All Gershwin featuring New York City Ballet | Program Notes

SPECIAL • 2015-2016 ALL GERSHWIN FEATURING NEW YORK CITY BALLET COLORADO SYMPHONY ANDREW LITTON, conductor / piano MEMBERS OF THE NEW YORK CITY BALLET MEGAN FAIRCHILD ASHLY ISSACS ASK LA COUR MEGAN LECRONE Tonight’s concert is gratefully dedicated to Rosemary and John Priester ​ Sunday, January 10, 2016 at 1:00 pm Boettcher Concert Hall

GERSHWIN orch. William David Brohn

Overture to Crazy for You

GERSHWIN Dayful of Song for Piano and Orchestra arr. /orch. Sid Ramin Hold On — I Must Write a Song — Hot — One Minute More — Sutton Place — My Honor Was at Stake — Machinery Going GERSHWIN orch. Ferde Grofé

Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Orchestra 1924 Jazz Band Version

— INTERMISSION —

GERSHWIN orch. Hershy Kay

Who Cares? A Ballet

SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG PROGRAM 1

SPECIAL BIOGRAPHIES

JEFF WHEELER

ANDREW LITTON, conductor / piano Colorado Symphony Music Director Andrew Litton is the newly appointed Music Director of the New York City Ballet. Mr. Litton also serves as Bergen Philharmonic Music Director Laureate, Artistic Director of the Minnesota Orchestra’s Sommerfest, and Conductor Laureate of Britain’s Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra. He guest conducts the world’s leading orchestras and opera companies, and has a discography of over 120 recordings with awards including America’s Grammy, France’s Diapason d’Or, and many other honors. Besides his Grammy®-winning Walton’s Belshazzar’s Feast with Bryn Terfel and the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, he also recorded the complete symphonies by Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov, a Mahler cycle with the Dallas Symphony, and many Gershwin recordings as both conductor and pianist. Mr. Litton is a graduate of the Fieldston School, New York, and received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from The Juilliard School in piano and conducting. The youngest-ever winner of the BBC International Conductors Competition, he served as Assistant Conductor at Teatro alla Scala and Exxon/Arts Endowment Assistant Conductor for the National Symphony under Rostropovich. His many honors in addition to Norway’s Order of Merit include an honorary Doctorate from the University of Bournemouth, Yale University’s Sanford Medal, and the Elgar Society Medal. An accomplished pianist, Litton often conducts from the keyboard and enjoys performing chamber music with his orchestra colleagues. For further information, visit www.andrewlitton.com.

© PAUL KOLNIK

MEGAN FAIRCHILD, dancer Megan Fairchild is a principal dancer with New York City Ballet. She was born in Salt Lake City, Utah, and began her dance training at the age of four, studying with Judy Levitre and Kaelynne Oliphant at Dance Concepts in Sandy, Utah; and at the Ballet West Conservatory in Salt Lake City with Sharee Lane, Deborah Dobson, and Maureen Laird. While at the Ballet West Conservatory, she was also a Ballet West trainee. She entered the School of American Ballet (SAB), the official school of New York City Ballet, in the fall of 2000. In November 2001, she became an apprentice with New York City Ballet, and in October 2002 she joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet.

Ms. Fairchild was promoted to the rank of soloist in February 2004, and in January 2005, she was promoted to principal dancer. In 2014 Ms. Fairchild made her Broadway debut in the Tony Award–nominated revival of On the Town at the Lyric Theater. She was nominated for an Outer Critics Circle Award, and received a Theatre World Award for her portrayal of Ivy Smith, AKA Miss Turnstiles. In 2011 Ms. Fairchild danced the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy in PBS’ Live From Lincoln Center telecast of George Balanchine’s The Nutcracker, which was also screened in movie theaters around the world. She is currently a Teaching Fellow with the School of American Ballet, the official school of New York City Ballet. Ms. Fairchild was the 2001 recipient of the Mae L. Wien Award.

