A Critical Edition of the Works of American Composers George Gershwin (1898-1937) and Ira Gershwin (1896-1983)

FAIN: RQ-266249-19

Regents of the University of Michigan (Ann Arbor, MI 48109-1382)
Jessica Getman (Project Director: December 2018 to August 2020)
Andrew S. Kohler (Project Director: August 2020 to present)
Mark Allan Clague (Co Project Director: December 2018 to present)

Preparation of a critical edition and performance scores of works by George and Ira Gershwin, including music for string quartet, symphony orchestra, Broadway musicals, and film scores. (36 months).

The names of George and Ira Gershwin are synonymous throughout the world with American musical creativity. While readily accessible, their work too often circulates in substandard scores that contain surprising errors. In response, the Gershwin family estates, their publisher (Schott Music Group), and the University of Michigan have joined forces to produce The George and Ira Gershwin Critical Edition, the first scholarly edition of the Gershwins’ oeuvre. This complete-works critical edition facilitates both study and performance, giving a wide audience—musicians, scholars, students, and enthusiasts alike—greater insight into the Gershwins’ creative output. By September 2019, the edition will have used its initial, three-year NEH grant to provide three volumes to Schott for publication and sale, and five volumes for rental to ensembles. An additional round of funding is sought to continue the employment of key staff and to continue this work.

Associated Products

Language in Porgy and Bess: The Challenge of Representing Gullah (Blog Post)
Title: Language in Porgy and Bess: The Challenge of Representing Gullah
Author: Andrew S. Kohler
Abstract: Following Heather L. Hodges’s fantastic guest post about the Gullah Geechee culture that the Gershwins and Heywards portray in Porgy and Bess, we turn to one of the opera’s most contended aspects: its treatment of the Gullah language. In this post, our managing editor, Andrew S. Kohler, explores how the work’s text came to be so far removed from Gullah, and how future performances may approach the inconsistent libretto so as to give Gullah culture and language the respect they are due.
Date: 08/06/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=12348
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

"I Heard the Angels Singing": Listening to Gullah Geechee People Who Inspired Porgy and Bess (Blog Post)
Title: "I Heard the Angels Singing": Listening to Gullah Geechee People Who Inspired Porgy and Bess
Author: Heather L. Hodges
Abstract: To kick off our new series, The Past and Present of Porgy and Bess, we’re pleased to welcome guest contributor and expert on Gullah Geechee culture, Heather L. Hodges. In this post, Heather tells the deeply researched story of a staged Gullah Geechee musical performance that George Gershwin heard during his 1934 trip to South Carolina. She explains that understanding Gullah Geechee musical traditions and learning about the people who have kept them alive is critical to how audiences, producers, and performers approach Porgy and Bess today.
Date: 07/27/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=12136
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

The Greens of Summers: The Gershwins and the Invention of Kodachrome (Blog Post)
Title: The Greens of Summers: The Gershwins and the Invention of Kodachrome
Author: Marlina Bowring
Abstract: In this post, discover the origins of one of the first successful color photography processing methods—and its surprising connection to the Gershwin family!
Date: 07/01/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11970
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog.
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

Introducing a New Series: The Past and Future of Porgy and bess (Blog Post)
Title: Introducing a New Series: The Past and Future of Porgy and bess
Author: Kai West
Author: Andrew S. Kohler
Abstract: Despite being among the most prominent operas of the twentieth century, and perhaps the Gershwin brothers’ most monumental achievement, Porgy and Bess occupies an uneasy place in US musical history. In this series, Managing Editor Andrew S. Kohler, Ph.D. and blog team leader Kai West explore the opera’s complex and at times problematic representations of race, gender, disability, and class, connecting Porgy and Bess to today’s conversations about social justice.
Date: 06/10/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11867
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

The Ghost in the Machine: Decoding Gershwin in His Piano Rolls (Blog Post)
Title: The Ghost in the Machine: Decoding Gershwin in His Piano Rolls
Author: Sarah Sisk
Abstract: George Gershwin’s work creating rolls for player piano remains a source of curiosity among scholars and enthusiasts alike. But the more we search for evidence of Gershwin’s individuality and style in this lost technology, the more questions arise about the role of the composer as a visible author of music within the culture of 1910–20s music consumption, and whether during his lifetime these musical artifacts were even perceived as “recordings” at all.
Date: 04/05/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11380
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

