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George Gershwin Quotes - Page 2

All Quotes Inspiration Jazz Music Talent Writing
It sounds simple, of course, but personally I can think of no more mentally arduous task than making music.

It sounds simple, of course, but personally I can think of no more mentally arduous task than making music.

George Gershwin
Simple, Thinking, Sound

Upper berth, lower berth, that's the difference between talent and genius.

George Gershwin
Differences, Genius, Talent

A skyscraper is at the same time a triumph of the machine and a tremendous emotional experience, almost breath-taking. Not merely its height but its mass and proportions are the result of an emotion, as well as of calculation.

George Gershwin
Emotional, Triumph, Machines
"Modernism and Music: An Anthology of Sources". Book editing by Daniel Albright (University of Chicago Press), essay "The Composer in the Machine Age" (1933), 2004.

The extraordinary thing about my mother, she's so modest about me.

George Gershwin
Mother, Modest, Extraordinary Things

Summertime And the living is easy Fish are jumpin' And the cotton is high Oh, your daddy's rich And your mama's good lookin' So hush little baby now don't you cry One of these mornin's You're gonna rise up singin' Then you'll spread your wings And take to the sky But til that mornin' Ain't nothin' can harm you With your daddy And your mammy standin' by.

George Gershwin
Summer, Baby, Sky

It took me three weeks to write the 'Rhapsody in Blue.' I had always wanted to write something blue and Paul Whiteman inspired.

George Gershwin
Writing, Blue, Three

All these tales of people sitting down and composing symphonies just as though they were writing a letter are very much exaggerated; at least, it isn't that way in my work.

George Gershwin
Writing, Symphony, People

For suddenly, I saw you there And through foggy London town The sun was shining everywhere.

George Gershwin
Love, Inspiring, Shining
"Song: "A Foggy Day in London Town"". 1937.

Porgy is...an interesting example of what can be done by talent in spite of a bad setup. With a libretto that should never have been accepted on a subject that should never have been chosen, a man who should never have attempted it has written a work that has a considerable power.

George Gershwin
Men, Interesting, Example

I want to say at once that I frankly believe that Irving Berlin is the greatest songwriter that has ever lived.... His songs are exquisite cameos of perfection, and each one of them is as beautiful as its neighbor. Irving Berlin remains, I think, America's Schubert.

George Gershwin
Beautiful, Song, Believe

An entire composition written in jazz could not live.

George Gershwin
Jazz, Composition, Gershwin
"Modernism and Music: An Anthology of Sources". Book editing by Daniel Albright (University of Chicago Press), essay "The Composer in the Machine Age" (1933), 2004.

Gershwin's tragedy was not that he failed to cross the tracks, but rather that he did, and once there in his new habitat, was deprived of the chance to plunge his roots firmly into the new soil.

George Gershwin
Roots, Track, Tragedy

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