PROGRAM 2 SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG

SPECIAL BIOGRAPHIES

© PAUL KOLNIK

ASHLY ISAACS, dancer Ashly Isaacs was born in Fort Lauderdale, Florida and began her dance training there at the age of three at Michael’s Academy of Performing Arts.

She later studied at Fort Lauderdale Ballet Classique before enrolling at the School of American Ballet, the official school of New York City Ballet, in September 2006. Ms. Isaacs became an apprentice with New York City Ballet in September 2009 and joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in September 2010. She was promoted to soloist in June 2015. Since joining New York City Ballet, Ms. Isaacs has danced featured roles in numerous ballets by George Balanchine, Peter Martins, Justin Peck, August Bournonville, and Christopher Wheeldon. Ms. Isaacs is the 2015-16 Janice Levin Dancer honoree, and was a recipient of the Mae L. Wien Award in 2009.

© PAUL KOLNIK

ASK LA COUR, dancer Ask la Cour was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, and began his dance training at the age of nine at the Royal Danish Ballet School, where he studied with Niels Balle, Adam Lüders, and Colleen Neary. He joined the Royal Danish Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet in 2000. Mr. la Cour joined New York City Ballet as a member of the corps de ballet in the fall of 2002 and was promoted to the rank of soloist in May 2005. In February 2013, la Cour was promoted to principal dancer. Mr. la Cour has originated featured roles in Peter Martins’ Bal de Couture, Benjamin Millepied’s Double Aria, and Christopher Wheeldon’s After the Rain and Shambards. He has originated corps roles in Mr. Eifman’s Musagète, Susan Stroman’s Double Feature (Flossy’s Husband), and Christopher Wheeldon’s An American in Paris and Carnival of the Animals. Mr. la Cour has received several awards, including the 1998 Royal Theatre Award, the 2001 Edith Allers Memorial Award, the 2001 Birger Bartholins Memorial Award, and the 2001 John Roagers Memorial Award.

© PAUL KOLNIK

MEGAN LeCRONE, dancer Megan LeCrone was born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. She began her dance training at the age of four at Greensboro Ballet, and at age 14, began studying at the North Carolina School of the Arts in Winston-Salem.

Ms. LeCrone entered the School of American Ballet, the official school of New York City Ballet, full-time in the fall of 2001, and in November 2001 she became an apprentice with New York City Ballet. Ms. LeCrone joined the Company as a member of the corps de ballet in October 2002 and was promoted to soloist in 2013. Since joining New York City Ballet, Ms. LeCrone has danced feature roles in numerous ballets by George Balanchine, Jerome Robbins, Peter Martins, Christopher d’Amboise, and August Bournonville.

SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG PROGRAM 3

SPECIAL BIOGRAPHIES GEORGE BALANCHINE George Balanchine transformed the world of ballet. He is widely regarded as the most influential choreographer of the 20th century, and he co-founded two of ballet’s most important institutions: New York City Ballet and the School of American Ballet. Balanchine was born in St. Petersburg, Russia, in 1904, studied at the Imperial Ballet School in St. Petersburg, and danced with the Maryinsky Theatre Ballet Company, where he began choreographing short works. In the summer of 1924, Balanchine left the newly formed Soviet Union for Europe, where he was invited by impresario Serge Diaghilev to join the Ballets Russes. For that company, Balanchine choreographed his first important ballets: Apollo (1928) and Prodigal Son (1929). After Ballets Russes was dissolved following Diaghilev’s death in 1929, Balanchine spent his next few years on a variety of projects in Europe and then formed his own company, Les Ballets 1933, in Paris.

