George Gershwin was not known forbeing much of a reader, but in 1926 hepicked up a recent bestseller calledPORGY and couldn’t put it down. He wasimpressed with the musicality of theprose and felt the book had the ingredi-ents for a great American opera. PORGYis the story of tortured romance, drugs,violence and murder set in a tenement inCharleston, South Carolina. It was inspired by a real-life, disabled Negrobaker called "Goat Sammy,” who soldhis wares on Charleston streets from acrude cart pulled by a goat.Gershwin immediately wrote to the author, DuBose Heyward, saying he hadnotions of “setting it to music” usingblues and jazz idioms and suggested acollaboration. Heyward was eager towork with Gershwin and invited him toCharleston to research the Gullah com-munity, the African-Americans who werethe characters in PORGY.In the summer of 1934, Heywardarranged for Gershwin to stay on FollyIsland in a cottage with an upright piano.The sparsely developed barrier islandten miles from Charleston was an unlikely choice for Gershwin, a NewYorker accustomed to rollicking night life,luxurious accommodations and adoringfans. “I have never lived in such a backto nature place,” Gershwin said.Heyward brought Gershwin to the neigh-boring James Island, which had a largeGullah population. They visited schoolsand churches, listeningto the music. “The mostinteresting thing to me,as we sat listening totheir spirituals,” wroteHeyward, “…was thatto George it was morelike a homecomingthan an exploration.” The two paid particularattention to a dancetechnique called“shouting,” which entailed a complicatedrhythmic patternbeaten out by feet andhands, as an accompa-niment to the spirituals.Gershwin was inspiredby the sounds and

rhythms that he heard and became afirst class shouter himself. He sang spiri-tuals with locals, including the Societyfor the Preservation of Spirituals, agroup of white singers that preservedsongs that otherwise might never havebeen written down.Heyward played a major role in the writ-ing of the acclaimed opera. A poet aswell as a novelist, he wrote the entire libretto and the lyrics to half the arias.Normally, Gershwin wrote the music firstand then his brother supplied lyrics.However, for PORGY AND BESS, hewrote much of the music after Heywardwrote the lyrics. Stephen Sondheim said: "Heyward has gone largely unrecog-nized as the author of the finest set oflyrics in the history of American musicaltheatre. It’s a pity he didn’t write any others. His work is sung, but he is unsung.” By 1935, the Gershwins andHeyward had transformed the novel intothe opera, which became one of thegreat American musical classics. When the opera debuted, critics were divided and its first run was disappoint-ingly brief. When Gershwin died sud-denly in 1937, he had no real assuranceof its legacy. He needn’t have worried;critics today are nearly unanimous thatPORGY AND BESS is one of Gershwin’sfinest works, if not his masterpiece.

References Smithsonian Magazine, CharlestonNews & Courier

music theatre

Audience GuideSee the guide in color online atwww.skylightmusictheatre.org

AUDIENCE GUIDEResearch/Writing by Justine Leonard

for ENLIGHTEN,Skylight Music Theatre’s Education ProgramEdited by Ray Jivoff414-299-4965

rayj@skylightmusictheatre.orgwww.skylightmusictheatre.org

2012-2013Our 54th SeasonIssue 5, May/June 2013IN THIS ISSUE

This production is generously sponsored byJohn Shannon and Jan Serr

Don’t Miss the 10th AnnualHIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL CELEBRATION

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A Collaboration of Music, Words and Culture

George Gershwin, Dubose Heyward and Ira Gershwin

DuBose Heyward, (1995-1949), above withwife Dorothy, was born in Charleston,South Carolina. Mainly known today asthe author of PORGY, Heyward was aversatile artist equally at ease withverse, short fiction, novels, plays andHollywood screenwriting. Heyward’s father, Edwin, was a mill handborn into an old and distinguished south-ern family that was ruined after the CivilWar. His mother, Jane, was also from aonce-prosperous plantation family. WhenHeyward was two, his father died andJane was reduced to taking in sewingand running a boardinghouse to supportthe family. She earned extra money writing advertisements for newspapers. As a young man, Heyward learned aboutthe Gullah culture from his mother, whohad been brought up with black servantswho spoke Gullah, and learned the language well enough to speak it andlecture on it to tourists. Jane was also amember of The Charleston Society for

