George Gershwin’s Creative Life in Greenwich

On my watch: George Gershwin’s Creative Life in Greenwich

By Anne Semmes

On this past Memorial Day, I enjoyed the sunshine on a long walk listening to a favorite piece of music via my air pods – George Gershwin’s “An American in Paris” conducted by Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. It is a joy to know that that great music was largely composed by George Gershwin in my hometown of Greenwich. And not only “An American in Paris,” but another favorite, the opera “Porgy and Bess.”

It was my late and lovely friend Joan Warburg who had shared this wondrous news on a visit at her “Bydale” estate on backcountry John Street. Joan was married to prominent banker James Warburg who had died years earlier leaving her with their four grown children. Joan would walk me outside