This week we are doing an all Gershwin concert. Gershwin music is one of those things … kind of like the whole opera/musical theatre thing I guess … where one wonders if it’s “classical” (in that general way, not in the era way) or pop music.

Okay, maybe no one else wonders, but whatever.

If we were doing his Concerto in F with, say, a Mozart overture up first, then a, I dunno, little bit ‘o something else, and ended with the concerto, it would be considered a regular sort of symphony concert, right? (Even though someone blogged about Porgy & Bess not being an opera, I do think Gershwin fits in the classical music genre.) But we are doing the Concerto, plus Rhapsody in Blue (another work that is sometimes on a symphony concert), and then a bunch of arrangements of his music. Also included is a singer and a radio announcer who will do old-time radio commercials (maybe with other things as well; I don’t know yet). So to me, it has become a pops concert. And I guess it is selling out, too. (I mean the concerts are selling out. I’m not saying we are. I certainly have felt that way other times, though!)

I don’t really mind a pops concert now and then, as long as it is put together well, includes good music, and includes high quality playing. It’s weird, though, to have such miniscule parts. The doublers have most of the music. So I guess this is a bit of a “coaster” for me. I do miss playing the English horn part in the concerto, but it works okay on the tenor sax. I think that, too, makes it feel more like a pops concert, though.

But I like what I do. I’m not complaining! And I do love Gershwin.