the Preservation of Spirituals, which performed Gullah folktales and songs. Inthis way, DuBose discovered the fasci-nating world he would immortalize in hisnovel PORGY. He gained further insight into this community when he dropped out of highschool in his first year and worked withAfrican-American stevedores (dockworkers)at a steamship company. At twenty-one,Heyward and a friend organized a realestate and insurance company, whichgave him financial independence andthe freedom to pursue a writing career. In 1913, he wrote a one-act farce, ANARTISTIC TRIUMPH, which was pro-duced in a local theater. Its success ledhim to pursue a literary career. In 1919,he and Hervey Allen, a teacher at thePorter Military Academy, formed the Poetry Society of South Carolina, spark-ing a revival of southern literature. Theypublished a collection, CAROLINACHANSONS: LEGENDS OF THE LOWCOUNTRY in 1922. While spending thesummer at the MacDowell Colony inNew Hampshire, Heyward met DorothyHartzell Kuhns, who was studying play-writing at Harvard. They were married in1923 and had one child, Jenifer. Heyward published his first book in 1924,a volume of poems called SKYLINESAND HORIZONS based on themes fromCharleston history. Soon, he moved tothe Great Smokey Mountains to work ona novel, PORGY, a poignant picture of aculture usually depicted with condescen-sion. Published in 1925, PORGYwas animmediate success. A New York Timesbook review described it as "a notewor-thy achievement in the interpretation ofNegro life by a member of an outsiderace, and conveys an authentic sense ofthe dignity, the pathos...the very essenceof this community." The book placedHeyward in the social and cultural frame-work of his time and was the foundationof his many extraordinary achievements. Two years later, he and his wife collabo-rated on a dramatization of PORGY. Thefirst major Broadway play with an allAfrican-American cast, it was a great hit,running for a total of 367 performancesin 1927-1928 and earning the Heywardsa Pulitzer Prize. A decade later, Heywardworked with George and Ira Gershwin totransform the book into, what has beencalled the greatest American opera.

In 1929, Heyward returned to the CatfishRow setting for MAMBA'S DAUGHTERS,a novel which chronicled the social ele-vation of an African-American operasinger in white society. In 1931, his playBRASS ANKLE, dealing with the prob-lems of a mulatto in small-town white society was produced but was a commercial failure. Abandoning thetheme of race in 1932, Heyward pub-lished PETER ASHLEY, a romantic novelset in pre-Civil War Charleston. The next year he went to Hollywood andwrote screenplays for Eugene O'Neill'sTHE EMPEROR JONES (1933) and PearlBuck's THE GOOD EARTH (1934). In theyear before his death in 1949, he published STAR-SPANGLED VIRGIN, anovelette about a society of blackswhose harmony with nature in the VirginIslands is disrupted by the effects of theNew Deal. That year, the Heywards'dramatization of MAMBA'S DAUGHTERS, starring Ethel Waters (below), was pro-duced on Broadway and he also published THE COUNTRY BUNNY ANDTHE LITTLE GOLD SHOES, a children'sbook written for his nine-year-old daugh-ter, Jenifer.

Pulled by tradition into a way of life hedid not completely accept, Heyward de-veloped a growing social consciencethrough writing. He began as a socialconservative but ended his life as astaunch progressive committed to theadvancement of African-Americans. Hissensitivity and keen observations of therhythms of African-American life and society have given him a lasting place inAmerican fiction.

Sources include THE LIFE AND TIMES OF PORGYAND BESS, by Hollis Alpert and article by JohnGarraty, for the American Council of Learned Soci-eties. Used by permission of Oxford UniversityPress, Inc. Wikipedia and PBS.

