Composer. Born September 26, 1898, in New York City. From a Russian-Jewish immigrant family, he began playing both popular and classical piano in childhood and soon was writing tunes. He left school in 1913 to pursue music, becoming a Tin Pan Alley song plugger and composer. His first hit song, "Swanee," dates from 1919; the same year saw his first Broadway musical, La, La, Lucille. During the next 18 years, he produced an astonishing amount of music, alone, as well as in collaboration with his lyricist brother, Ira. Together they produced a celebrated series of musicals such as Lady Be Good (1924), Funny Face (1927), Girl Crazy (1929), and the Pulitzer Prize-winning Of Thee I Sing (1931). For the stage and otherwise, he composed some of the most sophisticated American popular songs, among them "I Got Rhythm," "They Can't Take That Away From Me," and "Someone to Watch Over Me." Beyond his immense achievements in popular music, however, he also pursued an ambitious goal of uniting commercial and classical genres (at one point even seeking to study under Ravel). The result was his historic jazz-oriented concert works such as Rhapsody in Blue (1924) and An American in Paris (1928), as well as the folk opera Porgy and Bess (1935). Despite his premature death, Gershwin left a body of work whose sheer melody and inventiveness guarantee its appeal to music-lovers of all persuasions.