Gershwin: Piano Concerto / Rhapsody in Blue

Jean-Yves Thibaudet (Artist), George Gershwin (Composer), Marin Alsop (Conductor), Baltimore Symphony (Orchestra) | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Orchestra: Baltimore Symphony
• Conductor: Marin Alsop
• Composer: George Gershwin
• Audio CD (April 27, 2010)
• SPARS Code: DDD
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Decca
• ASIN: B0035F0MU0
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #10,109 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

From the Artist

GOING WITH THE SWING Jean-Yves Thibaudet and Marin Alsop in conversation with Kevin Gregory KG: Both the Rhapsody in Blue and the Concerto in F are more often heard in symphonic guise these days. How do the Ferde Grofé jazz-band orchestrations change your thinking about them? JYT: The Rhapsody is much better this way: it has a completely different feeling and sound. The entire experience is different - it's much more jazzy. People ask if the piece is jazz, classical or both. But the underlying jazz element really belongs to this great piece, and the original orches-tration gives it the flavour that it should have. The Grofé orchestration certainly brings jazzier colours to the Concerto in F than Gershwin's own more straightforward orchestration. Why is it heard so seldom? MA: Gershwin was offended by it, apparently. When Paul Whiteman had it done, Gershwin's attitude was: "I know how to orchestrate now, so why are we doing this?" The estate didn't per-mit anyone to record it after Gershwin's death because they felt it went against his wishes. Then they decided, for historical interest, to stop being so restrictive. That's when I first recorded it, with my Concordia Orchestra, about twenty years ago. Performing Grofé's orchestration of the Concerto presents almost a moral dilemma: Gershwin needed Grofé's help with the Rhapsody, but he orchestrated the Concerto himself. How do you resolve it? MA: By turning it into a double iconic tribute. These Gershwin works have come to represent American music - fundamental, quintessentially American music. Using the Paul Whiteman versions adds another iconic layer. Many of Gershwin's own performances survive, both on commercial recordings and radio broadcasts. What do they mean to you? JYT: I've heard them, of course - as many as I can. I also adore Oscar Levant, who had a won-derful way with Gershwin. He had chops. He had everything. But Gershwin's performances are always fantastic to hear. When I first heard Rachmaninov play his own concertos, I was shocked in a very positive way. You think of Rachmaninov's music as being heavy and loud, the way Russians play it. And then Rachmaninov, this amazing pianist, played it like feathers, which is the way I like it. Gershwin is much the same. I liked it. But we should never try to imitate some-one else. How do you decide how much you can swing in this music? JYT: If you don't swing, you don't play the Concerto in F. It's definitely between two chairs - classical and jazz - and you can go, to different degrees, one way or the other. So there's much you can do with it. With the jazz version of the Rhapsody, which I've never played before, you should swing even more. We'll kick it! I like the ambiguity of Gershwin being in both worlds. His music is beyond barriers. Yet wasn't it exactly that hybrid quality that for so long made Gershwin a somewhat suspicious figure on both jazz and classical fronts in America? MA: It's pretty far-out what he was thinking. You look at Porgy and Bess and realise he was pushing the envelope in every single form. Had he lived another ten years, he'd have been writ-ing more tone-poems for orchestra, maybe playing with twelve-tone compositional tech-niques . . . JYT: Having grown up in France, Gershwin has always been a really important part of my life, since I was fourteen or fifteen. He's been under-appreciated in the United States. When I played the Concerto in F with the Boston Symphony and James Levine, it was the first time it had been played at a subscription concert. I've also played Gershwin at the Amsterdam Concertgebouw and with the Munich Philharmonic. There's still a stigma about him being a jazz, film and caba-ret composer. But he's a star in France and always has been.

Product Description

Jean-Yves Thibaudet performs "jazz band" orchestrations of Rhapsody in Blue, variations on `I Got Rhythm,' and the Concerto in F live with the Baltimore Symphony and music director Marin Alsop. French pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet has long been a champion of Gershwin's music and has widely performed the Concerto in concert with major symphony orchestras around the world. Now, after more than 40 releases on Decca, Thibaudet turns his attention solely to the works of Gershwin. For this release, Thibaudet has made the daring choice to perform the original "jazz band" arrangements by Ferde Grofé for the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. Rarely heard or recorded, these arrangements create a completely different sound for these well-known and popular works, especially Rhapsody in Blue. Thibaudet is joined by Gershwin fan, American conductor Marin Alsop and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra for these live recordings. Gershwin is one of the most popular composers and Thibaudet gives a fresh spin and new twist on these familiar, and justly beloved, pieces.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Marin Alsop, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Baltimore SO: Gershwin Rhapsody, Variations, Concerto: Saucy, Slouched, Tang, Sizzle, May 20, 2010

