By Steven Suskin
14 Apr 2008

Vernon Duke: Piano Concerto & Cello Concerto [Naxos 8.559286]
It has long been known, by people who know such things, that the 23-year-old George Gershwin was duly impressed — and no doubt amused — when in 1922 he met Vernon Duke, an 18-year-old, conservatory-trained, modernist composer just off the boat from Russia (via Constantinople).

(Duke, of course, was the highbrow composer who would write a dozen Broadway musicals, most of them over the head of the general audience, including Cabin in the Sky and Ziegfeld Follies of 1936 and songs such as "April in Paris," "Taking a Chance on Love" and "I Can't Get Started.")

Gershwin, who had already achieved fame with "Swanee," was amazed by the extent of Duke's precocity and his musical knowledge. What we have just learned is that in the summer of 1923, Duke — at the behest of pianist Artur Rubinstein — wrote a piano concerto. Gershwin, who at this point didn't know a concerto from a cornpipe, thought it was super and would invite Duke to play one of the themes at parties (to a baffled response, presumably). Duke's concerto seems to have prodded Gershwin when, in early 1924, he dashed off his own initial symphonic attempt, "Rhapsody in Blue."

Duke, meanwhile, went back across the Atlantic to jumpstart his career in Paris. (His trip was funded, to a great extent, by some arranging jobs arranged by Gershwin; these included a full $100 fee for arranging the solo piano version of George's "Rhapsody" for publication.) In Paris, Duke played his still-unperformed and unorchestrated Concerto for Sergei Diaghilev, who immediately commissioned Vernon — or Vladimir Dukelsky, as he was known in serious music circles — to write "Zephyr et Flore" for the Ballets Russes.

The Concerto got lost in the shuffle, though a two-piano version was published in Paris in 1926. Seventy-odd years later, American pianist Scott Dunn found a copy, orchestrated it with the permission of Kay Duke Ingalls, and played the world premiere in January 1999 at Carnegie Hall. The piece has now made it to CD, where it is revealed to be — well, modernist, circa 1923. What can I say? George liked it, and that's good enough for me. Duke's Cello Concerto was commissioned during World War II and premiered in January 1947 with Sergei Koussevitsky and the Boston Symphony, with Gregor Piatigorsky as soloist. It similarly makes its CD debut, with Sam Magill on cello. The concerti are rounded out by "Homage to Boston," a seven-part piano composition Duke wrote in 1945. This Naxos CD is only for diehard Duke fans, I suppose; but as a diehard Duke fan, I find it a fascinating addition to the available catalogue.

(Steven Suskin is author of "Second Act Trouble," "Show Tunes" and the "Opening Night on Broadway" books. Past On the Record columns are archived in the Features section of Playbill.com. Suskin can be reached at Ssuskin@aol.com)