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(11) “The Street of
Dreams” -
 In 1980, Frank Sinatra
undertook an imposing project called
Trilogy. A three-LP-package, it was broken
into “Past,” “Present” and “Future”
components, each contained on an LP. (The CD
combines “Past and Present on a single disc,
with “Future” comprising the second.) The
version of this song, (first sung by FS during
the Columbia years) recorded when Sinatra was
65, shows how well he continued to make a
special impact on the musical scene at an age
when other singers (if they’re still
performing) are content to do “memory lane”
oldies shows. Indeed, the “Present” portion of
“Trilogy” included “New York, New York” (a
song originated by Liza Minelli), with which
Sinatra listeners have since developed more
than a passing familiarity. This is yet
another example of Sinatra making another’s
song his own. “Street of Dreams,” with words
by the prolific songwriting team Sam Lewis27
and Joe Young, and music by Victor Young, was
clearly a depression-era lyric meant to perk
up the flagging spirits of an America where
every fourth person was out of work. “Street”
was, like “Pennies From Heaven,” an escapist
song, the kind you might hear in a Busby
Berkeley musical. What makes this song special
to me is not its decent, but formulaic, lyric,
but the way Sinatra infuses the words with
deep meaning. It was a song which doubtless
gave hope to a lot of people who were down on
their luck, and Sinatra delivers its timeless
message, “poor, no one is poor, long as love
is sure, on the street of dreams.” Billy May’s
upbeat arrangement gives the old ballad a
touch of modernity, which enables Sinatra to
give it a crescendo-like ending. “The Street
of Dreams” (where “kings don’t mean a thing”)
sounds like a nice place to visit, even if it
is but a dream.
(10) “More than you
Know” - This beautiful song (with
music by Vincent Youmans, and words by Billy
Rose and Edward Eliscu) was written in 1919.
As with “Street of Dreams,” it appeared,
appropriately enough, as part of the “Past”
segment of Sinatra’s 1980, Trilogy
project, the segment arranged by Billy May.
“More Than you know” is given the full
treatment by FS, complete with a verse and
release that would challenge many a singer’s
mastery of pitch. Youmans’s melody is a
complex one, and the song (originally a 1930
hit for chanteuse Ruth Ettings, immortalized
in the bio-pic Love Me or Leave Me
starring Doris Day and James Cagney) was given
new life in this version by Sinatra, who more
than does justice to a complex lyric. While
the song does not contain any difficult highs
or lows, it is, as suggested, a hard song to
sing well. While the stanzas themselves
(though melodic) are fairly straightforward,
the modulation (key shift) between them and
the release are managed effortlessly. Sinatra
is in full-command of his lower register on
this song when he sings, “Oh how I’d cry, oh
how I’d cry, if you got tired and said
good-bye.” And when he closes with “more than
I’d show, more than you’d ever know,” we are
hearing a confession from a strong-silent type
guy, who is feeling more than he’d reveal to
the woman were she to break his heart. Sinatra
varies the original lyric (to fine effect) in
the second stanza when he tells her “you need
me so,” adds the word “much” and than
finishes, biting off the last five words “more
than you’d ever know.” In the original Rose/Eliscu
lyric, the words are “I need you so.” While I
don’t usually think Sinatra’s songs benefit
when he tampers with the lyric, here he turns
the tables on his lover by reminding her that
each of them needs the other in ways that
they, themselves don’t expect. As you may have
gathered, this is one of my very favorite
Sinatra songs, made more impressive given the
stage of his career when he recorded it. While
he was still to give us some fine music (She
Shot me Down, L.A. is my Lady and
Duets were yet to come), Trilogy
served as a “September Song” for the Chairman,
in which the aging Sinatra paid court to his
ever-adoring fans. (Speaking of “September
Song, read on).
(9) “September Song” -
 This
song was from the late ‘30’s, with words by
Maxwell Anderson and Music by Kurt Weill
(composer of, among others, “Mack the Knife,”
and “Speak Low,”). It debuted in the show
Knickerbocker Holiday, and was originally
sung by Walter Huston, father of the late
director, John Huston. Huston, by the way,
charted with the song, rising as high as
number 12 in 1938. Sinatra’s version eight
years later (at the tender age of 31), got as
high as number 8. Sinatra’s 1946 performance
is sweet to be sure, but this is a song best
performed by an older man28,
and I have selected his 1965 recording from
September of my Years, for this list. While
Sinatra did not always sing the verse on some
of his best-known songs (e.g. “The Lady is a
Tramp,” “Wee Small Hours of the Morning” “Fly
Me to the Moon,” and—most of the time—when he
sang “Night and Day”), he more than made up
for it by combining the two separate verses
into a long and poignant introduction on his
rendition of the song” on the album,
“September of my Years,” to great and moving
effect.
