This talk argues that Gershwin’s “tone poem for orchestra”—An American in Paris —is a synthesis of classical and popular aesthetics—at once a statement of the composer’s ambiton to write musically sophisticated yet accessible music that made money. It examines Gershwin’s work from three perspectives: popular modernism, as a synthesis of program and absolute musics, and as an exemplar of Gershwin’s economic strategies. It concludes that Gershwin’s music is more modern and compositionally rich than typically understood, while at the same time the composer was trying to write an orchestral “hit” that would reach a broad audience and reap financial reward.