George Gershwin quotes - page 2

Porgy is...an interesting example of what can be done by talent in spite of a bad setup. With a libretto that should never have been accepted on a subject that should never have been chosen, a man who should never have attempted it has written a work that has a considerable power. (George Gershwin)
Upper berth, lower berth, that's the difference between talent and genius. View quote
George Gershwin
I want to say at once that I frankly believe that Irving Berlin is the greatest songwriter that has ever lived.... His songs are exquisite cameos of perfection, and each one of them is as beautiful as its neighbor. Irving Berlin remains, I think, America's Schubert. View quote
George Gershwin
Gershwin's tragedy was not that he failed to cross the tracks, but rather that he did, and once there in his new habitat, was deprived of the chance to plunge his roots firmly into the new soil. View quote
George Gershwin
It took me three weeks to write the 'Rhapsody in Blue.' I had always wanted to write something blue and Paul Whiteman inspired. View quote
George Gershwin
When I'm in my normal mood, music drips from my fingers. View quote
George Gershwin
I didn't even start playing the piano until I was about 13 or 14. I guess I must have had a little talent or whatever-you-call-it, but I practised regularly, and that's what counts. View quote
George Gershwin
The extraordinary thing about my mother, she's so modest about me. View quote
George Gershwin
There is no better way to spend an evening than listening to George Gershwin at the piano. Fortunately for his audience, he seldom was away from it. He played his own tunes to Ira's special lyrics and though his voice was pure gravel it was special entertainment. View quote
George Gershwin
It would have been better if you had died and Gershwin had written the elegy. View quote
George Gershwin
Well, if I were thus rationed in this article and could have but one adjective for George Gershwin, that adjective would be "ingenuous." Ingenuous at and about his piano. Once an occasional composer named Oscar Levant stood beside that piano while those sure, sinewy, catlike Gershwin fingers beat their brilliant drum-fire-the tumultuous cascade of the "Rhapsody In Blue," the amorous languor of "The Man I Love," the impish glee of "Fascinating Rhythm," the fine, jaunty, dust-spurning scorn of "Strike Up the Band." If the performer was familiar with the work of any other composer, he gave no evidence of it. Levant (who, by the way, makes a fleeting appearance in the new Dashlell Hammett book, under the guise of Levi Oscant) could be heard mutterIng under his breath, "An evening with Gershwin Is a Gershwln evening." "I wonder," said our young composer dreamily, "if my music will be played a hundred years from now." "It certainly will be," said the bitter Levant,"if you are still around." (George Gershwin)
[I]t's only good songs that last, not good rhythm, and in the first six years or so of his composing George was interested mainly in developing new rhythms. View quote
George Gershwin