Shocking Blue, which is from Silver Star, is what is more readily available. So that means that Fragrant Plum is a f2 of it. FP is an overall nice plant with no real strong or weak points except for rain spotting. However, it isnt a pure mauve.
Blue Girl, Blue Moon, etc are decent growers but have poor foliage and a really, really hard color. If one goes that route, it would probably be easily to try Twice in a Blue Moon.
J/P has two new mauve floribundas out this year, but they lean on the dusky pink side of mauve. The plants are decent.
I once had a climbing blue moon which got loads of die-back plus blackspot. Too bad, since it made a most spectacular mass flowering show when it was in bloom. Nice fragrance too. I got rid of it 
Oh, Royal Amethyst isn’t too bad. Its major fault is bull-nosing. Also, it is a blend and not a pure mauve. So, if one wants to go the Blue Girl/Blue Moon route, then Royal Amethyst could bring you one step of improvement.
Blue Moon/Girl were OK forty years ago, but the plants aren’t up to 21st Century standards. I’d grow them to enjoy them, but not to include in breeding. Royal Amethyst is a better plant as far as structure goes, but it’s still a cross of Angel Farce and Blue Moon. And, it doesn’t have the blue-gray-green foliage and that’s what is so exciting about these seedlings.
For me to consider using a plant, it needs to be more like Meilland’s Love and Peace, Carruth’s Memorial Day, strong, well foliated, vigorous without the Charlotte Armstrong type flimsy peduncles. And, it must not contain Angel Farce, period. There are far too many awful traits from that rose which come back to haunt you many generations down the road.
I just received Blue For You and am blown away by its foliage! Clean, semi glossy with a very interesting gray cast to the green. Just based upon the foliage, this one is getting hit with DLFEDs!
Hi Kim, Im just offering all possibilities I can think of for anyone looking at non-mini/shrub/poly/etc mauves because there are so many limitations on this color class due to lack of much plant improvement relative to other color classes.
I forgot to add that I also love Blue for You. But mauve is a difficult idea because it could be purple, it could be silvery lilac or it could be a dark blend. All three are dramatically different.
Completely agreed Jadae. “Mauve” is even wider a term than “red”. Personally, it had better be more toward the blue end of the range than red or “raspberry”. Few color combinations repel me more than Paradise, Stinky Babs, Angel Farce, that mauve with a red edge. A darker mauve edging is one thing, that red over lavender just doesn’t do it for me. Heirloom’s raspberry and all the J&P swirly, muddy, faded raspberries (Purple Passion) are just as ho-hum.
There really aren’t any great mauve HTs. Neptune here comes closest to best. Silver Star (1966) and Charles de Gaulle were quite good plants and blooms in the heat here. Give me Tom Carruth’s Ebb Tide on Meilland’s Love and Peace and I will be euphoric.
Jon,
Instead of ‘Rhapsody in Blue’, have you thought about ‘Purple Splash’?
Jim Sproul
Truth be told, I love purples over lilac and mauve blends any day. My first love/hate was with Intrigue. I loved the color and blooms but hated the plant.I was happy when Ebb Tide came out. I tried out Fortune Teller, too, but it was junk. I actually dont like the mauve class other than purple but I breed them because 1) they need mass improvement and 2) I try to curb my biases with intent. I do, however, love the combo of lavender and yellow seen in Incognito. I have yet to see it done well in other similarly colored roses. Too bad Incognito is a bs magnet. Also, I tend to fall for an idea over my own biases. For example, I would love to see a fragrant, fully double, true lavender climber without plant issues. I think the idea is romantic and that a lot of people would be happy with that in their yard (which would make me happy if they are!).
Love and Peace must do well down there cause it defoliates with bs here lol. I think it has Silver Jubilee hidden in its lineage. It seems to have similar foliage and get bs in the same way here.
I hate Babs. I think that the plant is garbage and that it annoys me when roses are named after anything that can polarize people.
What the rose is named for as well as for whom, can usually tell you how good the breeder thinks it is. If the name is commercially good, chances are it’s at least an OK rose. If you name it for a loved one (outstanding exception being Agnes Winchell, for Joe named a DAWG of a plant for her, but it had the only thing he cared about, a winning flower), it is usually not bad, and likely to be something the breeder thought was good to exceptional. You never name a dud for your wife/girlfriend. That is too painful to live down!
Plants named for politicians are often junk. Those named for celebrities are more often middle of the road to worse and are banking on the name to sell the thing. Of course, there are other exceptions, but this has seemed often to be the case. A good rose will most often be given a good commercial name. A dud will usually have a celebrity’s name.
Babs polarizes people even without a substandard rose named for her. You have to give the marketers credit, though, it’s a very successful method of dumping junk and recovering RD costs.