Dr. Eva Jessye: The Grand Dame in Ann Arbor (Blog Post)
Title: Dr. Eva Jessye: The Grand Dame in Ann Arbor
Author: Sophia Janevic
Abstract: Dr. Eva Jessye had a special relationship to the University of Michigan and to the city of Ann Arbor. Join blog team member Sophia Janevic as she spends a day in Jessye’s archive, currently housed at the University of Michigan’s Bentley Historical Library, and speculates on what its materials can tell us about Dr. Jessye’s vibrant life. This is the final installment of a 3-part series on Dr. Eva Jessye. In part 1, we explored Jessye’s early life and her achievements as a choral director and composer, while part 2 chronicled Jessye’s work as the longtime choral director of The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess.
Date: 03/04/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11227
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

Dr. Eva Jessye: The Grand Dame of Porgy and Bess (Blog Post)
Title: Dr. Eva Jessye: The Grand Dame of Porgy and Bess
Author: Helen Bryant
Abstract: Dr. Eva Jessye’s work in the premiere production and subsequent revivals of The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess helped launch her choir to worldwide fame, and contributed to Jessye’s enduring legacy as “The Grande Dame of Black Music.” This is Part 2 of a 3-part series on Dr. Eva Jessye. In part 1, we explored Jessye’s early life and her achievements as a choral director and composer. Our next and final installment will discuss Jessye’s career in academia and the Eva Jessye Collection here at the University of Michigan.
Date: 03/03/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11221
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

Dr. Eva Jessye: Make Way for the Dame (Blog Post)
Title: Dr. Eva Jessye: Make Way for the Dame
Author: Clara Shen
Abstract: Composer, singer, and actress Dr. Eva Jessye was the first Black woman to earn international distinction as the director of a professional choral group, the Eva Jessye Choir. Inspired by her heritage, Jessye also arranged and composed spirituals and worked to increase appreciation for them. This is Part 1 of a 3-part series on Dr. Eva Jessye in which we explore the life and legacy of the “Grande Dame of Black Music.” Part 2 will chronicle Jessye’s work as the longtime choral director of The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess, while Part 3 will discuss Jessye’s career in academia and the Eva Jessye Collection here at the University of Michigan.
Date: 03/02/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=11196
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

"Jazz Opera? Problems of Genre in Blue Monday" (Blog Post)
Title: "Jazz Opera? Problems of Genre in Blue Monday"
Author: Ellen Sauer
Abstract: While it was never particularly successful, George Gershwin’s 1922 one-act “jazz-opera” Blue Monday played an important role in bridging the gap between his popular style and classical compositions. This post—the final installment of our three-part series devoted to Blue Monday—explores just what a “jazz-opera” might be and delves deeper into the cultural implications of these stylistic elements in Gershwin’s work.
Date: 01/28/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=10784
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

The Persistence of a Flop: Revivals and Re-Imaginings of Blue Monday (Blog Post)
Title: The Persistence of a Flop: Revivals and Re-Imaginings of Blue Monday
Author: Ellen Sauer
Abstract: While it was never particularly successful, George Gershwin’s 1922 one-act “jazz-opera” Blue Monday played an important role in bridging the gap between his popular style and classical compositions. This post—the second in a three-part series devoted to Blue Monday—chronicles various efforts to revive and record the piece since its brief stint on Broadway, and examines the ways these productions dealt with the racially and culturally offensive aspects of the show.
Date: 01/27/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=10772
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90&paged=2
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog.
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog.

Blue Monday: A Compositional Crossroads (Blog Post)
Title: Blue Monday: A Compositional Crossroads
Author: Ellen Sauer
Abstract: While it was never particularly successful, George Gershwin’s 1922 one-act “jazz-opera” Blue Monday played an important role in bridging the gap between his popular style and classical compositions. This post—the first of a three-part series devoted to Blue Monday—delves into the creation and short life of the work and explores its place in Gershwin’s compositional development.
Date: 01/26/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=10765
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90&paged=2
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