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Dan Fee "music fan aka drdanfee" (Berkeley, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Gershwin: Piano Concerto / Rhapsody in Blue (Audio CD)

This disc pulled me in and pushed me away at the same time. It looked on the downside like it might be yet another of those crossover efforts doomed to failure, usually drummed up by a marketing department with big name players to deploy. I've not always been a stark raving fan of pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet, not that he ever plays anything all that badly. I sometimes just don't felt engaged and convinced by his musical views in some of the literature; oh, well. He's got the jet-setting musical career; I don't.

For up sides, several glimmers might draw us in. Baltimore (under former Music Director David Zinman, now holding forth in Zurich at the Tonhalle) gave us one of the very best readings of the Gershwin Concerto in F. Their partnership with Helene Grimaud jazzed right up to the top of my keeper lists; as did the companion reading of Ravel's Concerto in g. If you look closely at the back disc cover, you will see that we are given the Ferde Grofe arrangements for jazz band ... although later listening seems to confirm that these famous originals have been adapted just a bit to suit the larger departments of the Baltimore SO.

Still, the catalog competition is pretty well established, both in the "Blue" rhapsody and in the piano concerto. Rhapsody keepers can start with the young Bernstein's long-lasting reading, then go on to consider other classics like Earl Wild with Fiedler (now remastered in super audio). Other appealing rhapsodies have been let loose by Wayne Marshall, Michael Tilson Thomas accompanying the 1925 piano rolls with the composer in the solo assignment, and Tzimon Barto with Andrew Davis letting their hair down more than you might expect (one of my sleeper favs). In the piano concerto I start my own keeper list with Grimaud in Baltimore - it has an uncanny meld of through-playing, glitter, sizzle, and sensuousness. I also like Earl Wild - with Fiedler in super audio, and in Des Moines with Joseph Giunta.

The up side is considerable, after all.

Somehow Thibaudet manages to serve up plenty of water front dive slouch, even as his keyboard technique stays consistently French-Piano-School. Marin Alsop has plenty of ability to bring out the saxophonic-swinging side of the Ferde Grofe orchestration, simultaneously with keeping a good eye or ear out for the symphonic dimensions of each piece as a whole. Most readings fall off the fence, landing way over on the free-wheeling pop side or the classical concert-hall side of these Gershwin works. Also, somewhat surprisingly, both Thibaudet and Alsop emphasize the driven-motoric pulses and figurations of Gershwin's muse. I found myself hearing clear links to Bartok and Prokofiev keyboard manners - and all to the benefit of Gershwin, in all three keyboard-orchestra outings.

The reading of the rhapsody manages propulsion, whimsy that nearly sounds improvised on the very spot, and bluesy lyricism that always keeps moving forward. Thibaudet and Alsop and the band seem able to position the rhapsody in its own Tin Pan Alley era, surprise connoting George Antheil being channeled by Francis Poulenc (among others?), while never, ever serving it up as a disconnected series of fun episodes that still don't quite add up, or rendering it as a giant symphonic-classical over-reach for jazz manners and sensibilities trying to strong arm pass the old money guards in the front lobby.

Second, we get the variations on that very durable tune, I got rhythm. Thibaudet and Alsop and the band bring it off handsomely, too. A step forward in coherence, rather closer kin to the famous Rachmaninoff Paganini Rhapsody than I had before glimpsed. The fun spirits open up readily, reminding us of Porgy and Bess and the Cuban Overture. The unanimity of perspective which all involved are bringing to bear through all of the imaginative variations helps infuse and connect them, again all to the better, all to the musical good. And again, these proceedings are enriched with passing motoric figuration associations with keyboard innovations by Bartok and Prokofiev, not to mention avant-garde composers like Henry Cowell and George Antheil.

The disc wraps up with Ferde Grofe's take on the piano concerto. Apparently, Gershwin felt offended by Paul Whitman bothering to have Ferde do it, since the composer believed he had learned to do his own orchestrations by that point in time. So it was suppressed by the Gershwin estate for a long time, until the estate powers relented, under the cover of letting Ferde's version sound out, for historical reasons. Ferde's orchestration bends way down at times, slouching far lower into casual manners and tonally spiced up colors and manners than the composer's own orchestration; and yet it has its own ways of illuminating the genius of the piano concerto after all. Part of the quality on offer is still the ways that Thibaudet and Alsop and the band keep it all up in the air, really going strong - despite what one suspects would otherwise turn into low-brow sleaziness in other, less musically adept hands?

