An American in Paris

Gershwin visited Paris in May 1928, for the first European performance of his Piano Concerto in F, and went back to New York a few weeks later with the complete works of Debussy, a set of Parisian taxi-horns and the sketches for a new orchestral work called An American in Paris. The taxi-horns, as we will hear, were an inspired discovery. Just how much An American in Paris owes to Debussy, on the other hand, is open to doubt. Gershwin did acknowledge a debt to “the manner of Debussy and the Six” but there is little trace of any of them here, Debussy least of all. It is true that the “Groupe des Six” - as the trendy but loose alliance of Milhaud, Honegger, Poulenc, Auric, Durey and Tailleferre was known in Paris at the time - had an interest in jazz and other forms of popular music, but George Gershwin, the composer of Rhapsody in Blue and several highly successful musicals, needed no encouragement in that area.

Where Gershwin did need encouragement was in writing music for the concert hall, to which end he sought to have lessons from Stravinsky, Ravel and other distinguished composers - but always to be rejected with the advice to be himself. So An American in Paris, which is the first ever tone poem written basically in the Broadway idiom, was a bold project and, as it turned out, a considerable achievement of Gershwin being himself. He described it as “the most modern music I’ve yet attempted” and, certainly, there are modernistic passages in it that a Broadway audience would not have recognised. But all the tunes and dance rhythms, most of the harmonies and much of the instrumental colouring would have been of a kind quite familiar to them.

My purpose here, Gerswhin explained, is to portray the impression of an American visitor in Paris, as he strolls about the city, and listens to various street noises and absorbs the French atmosphere. As in my other orchestral compositions, I've not endeavored to represent any definite scenes in this music. The rhapsody is programmatic only in a general impressionistic way, so that the individual listener can read into the music such as his imagination pictures for him. Even so, the composer did not resist drawing special attention to the “rich blues” section inspired by “a spasm of homesickness” at the heart of the piece.

There could be no better melodic equivalent of a happily strolling tourist than the opening theme on violins and oboe - which, though it is helped out by one or two other walking tunes from time to time, recurs many times over in all kinds of variations and remains the main theme of the piece. As for the “street noises,” the most prominent is the characteristic sound of the klaxons of the Parisian taxis of the day. Another, heard not much later on trombones, is a blast of “La Sorella” from a nearby café. There is also a quieter episode where the walking pace temporarily slows down a little (on cor anglais), out of respect for a church perhaps or some other noble building. But for the most part this opening section is put together with an exuberance which does indeed provoke comparison with the uninhibited harmonies of the composer’s French contemporaries.

The “rich blues” Gershwin referred to occupies the whole of the middle section. Following what sounds like a flirtatious encounter - she represented by a pretty violin solo, he by laconic allusions to the main strolling theme - it begins as a twelve-bar blues on muted trumpet. But if this represents “a spasm of homesickness” it is homesickeness taken to epic proportions as the blues melody is treated to a full-scale symphonic development. The way out of the depression proves to be a lively Charleston, also introduced by trumpets. Although the blues is never actually forgotten - a particularly lugubrious allusion is confided to the tuba - it does not get in the way of a coda that re-introduces the strolling theme in its original jaunty demeanour and recalls the bustling street scene, not excluding the taxis.

An American in Paris was first performed by Walter Damrosch and the New York Philharmonic in the Carnegie Hall in December 1928. The Vincente Minelli film of the same name, which features Gershwin’s music danced by Leslie Caron and Gene Kelly, wasn’t made until twenty-three years later.

Gershwin visited Paris in May 1928, for the first European performance of his Piano Concerto in F, and went back to New York a few weeks later with the complete works of Debussy, a set of Parisian taxi-horns and the sketches for a new orchestral work called An American in Paris. The taxi-horns, as we will hear, were an inspired discovery. Just how much An American in Paris owes to Debussy, on the other hand, is open to doubt. Gershwin did acknowledge a debt to “the manner of Debussy and the Six” but there is little trace of any of them here, Debussy least of all. It is true that the “Groupe des Six” - as the trendy but loose alliance of Milhaud, Honegger, Poulenc, Auric, Durey and Tailleferre was known in Paris at the time - had an interest in jazz and other forms of popular music, but George Gershwin, the composer of Rhapsody in Blue and several highly successful musicals, needed no encouragement in that area.

Where Gershwin did need encouragement was in writing music for the concert hall, to which end he sought to have lessons from Stravinsky, Ravel and other distinguished composers - but always to be rejected with the advice to be himself. So An American in Paris, which is the first ever tone poem written basically in the Broadway idiom, was a bold project and, as it turned out, a considerable achievement of Gershwin being himself. He described it as “the most modern music I’ve yet attempted” and, certainly, there are modernistic passages in it that a Broadway audience would not have recognised. But all the tunes and dance rhythms, most of the harmonies and much of the instrumental colouring would have been of a kind quite familiar to them.

My purpose here, Gerswhin said, is to portray the impression of an American visitor in Paris, as he strolls about the city, and listens to various street noises and absorbs the French atmosphere. As in my other orchestral compositions, I've not endeavored to represent any definite scenes in this music. The rhapsody is programmatic only in a general impressionistic way, so that the individual listener can read into the music such as his imagination pictures for him.

The opening gay section is followed by a rich blues with a strong rhythmic undercurrent. Our American friend perhaps after strolling into a café and having a couple of drinks, has succumbed to a spasm of homesickness. The harmony here is both more intense and simple than in the preceding pages. This blues rises to a climax followed by a coda in which the spirit of the music returns to the vivacity and bubbling exuberance of the opening part with its impressions of Paris. Apparently the homesick American, having left the café and reached the open air, has disowned his spell of the blues and once again is an alert spectator of Parisian life. At the conclusion, the street noises and French atmosphere are triumphant.

There could be no better melodic equivalent of a happily strolling tourist than the opening theme on violins and oboe - which, though it is helped out by one or two other walking tunes from time to time, recurs many times over in all kinds of variations and remains the main theme of the piece. As for the “street noises,” the most prominent is the characteristic sound of the klaxons of the Parisian taxis of the day. Another, heard not much later on trombones, is a blast of “La Sorella” from a nearby café. There is also a quieter episode where the walking pace temporarily slows down a little (on cor anglais), out of respect for a church perhaps or some other noble building. But for the most part this opening section is put together with an exuberance which does indeed provoke comparison with the uninhibited harmonies of the composer’s French contemporaries.

The “rich blues” Gershwin referred to occupies the whole of the middle section of the piece. Following a flirtatious encounter - she represented by a pretty violin solo, he by laconic allusions to the main strolling theme - it begins as a twelve-bar blues on muted trumpet. But if, as the composer says, this represents “a spasm of homesickness” it is homesickeness taken to epic proportions as the blues melody is treated to a full-scale symphonic development. The way out of the depression proves to be a lively Charleston, also introduced by trumpets. Although the blues is never actually forgotten - a particularly lugubrious allusion is confided to the tuba - it does not get in the way of a coda that re-introduces the strolling theme in its original jaunty demeanour and recalls the bustling street scene, not excluding the taxis.

An American in Paris was first performed by Walter Damrosch and the New York Philharmonic in the Carnegie Hall in December 1928. The Vincente Minelli film of the same name, which features Gershwin’s music danced by Leslie Caron and Gene Kelly, wasn’t made until twenty-three years later.