Impressions in Blue: Ravel & Gershwin
Sticky Notes: The Classical Music Podcast7 Elo 2025

Impressions in Blue: Ravel & Gershwin

In the mid-1920s, Maurice Ravel wrote a letter to the legendary composition teacher Nadia Boulanger. Boulanger's class was a mecca for composers, both young and old, and musicians from all over the world vied to study with her. But Ravel's letter wasn't on his own behalf. Instead, he urged Boulanger to take on a young student whom Ravel himself had declined to teach. He wrote:

"There is a musician here endowed with the most brilliant, most enchanting, and perhaps the most profound talent: George Gershwin. His worldwide success no longer satisfies him, for he is aiming higher. He knows that he lacks the technical means to achieve his goal. In teaching him those means, one might ruin his talent. Would you have the courage, which I wouldn't dare have, to undertake this awesome responsibility?"

Boulanger also declined to take Gershwin as a student, fearing, like Ravel, that she might damage his spontaneity and dynamic jazz sensibility. Whether or not the famous story is true (that Ravel turned down Gershwin's request to study with him by saying, "Why be a second-rate Ravel when you are a first-rate Gershwin?") we may never know. But the two composers were friendly, and formed something of a mutual admiration society.

Today, in this fourth collaboration with G. Henle Publishers in honor of their Ravel and Friends project, we're going to explore the connections between these two great composers: their friendship, their mutual influence, and the profound ways jazz infused itself into Ravel's music, particularly in his Violin Sonata and Piano Concerto in G. From the moment he discovered it, Ravel adored jazz, and like many French composers of the time, allowed its influence to permeate his work in ways both explicit and subtle. Join us!

Jaksot(283)

R. Schumann Piano Concerto

R. Schumann Piano Concerto

In January of 1839, Clara Wieck, Robert's future wife, wrote to Robert, "Don't take it amiss if I tell you that I've been seized by the desire to encourage you to write for orchestra. Your imagination...

2 Marras 202348min

Brahms Violin Concerto

Brahms Violin Concerto

Brahms' violin concerto is one of the most difficult works for any violinist to tackle. It is as virtuosic as the hardest piece of Paganini as well as being as musically complex as a Brahms symphony. ...

26 Loka 202350min

What Does Music Mean?

What Does Music Mean?

Today is a bit of an unusual episode. Last month I was invited by the British Society of Aesthetics to address their annual conference. My task was to give a lecture on whatever topic I wanted, having...

19 Loka 202352min

William Grant Still Symphony No. 1., "Afro-American"

William Grant Still Symphony No. 1., "Afro-American"

On October 29th, 1931, The Rochester Philharmonic presented the world premiere of a new symphony by the composer William Grant Still. A symphonic premiere is always something to look out for in musica...

12 Loka 20231h 6min

(Part 2) - The Music of World War II and the Holocaust with "Time's Echo" writer Jeremy Eichler

(Part 2) - The Music of World War II and the Holocaust with "Time's Echo" writer Jeremy Eichler

This is another episode where I highly recommend listening to Part 1 from last week before listening to this episode! It was a great honor to speak with the critic and cultural historian Jeremy Eichle...

5 Loka 202355min

The Music of World War II and the Holocaust with "Time's Echo" writer Jeremy Eichler (Part 1)

The Music of World War II and the Holocaust with "Time's Echo" writer Jeremy Eichler (Part 1)

I had the great pleasure and honor this week(and next week) to speak with the author of the new book Time's Echo Jeremy Eichler. The book chronicles four composers and their varied reactions to World ...

28 Syys 202357min

Mahler Symphony No. 4, Part 2

Mahler Symphony No. 4, Part 2

If you haven't listened to Part 1 of this episode about Mahler's 4th symphony, I highly recommend doing that, as every movement of this symphony builds to the "Heavenly Life" of the last movement. On ...

21 Syys 202359min

Mahler Symphony No. 4, Part 1

Mahler Symphony No. 4, Part 1

After the truly heavenly slow movement of Mahler's 4th symphony, a soprano emerges and sings a song literally called "The Heavenly Life." It is a symphonic ending like no other, one that leaves the li...

14 Syys 202351min

Suosittua kategoriassa Viihde

anni-jaajo
tuplakaak
grekovit
hei-baby-3
terveisia-perheesta
the-harlin-show
dear-shirly
antin-palautepalvelu
bella-table
antin-elokuvakerho
nonsensepodi
dear-shirly-ja-arttu
verhon-takaa
ootsa-kuullut-tasta-2
get-jassud
hollywood-love-stories-2
tahtitehdas
tervo-halme
everypodi
terkuin-jenna