• Prompted by the centenary (last week) of George Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, two pianists from different traditions, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, predominantly a classical performer with a flair for jazz, and Michael Feinstein, known for his American songbook expertise, have collaborated on Gershwin Rhapsody (Decca), a homage to the composer and his most famous concert work. Variously for two pianos, piano solo or piano and voice (with Feinstein adding vocals on four tracks), the album includes two world premiere recordings, but most of the tracks are Gershwin mainstays such as Someone to Watch Over Me, I Got Rhythm, They Can’t Take That Away from Me, Fascinating Rhythm. They show off Feinstein’s improvisational skills and Thibaudet’s concert-pianist virtuosity, in arrangements by Earl Wild, Tedd Firth and Feinstein himself. Two brief medleys on the Rhapsody just about justify the album’s title but no one should mind. The playing is toe-tapping, witty and irresistible.
