He would entertain a special group of friends by playing a piano that Gershwin had selected for her. Kevin proceeded to improvise a medley of Gershwin songs, as Gershwin himself had often done on the same instrument. Midway through, Emily’s brother, English Strunsky, who had heard Gershwin play whispered, "Where did he learn to play like George?"

He didn’t; he simply does. Other Gershwinites agreeing: Mabel Schirmer, Frances Godowsky (Gershwin’s younger sister, Frankie), as well as lyricist E.Y. Harburg ("Over the Rainbow"), who exclaimed, "I haven’t heard anyone play like that since George! Other Kevin admirers include songwriters Harold Arlen, Irving Berlin, and Hugh Martin, a virtual Who’s Who of American popular song.

Kevin, without realizing it, had recreated the kind of party that Gershwin had energized at the Paleys in the Village of the 1920’s, or at his penthouses in the Twenties and Thirties.

Welcome to the Party!

-Ed Jablonski
Gershwin Biographer

See all Editorial Reviews

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Total Delight, July 7, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Cole Plays Gershwin (Audio CD)

Cole's playing is amazing. He combines phenomenal
virtuosity with real feeling and a great sense of
musical fun. One can't help but feel that this is
how Gershwin's work was meant to sound.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome and inspiring, October 24, 2006

By 

Jeffrey A. Spenner "Jeffrey A. Spenner" (University of Illinois, Urbana, IL) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Cole Plays Gershwin (Audio CD)

I know Kevin personally, but that in no way affects my thinking of this album. Still, however, I find it to be the definitive CD for Gershwin's works. It's only a pity that Kevin hasn't recorded more than he has. I outright refuse to buy anyone else's Gershwin anymore...call me spoiled. Kudos to Kevin and his remarkable playing!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Gershwin interpreter, December 8, 2011

By 

Lark - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Cole Plays Gershwin (Audio CD)

Had the pleasure of seeing Kevin Cole in concert with a symphony orchestra recently. After playing Gershwin's Concerto in F for piano, he played two wonderful solo encores. This CD contains lots more spirited solos. If not for the technically well-produced digital sound, at times you'd think George Gershwin himself played on this recording.