PORGY and BESSDuBose Heyward

Program forMAMBA’S DAUGHTERS

George and Ira Gershwin (above) are the songwriting team whose music wassynonymous with the sounds and styleof the Jazz Age. From 1924 untilGeorge's death in 1937, the brotherswrote almost exclusively with each other,composing over two dozen scores forBroadway and Hollywood. Though theyhad many hit songs, their greatestachievement may have been the eleva-tion of musical comedy to an Americanart form. George Gershwin, born in 1898, was thesecond son of Russian immigrants. As aboy, George was anything but studious,so when his parents bought a piano forlessons for his older brother Ira, it cameas a surprise that it was George whoplayed it. In 1914, Gershwin left highschool to work as a Tin Pan Alley songplugger and within three years his song,When You Want 'Em, You Can't Get 'Em;When You Have 'Em, You Don't Want'Em, was published. His first major hitwas Swanee (1919), with lyrics by IrvingCaesar, and performed by Al Jolson. In 1924, when George teamed up withhis brother Ira, the Gershwins becamethe dominant Broadway songwriters,creating infectious rhythm numbers andpoignant ballads with lyrics that fit themelodies with a "glove-like" fidelity. Thisextraordinary combination created a succession of musical comedies, includ-ing OH, KAY! (1926), FUNNY FACE (1927),GIRL CRAZY (1930), and OF THEE I SING(1931), the first musical to win a PulitzerPrize for Drama. The Gershwins alsocomposed music for films, includingSHALL WE DANCE (1937) and A DAMSELIN DISTRESS (1937).

George Gershwin had ambitions to com-pose serious music and attained greatsuccess in the concert arena as a pianovirtuoso, conductor and composer. HisRHAPSODY IN BLUE (1924), commencingwith a low trill of the solo clarinet fol-lowed by a spine-tingling run up thescale, caught the public's fancy andopened a new era in American music.Other major compositions include PIANOCONCERTO IN F (1925), AN AMERICAN INPARIS (1928) and the SECOND RHAPSODYFOR PIANO AND ORCHESTRA (1932). PORGY AND BESS opened on Broadwayin 1935, and was influential in openingthe American theater to African-Ameri-can musical forms. PORGY AND BESSwas not truly successful during Gersh-win’s lifetime. Though some of the songsachieved popularity before his death, thework earned real approval only after the1940 Theater Guild production of aslightly revised version. For many years,it was performed more frequently in Europe, where it was considered a trueAmerican opera.

George Gershwin was not quite 39 yearsold and at the height of his career whenhe died of a brain tumor in 1937. Peoplethroughout the world, who knew Gersh-win only through his work, were stunnedby the news as if they had suffered apersonal loss. Gershwin was awarded aspecial posthumous Pulitzer Prize in1998, the centennial of his birth. Ira Gershwin, was born in 1896. Whileattending the College of the City of NewYork, he began writing light verse. In1918, while working as the desk atten-dant in a Turkish bath, he began collabo-rating with his brother George, and theirsong, The Real American Folk Song (Isa Rag) was performed in the Broadwayshow LADIES FIRST.

Ira adopted the pen name Arthur Fran-cis, combining the names of his brotherand sister, and wrote lyrics for his firstBroadway show, TWO LITTLE GIRLS INBLUE (1921), with music by VincentYoumans. By 1924, Ira dropped thepseudonym and the Gershwins createdtheir first hit, LADY BE GOOD for Fredand Adele Astaire.After George's death, Ira collaboratedwith many composers including VernonDuke (ZIEGFELD FOLLIES, 1936), KurtWeill (LADY IN THE DARK, 1941),Jerome Kern (COVER GIRL, 1944), HarryWarren (THE BARKLEYS OF BROADWAY,1949) and Harold Arlen (A STAR IS BORN,1954). He was nominated three times foran Academy Award for the songs TheyCan't Take That Away From Me, LongAgo (and Far Away) and The Man ThatGot Away. Ira was responsible for managing theGershwin legacy of songs, shows, filmscores and concert works. In 1976, hehired Michael Feinstein, a 20-year-oldsinger-pianist to catalogue their musiccollection. The seven years Feinsteinspent with Gershwin proved to be thecornerstone of Feinstein's career as aperformer, historian and the preeminentcrusader for what is known today as"The American Songbook." Ira Gershwin died in 1983, at the age of83 at the the Beverly Hills home that heshared with his wife Leonore, to whomhe dedicated his critically acclaimedbook, LYRICS ON SEVERAL OCCASIONS.Today, the Gershwin catalog has beenrejuvenated by the "new" Gershwin musicals, MY ONE AND ONLY (1983) andthe 1992 Tony Award winner for best mu-sical, CRAZY FOR YOU, which ran forfour years on Broadway. NICE WORK IFYOU CAN GET IT, a “brand-new Gersh-win musical comedy” is currently enjoy-ing a successful Broadway run. TheGershwin legend lives on.

