Great Galloping Gottschalk
Great Galloping Gottschnlk was commissioned by American Ballet Theater in 1982. It was inspired by the piano pieces of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, a composer of Jewish and Creole descent. Gottschalk toured extensively in South America, and he traveled by train across the United States with his piano in tow during the Civil War, entertaining in both the North and the South. Gottschalk was dark, handsome, and charismatic, not unlike a rock star of today. Smitten young women bought his sheet music and fought to sit in the front row of his concerts, and it is reported they often swooned and had to be carried out.
