It being Gershwin's 100th anniversary, BBC's classical radio channel
Radio 3 has temporarily elevated him to Beethoven status and we're
getting a lot of interesting recordings played.

I happened to tune into one this morning and it was immediately
recognisable as the Duo-Art roll(s) of "Rhapsody In Blue", doctored so
that the piano part could be played with a jazz band.  This was not the
Michael Tilson Thomas one with the "Columbia Jazz Band", but much
earlier -- 1930s or even late 20s by the sound of it.  I'd not heard
that this had been done for disc so far back.

The piano was muddy and not in good order, and Jumping Jehesophat ! --
someone had taken some scissors to the roll and it was leaping forward
and cutting out whole sections.  There was one unfamiliar linking
section.  But it had to be the Duo-Art; what came through was otherwise
wholly familiar.  While intrigued, I felt depressed that such a poor
recording of a piano roll was being aired.

Then we came to the end.  In fact, the recording was really a triumph,
because the hiss had been taken out and the frequencies balanced up.

It was George's own recording with the Whiteman band in 1924 !  Ouch !

Dan Wilson, London