PORGY and BESSThe Gershwin Brothers Make Musical History

Cartoon by Al Hirschfeld

Place: Catfish Row, a tenement on thewaterfront of Charleston, S.C.Time: The 1930s.Act I, Scene 1: Catfish Row, a summer eveningThe opera begins on an evening in Catfish Row. Clara, a young mother,sings a lullaby to her baby (Summertime)as the working men prepare for a gameof craps (Roll Them Bones). One of theplayers, Robbins, scorns his wife Ser-ena's demands that he not play, retortingthat on a Saturday night, a man has theright to play. Clara's husband Jake, trieshis own lullaby, (A Woman is a SometimeThing), with little effect.Mingo, another fisherman, talks to Jim, astevedore who decides to give up his joband join Jake and the other fishermen.Porgy, a disabled beggar, enters to organize the game. Crown, a strong andbrutal stevedore storms in with hiswoman, Bess, and buys cheap whiskeyand some “happy dust” from the localdope peddler, Sportin' Life. Bess is shunned by the women of thecommunity, especially the pious Serenaand the matriarchal shop owner Maria,but Porgy softly defends her. The gamebegins. Eventually, only Robbins andCrown, who has become extremelydrunk, remain. When Robbins wins,Crown attempts to prevent him from tak-ing his winnings. A brawl ensues, whichends when Crown stabs Robbins with acotton hook, killing him. Crown runs, telling Bess to fend for her-self but that he will be back for her whenthe heat dies down. Sportin' Life givesher a dose of “happy dust” and offers totake her with him when he goes to NewYork, but she rejects him. Bess begins topound on doors, but is rejected by all ofthe residents of Catfish Row, until Porgytakes her in.

Scene 2:Serena's room, the next nightThe mourners sing a spiritual to Robbins(Gone, Gone, Gone). To raise money forhis burial, a saucer is placed on hischest for the mourners' donations (Overflow). Bess enters with Porgy andtries to donate to the burial fund, butSerena rejects her money until Bess explains that she is living with Porgy. A white detective enters and coldly tellsSerena that she must bury her husbandthe next day, or his body will be given tomedical students for dissection. He accuses Peter of Robbins's murder.Peter denies his guilt and says Crownwas the murderer. The Detective arrestsPeter as a material witness, whom hewill force to testify against Crown. Serena laments her loss in My Man'sGone Now. The undertaker enters. The saucer holdsonly fifteen dollars of the needed twenty-five, but he agrees to bury Robbins aslong as Serena promises to pay himback. Bess, who has been sitting apartfrom the rest of the group, suddenly be-gins to sing a gospel song, and the cho-rus joins in, welcoming her into thecommunity. (Oh, the Train is at de Station)

Scene 3:Catfish Row, a month laterJake and the other fishermen prepare forwork (It Take a Long Pull to Get There).Clara asks Jake not to go because it istime for the annual storms, but he tellsher that they desperately need themoney. Porgy sings about his new,happy-go-lucky outlook on life (I GotPlenty O' Nuttin). Sportin' Life is selling"happy dust", but soon incurs the wrathof Maria, who threatens him. (I Hates Yo'Struttin' Styl’). Later, as the rest of the people of CatfishRow prepare for the church picnic onnearby Kittiwah Island, Sportin' Lifeagain tries to take Bess to New York withhim, and she refuses. He attempts togive her some "happy dust" despite herclaims that she's given up drugs, andPorgy grabs his arm and scares him off. Bess and Porgy are now left alone, andexpress their love for each other (Bess,You Is My Woman Now). The chorus prepares to leave for the picnic (Oh, ICan't Sit Down). Bess is invited to thepicnic by Maria, but she demurs asPorgy, due to his disability, cannot get onthe boat, but Maria insists. Bess leavesPorgy behind as they go off to the picnic.Porgy watches the boat leave (I GotPlenty O' Nuttin, reprise).