"A House of Many Mansions": Undine Smith Moore and the Fight for Black Music (Blog Post)
Title: "A House of Many Mansions": Undine Smith Moore and the Fight for Black Music
Author: Helen Bryant
Abstract: “Black music is a house of many mansions. Blacks have many musics and some of them relate in an extremely universal way to the human condition,” said Undine Smith Moore, who believed strongly in the power of Black music to reveal the innermost parts of the human heart, mind, body, and soul. This post is a celebration of her life as a Black woman in America, a legacy of bravery and persistence that lives on through her music.
Date: 01/12/2021
Primary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?p=10714
Primary URL Description: URL for the post.
Secondary URL: https://smtd.umich.edu/ami/gershwin/?page_id=90&paged=2
Secondary URL Description: URL for the blog.
Blog Title: The Gershwin Initiative Blog
Website: The Gershwin Initiative Blog

Presentation on Critical Editions for Musicology Course (Bibliography) (Course or Curricular Material)
Title: Presentation on Critical Editions for Musicology Course (Bibliography)
Author: Jessica L. Getman
Author: Andrew S. Kohler
Abstract: Our current Managing Editor, Andrew S. Kohler, has taught the bibliography course (Musicology 503) at the University of Michigan since 2018. Working with our previous Managing Editor, Jessica L. Getman (who is still part of the Editorial Board), he has incorporated a lesson plan on critical editions into his curriculum. This year, he taught a revised version of this lesson plan, including extensive examples from the AN AMERICAN IN PARIS and PORGY AND BESS editions, as well as the editorial apparatus used by the Gershwin Critical Edition. Dr. Kohler has found that this unit is among the most well-received by his students, most of whom are DMA performance majors who often have to think about the scores that they use. In the past, he has had students join the Gershwin Team or embark on their own editorial work.
Year: 2021
Audience: Graduate

A Modernist Manifesto: Reconsidering George Gershwin’s An American in Paris (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: A Modernist Manifesto: Reconsidering George Gershwin’s An American in Paris
Author: Mark Clague
Abstract: This paper argues that Gershwin’s An American in Paris is a modernist musical manifesto—a statement of the composer’s ambition to write musically sophisticated yet accessible music that made money. It examines Gershwin’s work from three perspectives: as popular modernism, as a synthesis of program and absolute musics, and as an exemplar of Gershwin’s economics. Sources include an overlooked 1920 Gershwin interview, discoveries from the work’s new critical edition, and financial documents from contemporary newspapers and the Library of Congress. It concludes that Gershwin’s music is more modern and compositionally rich than typically understood, while serving to make classical music pay.
Date: 07/16/2020
Primary URL: file:///Users/andrewkohler/Downloads/3c_ClagueMark_Abstract.pdf
Primary URL Description: Link to abstract.
Secondary URL: https://www.american-music.org/page/SAM2020ProgramLive-Thurs
Secondary URL Description: Link to conference program.
Conference Name: 46th Annual Conference of the Society for American Music

Rhapsody in Blue (Arr. by Ryan Banagale) (Radio/Audio Broadcast or Recording)
Title: Rhapsody in Blue (Arr. by Ryan Banagale)
Director: Bruce Anthony Kiesling, conductor; Adrian Symphony Orchestra; Jeffrey Biegel, piano
Producer: CD Baby (label)
Abstract: This is the premiere recording of Ryan Raul Bañagale's edition of Ferde Grofé's original jazz band arrangement of George Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue (1924)
Date: 08/27/2021
Primary URL: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09HV7PSD5/ref=dm_rogue_cd
Primary URL Description: Link to recording on Amazon.
Secondary URL: https://music.apple.com/us/album/rhapsody-in-blue-arr-by-ryan-banagale-ep/1583094420
Secondary URL Description: Link to recording on Apple Music.
Access Model: Available for purchase (CD and several streaming services: Spotify, Apply Music, iTunes, Amazon, and Pandora)
Format: CD
Format: Digital File
Format: Web