Following a performance of Les Ballets 1933 at the Savoy Theater in London, he met American arts connoisseur Lincoln Kirstein, who later persuaded him to come to the United States. In 1934, the pair founded the School of American Ballet, which remains in operation to this day, training students for companies around the world. Balanchine’s first ballet in the U.S., Serenade, set to music by Tchaikovsky, was created for SAB students and was first performed on June 9, 1934, on the grounds of the Warburg estate in White Plains, N.Y. Balanchine and Kirstein founded several short-lived ballet companies before forming Ballet Society in 1946, which was renamed New York City Ballet in 1948. Balanchine served as the Company’s ballet master from that year until his death in 1983, building it into one of the most important performing arts institutions in the world, and a cornerstone of the cultural life of New York City. He choreographed 425 works over the course of 60-plus years, and his musical choices ranged from Tchaikovsky (one of his favorite composers) to Stravinsky (his compatriot and friend) to Gershwin (who embodied the choreographer’s love of America). Many of Balanchine’s works are considered masterpieces and are performed by ballet companies all over the world.

ABOUT NEW YORK CITY BALLET New York City Ballet is one of the foremost dance companies in the world, with an unparalleled active repertory of ballets—most of them created for NYCB—many of which are considered modern masterpieces. The Company was established in 1948 by choreographer George Balanchine and arts aficionado Lincoln Kirstein at the City Center of Music and Drama, and quickly became known for pure neo-classicism, which resonated with modern audiences. In 1949, Jerome Robbins joined the Company as associate artistic director and, with Balanchine and many guest choreographers, created a varied repertory that grew each season. Balanchine served as Ballet Master of NYCB from its inception until his death, in 1983, during which time he choreographed countless works and created a company of dancers known for their speed and musicality. In 1964 NYCB moved to its current home at Lincoln Center’s New York State Theater (now the David H. Koch Theater), where it grew into one of the world’s great dance companies.

Now under the direction of Ballet Master in Chief Peter Martins and Executive Director Katherine Brown, the company has more than 90 dancers, a 62-member orchestra, an official school (the School of American Ballet), an institute for choreography (the New York Choreographic Institute), and an annual 21-week season in New York City, the longest home season of any dance company in the world. Widely acknowledged for its enduring contributions to dance, NYCB is committed to promoting creative excellence and nurturing a new generation of dancers and choreographers. For more information visit www.nycballet.com.

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SPECIAL PROGRAM NOTES GEORGE GERSHWIN (1898-1937) Overture to Crazy for You Orchestrated by William David Brohn George Gershwin was born on September 26, 1898 in Brooklyn, New York, and died on July 12, 1937 in Hollywood, California. The Broadway musical Crazy for You, based on Gershwin songs, opened on February 19, 1992 at the Shubert Theatre in New York City. The score calls for three flutes (all doubling piccolo), two oboes, English horn, two clarinets, bass clarinet, alto, tenor, and baritone sax; two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, harp, piano, and strings. Duration is about five minutes. This is the first performance of this orchestration by the orchestra.

Girl Crazy (1930) is a legend among Broadway shows. It provided the first starring role for Ethel Merman, featured Ginger Rogers as the ingénue, and boasted a pit orchestra that included Red Nichols, Glenn Miller, Gene Krupa, Jack Teagarden, Benny Goodman and Jimmy Dorsey.

Though the plot was nothing more than a silly satire on a city slicker vacationing at a dude ranch in Arizona, the score by George and Ira Gershwin contained a treasury of their finest songs — I Got Rhythm (with which Ethel Merman belted her way to overnight stardom), Embraceable You, But Not For Me, Bidin’ My Time, Sam and Delilah and Treat Me Rough. In 1991, producers Roger Horchow and Elizabeth Williams, both life-long Gershwin fans, engaged author Ken Ludwig (1989 Tony Award winner for Lend Me a Tenor), Olivier Award-winning director Mike Ockrent and fivetime Tony winner choreographer Susan Stroman to create a new show based on Girl Crazy using an expanded range of Gershwin songs and a re-written book. Their Crazy for You (named for the song K-ra-zy for You from the 1928 Treasure Girl) opened at the Shubert Theatre on February 19, 1992, won Tonys and Drama Desk Awards for Best Musical and Best Choreography, ran for 1,622 performances on Broadway and for nearly three years in London, and played to packed houses on its extensive national tour. The Overture to Crazy for You includes three hits from the original Girl Crazy — I Got Rhythm, Embraceable You and Could You Use Me? — plus Someone to Watch Over Me (from Oh, Kay!, 1926), Stiff Upper Lip (from the 1937 Fred Astaire film A Damsel in Distress) and Stairway to Paradise (from George White’s Scandals of 1922).