PORGY and BESSSynopsis: Act I

Scenic design by Ken Goldstein

Act II, Scene 1: Kittiwah Island, that eveningThe chorus enjoys the picnic (I Ain't GotNo Shame). Sportin' Life tells them hiscynical views on the Bible (It Ain't Necessarily So), causing Serena tochastise them (Shame On All You Sinners). As everyone leaves, Crown emergesfrom the bushes. He laughs off Bess’claims that she has been living decentlynow. Bess attempts to make him forgetabout her (Oh, What You Want WidBess?) but Crown refuses to give her up.He will not let her go to the boat, whichleaves without her. He laughs as herresistance fades, and commands her toget into the woods, where his intentionsare only too clear.Scene 2: Catfish Row, a week later, before dawnJake leaves to go fishing with his crew,even though a storm is coming in. Peter,still unsure of his crime, returns fromprison. Meanwhile, Bess has been lyingin Porgy's room delirious with fever eversince returning from Kittiwah Island. Serena prays to remove Bess' affliction(Oh, Doctor Jesus), and tells Porgy thatBess will be well by five o'clock. As the day passes, a strawberry woman,Peter the Honey Man and a crab maneach pass by with their wares (Vendor'sTrio). As the clock chimes five, Bess re-covers from her fever. Porgy tells Bess

that he knows she has been with Crown,and she admits that although she wantsto stay, she is afraid of Crown's hold onher and begs him to protect her. Hepromises that she will never have to beafraid again (I Loves You, Porgy).Clara watches the water, fearful for Jake.Maria tries to allay her fears, until thehurricane bell begins to ring.Scene 3: Serena's Room, dawn of the next dayThe residents of Catfish Row are gath-ered in Serena's room for shelter fromthe hurricane. They drown out the soundof the storm with prayers (Oh, DoctorJesus) while Sportin' Life mocks theirbelief that the storm is a signal of Judg-ment Day. A knock is heard at the door,and the chorus believes it is Death (Oh,There's Somebody Knocking at theDoor). Crown enters, having swum from Kitti-wah Island, seeking Bess. He shows nofear of God, claiming that after the longstruggle from Kittiwah, God and he arefriends. He taunts them by singing a vulgar song. (A Red-Headed Woman). Suddenly, Clara sees Jake's boat floatpast the window, upside-down, and sheruns out to try to save him, handing herbaby to Bess. Bess asks that a man goout with her, and Crown taunts Porgy,who cannot go. Crown goes himself, andthe chorus prays as the storm rises.

Scene 4: Catfish Row, the next dayA group of women mourn Clara, Jake,and all of the other fishermen, who havebeen killed in the storm (Clara, Don't Yoube Downhearted). When they begin tomourn for Crown as well, Sportin' Lifelaughs and insinuates that Crown maynot be dead. He observes that when awoman has two men, then it's highlylikely she'll end up with none. Bess singsa lullaby to Clara's baby, whom she isnow caring for. (Summertime, reprise). Once Catfish Row is dark, Crownstealthily enters to claim Bess, but isconfronted by Porgy. A fight ensueswhich ends when Porgy kills Crown.Porgy exclaims to Bess, "You've got aman now. You've got Porgy!"Scene 5: Catfish Row, late the next nightThe detective asks Serena and herfriends about the murders of Crown andRobbins. They deny knowledge ofCrown's murder. He questions Porgy,and orders him to come and identifyCrown's body. Porgy refuses, supersti-tiously believing that corpses bleed inthe presence of their murderers, but isdragged off anyway. Bess is distraught,and Sportin' Life tells her that Porgy willbe locked up for a long time. She re-fuses his offer of "happy dust," but heforces it on her. After she takes a whiff,he paints a seductive picture of life withhim in New York (There's a Boat Dat'sLeavin' Soon for New York). When Serena sees Bess taking drugs, she takes Clara’s baby away from Bess. Scene 6: Catfish Row, a week laterPorgy is released from jail, where he hasbeen arrested for contempt of court afterrefusing to look at Crown's body. He re-turns to Catfish Row and everyoneseems uneasy at his return. When hesees Clara's baby with Serena, he real-izes something is wrong. He asks whereBess is, (Oh Bess, Oh Where's myBess?) and Maria and Serena tell himthat she has run off to New York withSportin' Life. Porgy resolves to leaveCatfish Row to find her. He prays forstrength, and begins his journey. (Oh,Lawd, I'm On My Way).