Buckra: Whiteness and Porgy and Bess (Article)
Title: Buckra: Whiteness and Porgy and Bess
Author: Kai West
Abstract: Questions of race have been central to an understanding of George Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess (1935), yet the opera’s portrayal of whiteness remains an aspect hidden in plain sight. While focusing on a Black community living under Jim Crow segregation, the work also features five white characters—a Detective and two police officers, a Coroner, and a lawyer—whose actions affect the lives of the people of Catfish Row in three often overlooked sections of the opera. Through close readings of the score, literary antecedents, and recorded as well as live performances, this article examines the relational role that whiteness plays in the compositional architecture and production history of Porgy and Bess. To show how the opera’s complex social dynamics are embedded in its musical structure, I employ an interdisciplinary approach combining musicological analysis with critical race theory, which pinpoints racial formation as a key component of Gershwin’s score. The article’s central analysis of the score reveals nuanced portrayals of Jim Crow race relations, highlighted by both multilayered expressions of white supremacy and powerful moments of Black resistance. These nuances, however, depend on reading the opera in its complete state, yet the three Black/white exchanges are often heavily altered in performance. To further understand how staging these scenes can affect their meanings, I investigate several key productions from across the opera’s history. Concluding with the Metropolitan Opera’s 2019–20 production, I reflect that the depictions of police brutality, white supremacy, and Black resistance in Porgy and Bess are more painfully relevant today than ever before.
Year: 2022
Primary URL: https://online.ucpress.edu/jams/article/75/2/319/185498/Buckra-Whiteness-and-Porgy-and-Bess
Access Model: It appears to be open access.
Format: Journal
Publisher: Journal of the American Musicological Society

Recovering Catfish Row: Toward Centering Gullah Culture in the Gershwins' and Heywards' Porgy and Bess (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Recovering Catfish Row: Toward Centering Gullah Culture in the Gershwins' and Heywards' Porgy and Bess
Author: Andrew S. Kohler
Abstract: The question of “Who owns this?” has long loomed over Porgy and Bess, the 1935 opera about a Gullah Geechee community in a Charleston tenement called Catfish Row. The representation of marginalized communities is always fraught, and this piece is especially contentious because it was created by outsiders—the Russian-Jewish brothers George and Ira Gershwin, and the White Charleston couple DuBose and Dorothy Heyward. Despite ongoing debates about the work, particularly its treatment of race, there has been troublingly little focus on the Gullah people. My presentation also evaluates Porgy and Bess in the larger context of controversies surrounding representation, focusing particularly on the discourse among Black intellectuals around the time the opera and its source materials were written. Sterling A. Brown warned against looking down on places like Catfish Row, and noted the importance of proper framing. In 1959, James Baldwin observed that what Porgy and Bess and its audiences were missing is how the story is shaped by the realities of life in the Jim Crow south. A closer examination of the score and libretto, including several revealing lines that are either cut or sanitized in most productions, reveals that thoughtful productions could make for an effective vehicle for greater understanding. As Baldwin noted, the characters “keep reminding one, most forcefully, of a real Catfish Row.”
Date: 02/26/2022
Primary URL: https://www.coastal.edu/joynerinstitute/conference/2022schedule/
Conference Name: IGGAD 2022: Who Owns This? Communities, Heritage, and Preservation

Unit on critical editions for Musicology 503 (Course or Curricular Material)
Title: Unit on critical editions for Musicology 503
Author: Andrew S. Kohler
Abstract: This was a two-week unit for my bibliography course for graduate students at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance. Please see under "supplementary materials" for the Powerpoint slides.
Year: 2022
Audience: Graduate

Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Jazz Band, full score (Book)
Title: Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Jazz Band, full score
Author: Ferde Grofé
Author: George Gershwin
Editor: Ryan Raul Bañagale
Abstract: This is the original orchestration of Rhapsody in Blue, first performed on February 12, 2023. This volume is the full score.
Year: 2023
Primary URL: https://www.schott-music.com/en/rhapsody-in-blue-no577145.html
Primary URL Description: Publisher's website.
Access Model: Available for purchase
Publisher: Schott Music (GIGE 2101)
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 978-3-7957-31

Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Jazz Band, two-piano score (Book)
Title: Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Jazz Band, two-piano score
Author: Ferde Grofé
Author: George Gershwin
Editor: Ryan Raul Bañagale
Abstract: This is the two-piano score to accompany the full score volume. The piano reduction was made collaboratively by Jessica Getman, Andrew S. Kohler, Bran Scott Rumsey, Logan Skelton, and Evan Ware.
Year: 2023
Primary URL: https://www.schott-music.com/en/rhapsody-in-blue-no577148.html
Primary URL Description: Publisher's website.
Access Model: Available for purchase.
Publisher: Schott Music
Type: Scholarly Edition
ISBN: 978-3-7957-315

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