George Gershwin: The Annotated Rhapsody in Blue

Rhapsody in Blue has been restored to Gershwin’s original manuscript by the talented Alicia Zizzo. This special edition includes an addendum to the two piano, four hands edition and the fully restored piano manuscript. When preparing the Rhapsody in Blue for publication, editors at Sam Harms Music Co. applied their own 19th century compositional conservatory training to the piece. With good intentions and due respect to Gershwin, they discreetly altered chords, phrases, dynamics, and accents, deleting whole passages to create a more concise work. Oddly, with the exception of four bars, all the deletions were from the piano solo sections, leaving the orchestration mostly undisturbed. Over 50 measures were deleted from the manuscript for the two-piano, four-hands publication, and the piece was shortened by several minutes. Approximately 80 measures were deleted from the original manuscript for the piano solo version and the editors used the second piano/orchestral reduction as a basis for it, further distancing the piano solo edition from Gershwin’s original intent. After 70 years, the majesty of the complete Rhapsody in Blue as originally conceived and performed is finally available to future generations in this special annotated edition.