PORGY and BESSSynopsis: Act II

Cabbage Row, the real Catfish Row, after it was abandoned.

To understand PORGY AND BESS as arepresentation of southern African-American life, it is important to knowmore about the roots of the story and theGullah culture that inspired Dubose Hey-ward when he was growing up inCharleston. Gullah HistoryThe Sea Islands are a cluster of islandsthat stretch along the coasts of SouthCarolina and northern Georgia. Amid theresorts and the new developments thathave sprung up along the beaches ofthese beautiful islands, one can find thedistinct language and culture of native islanders called Gullah (Gul-luh, orGeechee in Georgia). Gullah is a wordused for both the native islanders andthe language they speak. These is-landers were descended from slavesbrought to the region from West Africa tofarm indigo, rice and cotton on the SeaIsland plantations. Many historians havespeculated that the term "Gullah" isderived from Angola or “N'gulla”, as itwould have been pronounced. Today the Gullah still share many simi-larities with the people of Sierra Leoneand the West coast of Africa. Thoughseparated by an ocean, the two groupsof people fish, grow rice, have the samefolk tales, make the same baskets, havesimilar languages and belief systems.These ties to Africa are stronger thanany other group of African-Americanpeople. They blend European and Na-tive American influences together with athick stock of West African roots andhave retained a distinctive culture. It is apeople, a language and a culture thathave survived through years of slavery,oppression and development. The Charleston accent is unique amongthe various regional Southern dialects. Itcan be particularly noted in the local pro-nunciation of the city's name itself. ACharleston native will typically

ignore the r, elongate the middle vowel,and shorten the ending vowel, pronounc-ing the name as "Ch-\aw\lst-un." Some attribute the unique features ofCharleston's speech to its early settle-ment by the French Huguenots andSephardic Jews, both of which played influential parts in Charleston's develop-ment and history. However, given Charleston's high con-centration of African-Americans whospoke the Gullah language, the speechpatterns were probably more influencedby the dialect of the Gullah community.For years people thought Gullah waspoor English. The language is actually atype of Pidgin that is a combination ofEnglish and the traditional language spoken by the Wolof and Fula people ofWest Africa. In the 1930s, African-Ameri-can scholar Lorenzo Dow Turner studiedGullah on the Sea Islands. He deter-mined that this language is made up ofEnglish and over 4,000 words frommany different African languages.Today, the Gullah/Geechee languageand dialect is still spoken among African-American locals. However, rapid devel-opment is slowly diminishing itsprominence.

PORGY and BESSUnderstanding PORGY

These sentences are examples of how Gullah was spoken in the 19th century:“Uh gwine gone dey tomorruh.” "I'm going to go there tomorrow.”“We blan ketch 'nuf cootuh dey.” "We always catch a lot of turtles there."“Dem yent yeddy wuh oonuh say.” "They did not hear what you said."“Dem chillun binnuh nyam all we rice.” "Those children been eating all our rice.”“E tell'um say 'e haffuh do'um.” "He told him that he had to do it."“Duh him tell we say dem duh faa'muh.” "He's the one who told us that they are farmers."“De buckruh dey duh 'ood duh hunt tuckrey.” "The white man is in the woods hunting turkeys."“Alltwo dem 'ooman done fuh smaa't.” "Both those women are really smart."“Enty duh dem shum dey?” "Aren't they the ones who saw him there?"