Dayful of Song for Piano and Orchestra Arranged and Orchestrated by Sid Ramin (b. 1919) The score calls for three flutes (2nd and 3rd doubling piccolo), oboe, three clarinets (3rd doubling bass clarinet), two alto saxes, tenor sax, bassoon, two horns, three trumpets, two trombones, timpani, percussion, piano, guitar, and strings. Duration is about 15 minutes. The piece was last performed on May 18, 2013, with Andrew Litton at the piano and conducting the orchestra.

Andrew Litton provided the following information in the liner notes for his 1997 recording of Dayful of Song with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra on the Delos label: “My love affair with the music of George Gershwin started when I was a child. I grew up in New York City living just yards from where Gershwin wrote many of his greatest works. He has always been a hero and an endless source of fascination for me. His virtuosic piano playing, his natural gift of melody, his inexhaustible enthusiasm and ebullient personality — I wish I could have known him! His sister-in-law Leonore once said: ‘Whenever he entered a room, he captured it instantly and completely, not because he was overbearing but because he had an irresistible infectious vitality, an overwhelming personal magnetism beyond that of most of the greatest movie stars….’

“In 1985, I had the great honor to be music director for a concert presented at the Warner SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG PROGRAM 5

SPECIAL PROGRAM NOTES Theater in Washington, D.C. by the Library of Congress in celebration of its George and Ira Gershwin Collection, and sponsored by the Ira and Leonore S. Gershwin Estate. We were given access to a dozen or so Gershwin songs in manuscript form that had never been published or performed. Boxes and boxes of these songs, many of them just fragments or sketches for future ideas, were stored in Ira’s house before his death in 1983. One has the most amazing sensation playing through these unmistakable yet strangely unfamiliar Gershwin songs!

“Since these manuscripts are written for piano, we picked a group of songs to flesh out into a piano and orchestra arrangement, not unlike the treatment of the original Gershwin Songbook.

With the help of arranger and orchestrator Sid Ramin, seven unknown songs have been given new life: Hold On, I Must Write a Song, Hot, One Minute More, Sutton Place, My Honor Was at Stake and Machinery Going Mad. The Gershwin Estate decided to name the medley after a line in the verse of the hit song I Got Rhythm: ‘ … Birds in the tree sing their dayful of song ...’ It is therefore our great pleasure to present seven ‘new’ Gershwin songs under the title Dayful of Song.”

Veteran arranger, orchestrator and composer Sid Ramin, born in Boston in 1919, has theater, television and movie credits that range from The Milton Berle Show in the early 1950s to the most recent Broadway revivals of Gypsy (2008) and West Side Story (2009). He also collaborated on such hit musicals as the original versions of Wonderful Town, West Side Story, Wildcat, I Can Get It for You Wholesale, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Jerome Robbins’ Broadway and Crazy for You, as well as the classic TV series Candid Camera, The Patty Duke Show and All My Children.

Ramin received an Oscar and a Grammy for his work on the 1961 film version of West Side Story, and collaborated with Irwin Kostal on orchestrating the Symphonic Dances from “West Side Story” at the request of Leonard Bernstein.

