Stories of Standards: “Fascinating Rhythm”

Tune in to Jazz with Victor Cooper – weekdays from 6-9 a.m. MT – for Stories of Standards to hear our favorite versions of this song all week long starting Monday, September 3!

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In 1924 George and Ira Gershwin wrote music for “Lady Be Good”, which opened December 1, 1924, their first Broadway collaboration.  “Fascinating Rhythm” and “Oh, Lady Be Good” proved to be two of the more popular songs in that play, in which Fred and Adele Astaire played a brother-sister dance team. Both the Gershwins and the Astaires found their reputations greatly enhanced by the show, which had featured an unusual degree of collaboration between composers and performers. Fred and George, who had first wished to work together in 1916, especially benefited from Fred’s abilities as a composer and George’s talent as a dancer.

George Gershwin (1898-1937) composed music for theater, film, orchestra, and opera. He dropped out of school when 15 years old to play piano, plug songs and start composing. His first hit was the 1918 song “Swanee”, which Al Jolson sang in the musical “Sinbad”. Endlessly curious, he studied jazz, tin pan alley, modern European composers (among them Ravel, Stravinsky, Milhaud, and Auric) and American experimental composers, such as Henry Cowell. George was the first composer to combine classical and popular music (with the 1924 jazz concerto “Rhapsody in Blue”) and the first to score a Pulitzer Prize-winning musical (1931’s “Of Thee I Sing”). George unexpectedly died of a brain tumor in July 1937. George and Ira were awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1985, while the Library of Congress honored their contributions by creating the Gershwin Prize for Popular Song in 2007.

Ira Gershwin (1896-1983) attended Townsend Harris High School with E. Y. “Yip” Harburg, with whom he wrote lyrics using the pen name of Arthur Francis. Ira’s collaboration with George began in 1924 and proved to be one of the most successful in American songwriting history. “Fascinating Rhythm” beautifully demonstrates the way their lyrics and melody fit together to the benefit of both.  After George’s death, Ira stopped writing for three years, before going on to collaborate with Kurt Weill, Jerome Kern, and Harold Arlen, among others.