George Gershwin essays

George Gershwin essays George Gershwin was the most celebrated and wealthiest American composer who expressed the dreams of every American citizen of the 1920's. He achieved this by mixing different styles of music like Jewish, black, jazz, classical, blues and put them into one genre and created absolute music. He was primarily a composer of popular songs and a jazz pianist though. George became one of America's first premier composers. His compositions are still used today, and are used as examples of the American entrance to the musical world of Chopin, Beethoven, and Mozart. Although he did not live very long, his impact on American musical culture was undeniable. In the following paragraphs, his biographical information and musical works will be examined. George Gershwin born Jacob Gershowitz, in Brooklyn, New York on 26 September 1898, was born the second of four children of Morris and Rose Gershovitz, Russians who immigrated to New York in 1891. George had two brothers, Arthur and Ira, and one sister, Francis. George and his family lived on Manhattan's lower east side in a poor Jewish community. After settling down in New York, his father changed the family name to Gershvin. It was George who later altered his last name to Gershwin when he entered the professional world of music. Most of his family was not musically talented, but his brother Ira became a fairly well-known musician. He had the childhood of any average kid growing up in the early 1900's. Most of Gershwin's early childhood was spent playing sports, which he was good at, and it interested him. He was a very wild and robust child who was not interested in any type of school work (The George and Ira Gershwin Educational Fanpage.). Gershwin was first attracted to music when he was ten years old, when he heard Dvoraks Humoresque played by a young violinist at a school assembly. It wasn't until Gershwin was 12 years old that he first felt his calling as a mu...