My Man's Gone Now
"My Man's Gone Now" is an aria composed by George Gershwin, with lyrics by DuBose Heyward, written for the opera Porgy and Bess (1935). Sung in the original production by Ruby Elzy, it has been covered by many singers, notably Ella Fitzgerald (on the 1958 Porgy and Bess album), Leontyne Price, Audra McDonald (who would later sing the part of Bess), Nina Simone, Sarah Vaughan, and Shirley Horn, among others. In the opera In the opera, the aria is sung by Serena, the grieving widow, at her husband Robbins's wake. He has been murdered by Crown, a drunken stevedore, during a crap game played in the courtyard of Catfish Row. She sings that she will no longer hear his footsteps coming up stairs and that "ol man sorrow" will be her companion from now on, telling her she is old. The aria's music and lyrics refer to popular African American spiritual songs and are accompanied by melodic wails which are picked up by the chorus. Versions Leontyne Price, who regularly played Bess, once said in a master class that it was important to express the "cultural context that is captured in the music." Speaking to an aspiring singer, she said