Gershwin’s “An American in Paris”: A “Rhapsodic Ballet” Born in the Jazz Age
In the spring of 1928, George and Ira Gershwin traveled to Europe for a three-month sojourn. The brothers, among the most celebrated composer-lyricist teams on Broadway, had just finished work on the musical, Rosalie, produced by Florenz Ziegfeld, and they relished the time off. It was during this trip that George Gershwin set to work on a commission he had received from the New York Philharmonic. The result was the vividly evocative …