Front of Cabbage Row in Charleston, SC, 1930s

Sea Island Gullah portraits, 1930

Gullah rice pounders, 1930

Du Bose Heyward’s original novelPORGY (1925) and the Gershwin’s operaPORGY AND BESS (1935), are works thathave proven to be litmus tests for racerelations in America. The bestselling novel was praised bywhite critics in 1925 for Heyward’s sensi-tive, well-rounded depiction of his char-acters; the fact that Heyward was awhite southerner underlined the noveltyof his achievement. New York Times columnist HeywoodBroun wrote that he was “fully preparedfor another condescending book aboutfine old black mammies and the like. In-stead, a literary advance in the Southmust be acknowledged when the writersof that land come to realize, as Heywarddoes, the incredibly rich material inNegro life which has so far been neg-lected.” A review in the city’s black news-paper praised Heyward’s sensitivity tohis subjects, but criticized his choice todepict the poorest, least sophisticatedsector of Charleston’s black community. Black poet Countee Cullen calledPORGY “the best novel by a white manabout Negroes.” W.E.B. DuBois, Ameri-can sociologist, historian and civil rightsactivist, praised Heyward’s talent, butrecognized the novel as a white achieve-ment, praiseworthy but separate fromthe project of cultivating black literatureand a black readership.From the outset, the opera's depiction ofAfrican-Americans attracted controversy.Though early critics praised the opera asa sympathetic rendering of African-Americans, they lamented that the char-acters were still stereotyped and thisambivalence has persisted through thedecades.

Duke Ellington stated "the times are hereto debunk Gershwin's lampblack Negro-isms." However, Ellington's response toa later production was almost completelythe opposite. His telegram to the pro-ducer read: "Your PORGY AND BESS thesuperbest, singing the gonest, acting thecraziest, Gershwin the greatest."A planned production by the NegroRepertory Company of Seattle in the late1930s was cancelled because actorswere displeased with what they viewedas a racist portrayal of aspects ofAfrican-American life. A production at theUniversity of Minnesota in 1939, ran intosimilar troubles and was cancelled. According to Barbara Cyrus, one of thefew black students then at the university,members of the local African-Americancommunity saw the play as "detrimentalto the race" and as a vehicle that pro-moted racist stereotypes. The belief that PORGY AND BESS wasracist gained strength with the AmericanCivil Rights and Black Power move-ments of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.As these movements advanced, theopera was seen as more and more outof date. Over time, however, it gainedacceptance from some (though not all) inthe African-American community and theopera community, launching the careersof many prominent singers. PORGY AND BESS was made into amajor motion picture starring DorothyDandridge and Sidney Poitier in 1959,while Trevor Nunn's landmark Glynde-bourne Opera production was taped fortelevision in 1993. The opera received itsfirst uncut production in Houston in the1970's, to great acclamation, and it wasfinally produced at the MetropolitanOpera some 50 years after the first pro-duction. Hollis Alpert wrote in THE LIFEAND TIMES OF PORGY AND BESS, thatthe opera was “virtually canonized,” byentering into the repertory of the Metro-politan Opera. The New York Timescalled it “the ultimate establishment em-brace of a work that continues to stircontroversy.” During the era of apartheid in SouthAfrica, several South African theatrecompanies planned to put on all-whiteproductions of PORGY AND BESS. IraGershwin consistently refused to permitthese productions to be staged. But in2009, Cape Town Opera's production,

set in 1970s South Africa and inspired bylife in Soweto, toured Britain. Most of thecast were South African; Americansingers involved in the production foundthe "passionate identification with theopera" by the South African singers "awake-up call."One of the most thought provoking com-ments about the opera came from LisaDaltirus, one of two singers who playedBess on the UK tour. "A lot of people justthink that this is a show that is lovely tolisten to and happened way back when.They're not thinking that you can still findplaces where this is real. And if we're notcareful we could be right back there."The 2012 revival of PORGY AND BESSarrived on Broadway with some pre-show controversy, though not aboutracial issues. The revised productionfeatured cuts, spoken dialogue insteadof recitative and revisions that promptedcomposer Stephen Sondheim to write aharsh letter to the New York Times inwhich he attacked the show, sight unseen. However, the production hadthe blessings of the Gershwin estate andwas nominated for nine Tonys. Because of publisher’s rights and royaltyissues the show titled PORGY AND BESSwould soon have shifted into public do-main, where no royalties would be paid.The Gershwin estate made the decisionto alter the title, thereby permitting therights to be retained for another 75years. All future productions, includingthe Skylight’s reduced opera version, willnow be called THE GERSHWINS’ PORGYAND BESS.

