The musical idiom of jazz evolved in New Orleans in the early part of the twentieth century from ragtime and the blues. But it was in Europe where American dance bands became popular, and where classical composers first incorporated the new idiom into their compositions: Claude Debussy in Golliwog's Cakewalk (1908), Igor Stravinsky in Ragtime (1918) and especially Darius Milhaud in the ballet La création du monde (1923). 

George Gershwin was the first American composer to make jazz acceptable to the classical music audience. The son of poor Jewish immigrants in lower Manhattan, he was a natural-born pianist and left school at 16 to become a pianist with a Tin-Pan Alley firm, plugging their new songs. He soon commenced writing songs himself, eventually teaming up with his brother Ira as lyricist to become one of the most successful teams of song and musical comedy writers on Broadway.

In 1923 Paul Whiteman, the self-styled “King of Jazz” who attempted to make jazz more symphonic and more respectable, heard Gershwin play piano arrangements of a few of his songs. In an attempt to move jazz from the dance hall to concert hall, Whiteman commissioned Gershwin to write an extended jazz composition. The result was the Rhapsody in Blue. Its performance at the Paul Whiteman Concerts in 1924 made history. Although the critics – true to form – mostly panned it, the audience loved it. Gershwin himself played the piano part and became an instant celebrity. 

He transformed that fame into a string of immensely successful musicals. From Lady be Good in December 1924 to Let ‘em Eat Cake in October 1933, the opening night of a George Gershwin musical comedy was a social and media event with Gershwin himself usually leading the orchestra.

Gershwin’s ambition to write a real opera, rather than musicals, culminated in 1935 in Porgy and Bess, a blending of spirituals, jazz and blues, which is probably his most enduring stage work. It is based on a novel by DuBose Heyward, who had already converted it into a successful stage play and later collaborated with the two Gershwin brothers in creating the opera. Gershwin had been captivated by the novel; when he received a commission from the Metropolitan Opera to write a quintessentially American opera, he turned to Heyward’s story. He stipulated that his “American folk opera” always be performed by an Afro-American cast, a stipulation that is still in hot dispute today. But in the 1930s the Met had never employed so much as a single black extra and was not about to change its policy, and the composer refused to have it performed in blackface. Porgy and Bess finally premiered on Broadway under the aegis of the Theater Guild in 1935.

The opera's gritty story of life and death in Catfish Row, one of the poor black tenements of Charleston, South Carolina, reflected Gershwin’s identification with the poor and oppressed. It opens on a crap game in Catfish Row. Clara, wife of Jake, one of the gamesters, sings a lullaby to her baby (“Summertime”). Jake has his own take on the domestic scene (“A Woman is a Sometime Thing”) Porgy, a crippled peddler arrives in his goat cart at the same time as Crown, a “tough stevedore” and his woman, Bess. Crown kills another player, Robbins, who has beaten him in the game while the chorus reacts in horror. Bess urges Crown to flee and gives him money while she remains in Catfish Row. Sportin’ Life, a dope pusher, suggests that Bess drown her worries in a trip to New York, but she refuses and Porgy takes her under his wing.

In scene 2, in Robbins’s apartment, the residents of Catfish collect money for his funeral and his widow Serena. (“Gone, Gone, Gone”) Then, in fear of Crown, they mislead the police by accusing an old deaf man of the murder. Serena continues the lamentation (“My Man's Gone Now”) but Bess sings (“Leavin' for The Promise Lan'”) as the act ends.

Act II takes place a few weeks later by which time Porgy and Bess have become lovers, despite Crown’s parting warning to Bess that she’s permanently his woman (“I Got Plenty O'Nuttin'”). Bess purchases a “divorce” from “lawyer” Frazier, and the residents of Catfish Row prepare for a picnic on Kittiwah Island. Sportin’ Life continues his predatory advances to Bess, who again rejects him. She tells Porgy she doesn’t want to go to the picnic if he can’t go and the two affirm their love (“Bess, You is My Woman Now”).

Scene 2 takes place at the picnic where the chorus sings “Oh, I Can't Sit Down.” Sportin’ Life entertains them with the ballad (“It Ain't Necessarily So”). A hurricane is threatening and the revelers quickly run to the boats back to Charleston. Crown suddenly appears and confronts Bess, who is unable to resist him, and the two remain on the island despite the storm. Back in Serena’s room a few days after the picnic, Bess, apparently sick from exposure, has been rescued from the Island although Crown, Jake and Clara are still missing. She tells Porgy about her confrontation with Crown but claims she still loves him (“I Loves You, Porgy”).

In Act III, the injured Crown unexpectedly returns and crawls his way to Porgy’s door where Porgy stabs and then strangles him. When the police come to arrest the killer, the crowd protects Porgy, whom the police ask to identify the body. But Sportin’ Life warns Porgy that Crown’s wounds will bleed in the presence of the killer and Porgy is ultimately jailed a week for contempt of court for refusing to look at the body. While he is gone, Sportin’ Life offers “happy dust” to Bess, who is simply too weak physically and emotionally to resist her need for more and she runs off with him to New York. (“There’s a Boat That’s Leavin’ Soon for New York”) When Porgy returns, he hitches up his goat cart to find Bess as the opera ends (“Lawd, I’m on My Way”). 

Sadly, Gershwin belongs to the large number of composers who never saw their 40th birthday, succumbing to a brain tumor in 1937.