Rhapsody in Blue for Piano and Orchestra Orchestrated by Ferde Grofé (1892-1972) (original jazz band version) The Rhapsody in Blue was composed in 1924 and premiered in New York City on February 12, 1924, conducted by Paul Whiteman with the composer as piano soloist. The score calls for two flutes, two oboes, two clarinets, bass clarinet, two alto saxophones, tenor saxophone, two bassoons, three horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion and strings. In addition to the solo piano, the score calls for oboe, three clarinets, bass clarinet, e-flat clarinet, soprano sax, two alto saxes, tenor sax, baritone sax (all the above are doubled in various ways), two horns, two trumpets, two trombones, tuba, timpani, piano (doubling celesta), banjo, violins, and double bass. Duration is about 18 minutes. Last performance of the jazz band version of Rhapsody in Blue was on September 17, 19, & 20, 2009 with Jeffrey Kahane as the soloist and conductor.

For George White’s Scandals of 1922, the 24-year-old George Gershwin provided something a little bit different — an opera, a brief, somber one-act called Blue Monday (later retitled 135th Street) incorporating some jazz elements that White cut after only one performance on the grounds that it was too gloomy. Blue Monday, however, impressed the show’s conductor, Paul Whiteman, then gaining a national reputation as the self-styled “King of Jazz” for his adventurous explorations of the new popular music styles with his Palais Royal Orchestra. A year later, Whiteman told Gershwin about his plans for a special program the following February in which he hoped to show some of the ways traditional concert music could be enriched by jazz, and suggested that the young composer provide a piece for piano and jazz orchestra. Gershwin, who was then busy with the final preparations for the upcoming Boston tryout of Sweet Little Devil and somewhat unsure about barging into the world of classical music, did not pay much attention to the request until he read in The New York Times on New Year’s Day that he was writing a new “symphony” for PROGRAM 6 SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG

SPECIAL PROGRAM NOTES Whiteman’s program. After a few frantic phone calls, Whiteman finally convinced Gershwin to undertake the project, a work for piano solo (to be played by the composer) and Whiteman’s 22-piece orchestra — and then told him that it had to be finished in less than a month. Themes and ideas for the new piece immediately began to tumble through Gershwin’s head, and late in January, only three weeks after it was begun, the Rhapsody in Blue was completed.

The premiere of the Rhapsody in Blue — New York, Aeolian Hall, February 12, 1924 — was one of the great nights in American music. Many of the era’s most illustrious musicians attended, critics from far and near assembled to pass judgment, and the glitterati of society and culture graced the event. Gershwin fought down his apprehension over his joint debuts as serious composer and concert pianist, and he and his music had a brilliant success. “A new talent finding its voice,” wrote Olin Downes, music critic for The New York Times. Conductor Walter Damrosch told Gershwin that he had “made a lady out of jazz,” and then commissioned him to write the Concerto in F. There was critical carping about laxity in the structure of the Rhapsody in Blue, but there was none about its vibrant, quintessentially American character or its melodic inspiration, and it became an immediate hit, attaining (and maintaining) a position of popularity almost unmatched by any other work of a native composer.

Who Cares?

Orchestrated by Hershy Kay (1919-1981) Who Cares? was premiered on February 5, 1970 by the New York City Ballet.

The score calls for two flutes (2nd doubling piccolo), two oboes (2nd doubling English horn), two clarinets, bass clarinet, two bassoons, four horns, three trumpets, three trombones, tuba, timpani, percussion, piano (doubling celesta), and strings. The duration is about 45 minutes. The last performance by the orchestra was on May 18, 2013, with Andrew Litton conducting the orchestra.

In his Balanchine’s Complete Stories of the Great Ballets, the choreographer George Balanchine (1904-1983) wrote of Who Cares?: “This ballet is a set of dances to some songs by George Gershwin that I have always liked very much. Who Cares? [the song that gave the ballet its title] goes back to 1931 and the musical Of Thee I Sing. In Europe in the late 1920s and 1930s, we all knew Gershwin’s music and loved it; it is very beautiful, very American, too. Before I came to America I saw the Gershwin musical Funny Face in London and admired it. I did some work in musical comedies in London after that and continued to make dances for them after I came to New York. I don’t think I would have done that if it had not been for George Gershwin’s music. There are popular songs and popular songs; Gershwin’s are special.