PORGY and BESSThe Controversy Continues

In composing PORGY AND BESS,George Gershwin drew inspiration fromthe James Island Gullah communitywhich had preserved many African musi-cal traditions. The composer modeledsongs after southern black music andvarious types of folk songs including jubilees, blues, praying songs, streetcries, work songs and spirituals andblended them with traditional arias andrecitatives. Gershwin’s New York jazzroots are also apparent and for manynumbers he used melodies from Jewishliturgical music. Gershwin biographer Edward Jablonskicompares the melody of It Ain't Neces-sarily So to the Haftarah blessing, whileothers have attributed it to the Torahblessing. Another musicologist noted "anuncanny resemblance" between the folktune Havenu Shalom Aleichem and thespiritual in PORGY AND BESS, It Take aLong Pull to Get There.The score makes use of a series of leit-motifs. Many of these represent individ-ual characters, some of these arefragments of the opera's set numbers.Sportin' Life, for example, is frequentlyrepresented by the melody of It Ain'tNecessarily So.Other motifs represent objects (such asthe sleazy chromatic 'Happy Dust' motif)or places, notably Catfish Row. Many ofthe through-composed passages of thescore combine or develop these leitmo-tifs in order to reflect the on-stage action.Particularly sophisticated uses of thistechnique can be seen after the ariaThere's a Boat Dat's Leaving Soon forNew York in Act 2, scene 5. The opera also frequently reprises its setnumbers. Notable in this respect are thereprises of Bess, You is My Woman Nowand I Got Plenty O' Nuttin. The songSummertime is stated four times alone. Happily, the great Porgy debate over itbeing a folk opera, musical, a jazzdrama or an operetta is now history.PORGY AND BESS is an opera, and agrand opera at that. As a theater piece, iteasily meets the criteria for opera onceestablished by Richard Strauss: It haspathos, comedy and high drama, andeach of these elements is expressedthrough a wide variety of music.

DanceGeorge Gershwin wasdrawn into the spirit of Gullah ring shouts anddances on his visit to SouthCarolina to research PORGYAND BESS. He claimed thata Gullah man had said tohim: “By God, you sure canbeat out them rhythms, boy.I’m over seventy years oldand I ain’t never seen no po’little white man take off andfly like you. You could be myown son.”Ring shouting is an ecstatic,transcendent religious ritual,first practiced by Africanslaves in the West Indiesand the United States.“Shouting" often took placeduring or after a Christianprayer meeting or worshipservice. Men and womenmoved in a circle in a coun-terclockwise direction, shuf-fling their feet, clapping, andoften spontaneously singingor praying aloud. In somecases, shouters formed acircle outdoors, around thechurch building itself. Slavesretreated into the woods atnight to perform shouts,often for hours at a time,with participants leaving thecircle as they became exhausted. In the twentieth century, some African-American churchgoers in the U.S. performed shouts by forming a circlearound the pulpit, in front of the altar, oraround the nave in churches with fixed,immobile pews.The origin of the ring shout is obscure,and is usually assumed to be derivedfrom African dance. According to musi-cologist Robert Palmer, the first writtenaccounts of the ring shout date from the1840s. The stamping and clapping in acircle was described as a kind of "drum-ming," and 19th-century observers asso-ciated it with the conversion of slaves toChristianity.In his article, Ring Shout! Literary Studies, Historical Studies and BlackMusic Inquiry, Samuel A. Floyd Jr. argues that many of the stylistic

elements observed during the ring shoutlater laid the foundations of various blackmusic styles developed during the nine-teenth and twentieth centuries. Accord-ing to Floyd, "...all of the definingelements of black music are present inthe ring...".These basic elements in-cluded calls, cries, hollers, blue notes,call-and-response and various rhythmicaspects.

References: SHOUT BECAUSE YOU'RE FREE:THE AFRICAN AMERICAN RING SHOUT TRADI-TION IN COASTAL GEORGIA by Carla GardinaPestana, Sharon V. Salinger and Floyd Jr., SamuelA. RING SHOUT! LITERARY STUDIES, HISTORI-CAL STUDIES, AND BLACK MUSIC INQUIRY.Black Music Research Journal, Vol. 22 (2002): 49-70.

PORGY and BESSAnalyzing the Musical and Dance elements

Map of the Sea Islands