Gershwin, Ira

Gershwin, Ira [né Israel Gershvin] (1896–1983), lyricist. Born in New York and the older brother of George Gershwin, he was a bookish, introspective youth. When he first decided to write lyrics professionally he did it under a pseudonym derived from the first names of another brother and a sister, Arthur Francis. It was as Francis that he created lyrics for Vincent Youmans's Two Little Girls in Blue (1921). During the 1920s he occasionally wrote with composers other than his brother; his work with his brother is listed in the entry for George Gershwin immediately above. He also wrote lyrics for Americana (1926), Life Begins at 8:40 (1934), and the 1936 edition of the Ziegfeld Follies. After his brother's death he wrote the innovative Lady in the Dark (1941) with Kurt Weill, but his last two shows were failures: The Firebrand of Florence (1945), written with Weill; and Park Avenue (1946), written with Arthur Schwartz. He did live to see another Gershwin hit on Broadway: My One and Only (1983). Ira Gershwin was often in his brother's shadow and only later was he recognized as one of the best American lyricists, with superior work that was cheery, colloquial, and marked with a unique, slangy shorthand.