“I was lucky enough to know Gershwin, who asked me to Hollywood to do dances for the movie Goldwyn Follies. Gershwin gave me a book of his songs, arranged in the way he used to do them in concerts. One day at the piano I played through one and thought to myself, beautiful, I’ll make a pas de deux. Then I played another, it was just beautiful and I thought, A variation! And then another and another and there was no end to how beautiful they were.

“And so we had a new ballet [arranged and orchestrated by Hershy Kay]. No story, just the songs. Here they are: Strike Up the Band (1927); Sweet and Low Down (1925); Somebody Loves Me (1924); Bidin’ My Time (1930); ’S Wonderful (1927); That Certain Feeling (1925); Do Do Do (1926); Lady Be Good (1924); The Man I Love (1924); I’ll Build a Stairway to Paradise (1922); Embraceable You (1930); Fascinatin’ Rhythm (1924); Who Cares? (1931); My One and Only (1927); Liza (1929); Clap Yo’ Hands (1926); I Got Rhythm (1930).” © 2015 Dr. Richard E. Rodda SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG PROGRAM 7

SPECIAL PROGRAM NOTES WHO CARES? Balanchine had an early opportunity to work with George Gershwin: In 1937 Gershwin asked Balanchine to come to Hollywood to work with him on Goldwyn’s Follies (released 1938), which included a Romeo and Juliet number with a mock duel between ballet-dancing Montagues and tap-dancing Capulets. Thirty-three years later, Balanchine choreographed Who Cares? to 16 songs Gershwin composed between 1924 and 1931. Balanchine used the songs not to evoke a particular era but as a basis for a dynamic that is uniquely American and, more specifically, evocative of New York City: Balanchine’s choreography brings out the exuberance of city life.

Who Cares? is both the name of a ballet in the classical idiom by George Balanchine and an old song George and Ira Gershwin wrote in 1931 for Of Thee I Sing. The dictionary says “classic” means standard, leading, belonging to the highest rank or authority. Once it applied mainly to masterpieces from Greco-Roman antiquity; now we have boxing and horse-racing classics, classic cocktail-dresses, and classic cocktails. Among classic American composers we number Stephen Foster, John Philip Sousa, and George Gershwin (1898-1937). First heard 50 years ago, the best of Gershwin songs maintain their classic freshness, like an eternal martini—dry, frank, refreshing, tailor-made, with an invisible kick from its slightest hint of citron. Nostalgia has not syruped the songs’ sentiment nor robbed them of immediate piquancy. We associate them with time past, but when well sung or played, or preferably both at once, they not only revive but transcend their epoch.

The Gershwins’ beautiful manners and high style, their instant mélange of insouciance and shrewd innocence, their just estimation of the imaginative elasticity of an elite audience that they had developed, have left a body of words and music that lives unblurred by vulgar rhetoric or machine-made sentiment. To combine an intensely personal attitude with a flagrantly popular language is a feat that few popular artists manage, and it is appropriate that Balanchine has used the songs not as facile recapitulation of a lost epoch, but simply as songs or melodies for classic, undeformed, traditional academic dances, which in their equivalence of phrasing, dynamics, and emotions find their brotherly parallel.

—Lincoln Kirstein, 1970

Who Cares?

Music by George Gershwin Adapted and Orchestrated by Hershy Kay Choreography by George Balanchine* Scenery by Jo Mielziner Costumes by Santo Loquasto Lighting by Mark Stanley

*© The George Balanchine Trust Premiere: February 5, 1970, New York State Theater Dancers appear courtesy of New York City Ballet Ballet Master in Chief: Peter Martins Executive Director: Katherine E. Brown PROGRAM 8 SOUNDINGS 2015-2016 | COLORADOSYMPHONY.ORG