The Concerto turned out, in fact, to be not quite as jazzy as might have been expected
elements of jazz with classical music was at the time such works were launched.
Gershwin was, of course, in the vanguard of this initiative with his Rhapsody in Blue, written for the bandleader Paul Whiteman and showcased in a tellingly entitled ‘Experiment in Modern Music’ concert held at New York’s Aeolian ★all in February 1924. The Rhapsody’s melding of dance-band jazz with a somewhat old-fashioned rhapsodic virtuosity, more reminiscent of Liszt, was by no means Gershwin’s most successful attempt at a hybrid concert-jazz style, though to be fair the infectious jazziness of the original version (as premiered by Whiteman’s own band) later became dulled by the overinflated arrangement the summer of 1925, this time undertaking all the instrumentation himself and hiring his own private orchestra to try the piece out in advance of the official rehearsals. The Concerto’s premiere took place in a packed Carnegie ★all on 3 December, with Gershwin at the keyboard and Walter Damrosch conducting the New York Symphony Orchestra. The piece at first received mixed reviews, with some critics (predictably) feeling that the work was neither good classical music nor good jazz, and many taking the composer to task for his apparent structural slackness and limited command of traditional developmental techniques. Overall, there was a distinct sense of disappointment in the air