Again, the concerto melds disparate sides of Gershwin into a rich, dazzling display that brings the music together, more often than not. We get all the blues-jazz spices we could possibly want, and all the direct-melody pop song appeal that only a great tune smith like Gershwin could serve up, with frisk and energy from both the Bartok-Prokofiev motorways, as well as from the quirky-glittering colors and shine we may tend to associate with Stravinsky-Ravel-Poulenc-Satie. The middle slow movement is as rich and bluesy-mournful as anybody could ever want, overflowing with those welcome connotations of Porgy and Bess. Very uptown, Manhattan Island, after hours. The stepping flow and the chromatic modulations have hardly ever made as much logical musical sense as they do in the capable-inspired handling of Thibaudet and Alsop and Baltimore. Then the final movement drives things home, as well as Bartok does in his second piano concerto.

All in all, one whale of a musical Gershwin package, is this disc. The only possible improvement would be that a super audio surround sound edition of it could be released. So far as the rhapsody and variations go, this one is a sure-fire keeper. For the concerto, it rises high, right up there with my near-definitive concerto reading by Grimaud and Zinman, also in Baltimore .... (but in the Gershwin orchestration).

Gotta grab it, fast. Watch out for the sharp edges on each of those five stars. Jazz hands, all around.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars perhaps too "moderne", May 19, 2010

By 

Douglas N. Hogue (Glendora, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Gershwin: Piano Concerto / Rhapsody in Blue (Audio CD)

The Thursday before this CD was released I saw a concert performed by Mr Thibaudet and this was the autographed disk offereed afterward I first to this with a person who disliked it because it seemed so entirely untraditional. I found that the focus seemed not so much on swing but speed. Aside fron the dramatically different orchestrations, the piano was much faster with riffs and onamentations played in a very different manner from what we are used to. If you are expectiong the normal 30's Gershwin, this ain't it, but if you approach this CD as an entirely new experience it is a lot of fun to hear. My issue is with the engineering. Balance is not what it should be, especially in the concerto. The percussion is sometimes piercing with the saxaphones sounding far away. Still I listen to this often.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars A very strange Concerto in F. Some odd balances too., June 25, 2010

By 

B. Guerrero "Mahler nutcase" - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Gershwin: Piano Concerto / Rhapsody in Blue (Audio CD)

The Ferde Grofe version of Gershwin's "Rhapsody In Blue", arranged especially for the work's premiere with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra, is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to the standard orchestral version. Rightfully so, I'd say. Therefore, what's good for the goose must also be good for the gander, right? . . . wrong. By the time Gershwin composed his "Concerto in F", he had already become a proficient orchestrator. Without consulting Gershwin, Grofe went ahead with his own orchestration at the request of Whiteman. Apparently, Gershwin was not too pleased by this turn of events. But more to the point, if you're already familiar with the concerto, this Grofe version may strike you as being very strange sounding. It's not the ubiquitous saxophones and banjo that are bothersome. Instead, it's the fact that Grofe changes more than just some of Gershwin's actual writing, and throws in a number of unnecessary tam-tam strokes as well (and I'm a huge gong-head!). The very beginning of the concerto, for example, has some brass chords that are changed in a very big way. Two big tam-tam smashes towards the end of the slow movement sound more like Shostakovich or Mahler, than Gershwin. It isn't so much that it's awful, but that it's in no way an improvement over Gershwin's own version. I have no qualms over Thibaudet's playing, although he does sound a tad stiff here and there - especially during the "I Got Rhythm" Variations. But equally troubling, is that certain wind instruments will suddenly sound larger than life.

Baltimore's Meyerhoff Hall is a notoriously dry place to record, and it sounds as though the Decca engineers struggled a bit here. Make no mistake, there's the usual richness and deep bass to the Decca sound. But it's also apparent that the Decca engineers had to crack open a few spot-mikes more than they're usually accustomed to doing. There's a slight air of artificiality to the proceedings. It comes off a bit slick and plastic to me. But the main problem is just Grofe's willy-nilly version of the concerto. Pick this up only as a supplement or novelty, as this simply isn't a first pick by any stretch of the imagination.