Rhapsody in Blue is the greatest piece of music ever written. It includes about three, four, or nine different thematic threads. It rocks so haaaaaaardcore!!! I've probably listened to it at least forty-nine times, quite possibly more. This song is SO good that, if I could, I'd clone it so there could be more of it. Rhapsody in Blue is best described as Beethoven plus jazz. Jazz cool-style, that is. Never before had such sweet action been part of the classical repertoire, and maybe never again. George Gershwin didn't even care about music until his parents got him a piano. Don't listen to An American in Paris: it is the antithesis to Rhapsody in Blue. Take that seventeen minutes you'd spend on An American and listen to Rhapsody again. Then call in sick at work and listen to it twice more. Gershwin 0wns j00 on the piano and you should at least listen to Rhapsody one-hundred and thirty-two times before your twenty-fifth birthday. On a side note, Gershwin's real last name was Gershovitz. Maybe he was Jewish.