FS was 50 when he recorded “September of My
Years,” and the album coincided with his
courting 20 year-old Mia Farrow, the star of
“Rosemary’s Baby,” a woman he was soon to
marry. Much as I believe Sinatra had lost love
Ava Gardner on his mind when he sang “I’m a
Fool to Want You” (see #23 above), so he must
have been thinking of his upcoming nuptials
with Ms. Farrow when he recorded this touching
rendition of everyman’s second chance. No
longer the crooner who wowed the bobby-soxers,
and disillusioned by the abandonment by, and
subsequent assassination of, President
Kennedy, even the days of the “Rat Pack” were
beginning to slip away. Sinatra, at 50, was
both taking stock and looking forward. Listen
to his words at the end of the verse where he
laments “the plentiful waste of time” inherent
in the “waiting game,” a prolonged courtship
he can no longer afford. While some of the
lyrics in the verse seem quite dated (when was
the last time you heard the phrase “clover
ring?”), the song remains deeply moving. When
Sinatra sings the final line about the
importance of “these few precious days, I’ll
spend with you,” we know how fragile time is,
a commodity far too valuable to waste.
(8) “I Get a Kick out
of You” —
 This staple of the Sinatra
songbook has been so much a part of his
concerts that we forget how new, original,
and, yes, hip it was when it first came out.
With words and music by the inimitable Cole
Porter, and a pulsating arrangement by Nelson
Riddle, the song first appeared on the 1953
10-inch LP, Songs for Young Lovers. The
now-legendary collaboration with Riddle was
then in its infancy, but the unique sound they
produced was already evident. It was not a new
song. Porter had written it for the 1934
Broadway show Anything Goes, where it
was belted out by a young Ethel Merman, and
its legendary triple internal rhyme (“flying
so high with some guy in the sky”) made it a
natural for female vocalists.29
Undaunted, Sinatra changed “guy” to “gal,” and
made the song his own. In part because we are
so familiar with the song, we forget (a) how
great it is and (b) how original was its
arrangement. Given its lineage, it was
actually revived by Sinatra, having lain
dormant for almost twenty years. While most
vocalists (largely because of the three-minute
limitation on singles) dropped the verse from
the standard song of which it was an integral
(and, I submit, valuable) part, the LP format
enabled singers like FS to use restore the
verse to its rightful place. Listen to how it
sets up all that follows. “My story is much
too sad to be told, ‘cause practically
everything leaves me totally cold. The only
exception I know is the case, when I’m out on
a quiet spree, fighting vainly that old ennui,
then I turn and suddenly see your fabulous
face.” Sinatra treats the closing words of the
verse (“your fabulous face”) as if they
comprised a separate sentence.
From beginning to the final “I get a kick out
you,” we hear Sinatra—after riding the notes
up in a tempo Crosby would never have
attempted—draw out in a croon the final “oo”
in “you” in a way that would have made Crosby
proud. One interesting sociological note is
the alteration of that part of the original
lyric referring to cocaine (“I’m sure that if
I took even one whiff, it would bore me
terrifically, too”). This original line was
retained by Sinatra in 1953, only to be
abandoned a decade later in favor of lame
substitutes (“some like the bop-type refrain,
I’m sure that if I heard even one riff it
would bore me terrif…” or the forced rhyming
of “perfume from Spain…if I had even one
sniff”)
30
Even Sinatra, when singing as the 1962 Paris
concert, vocally winced on the “perfume from,
Spain” line, quizzically repeating the word
“Spain” in the homeland of fine perfume. “I
get a Kick Out of You” (along with, of course,
the other Cole Porter classic, “I’ve Got you
Under my Skin” discussed in #13 above) firmly
established a new sound, the up-tempo,
swinging Sinatra who would stand side-by-side
with the saloon singer and “concert hall”
Sinatra (“Old Man River,” “Soliloquy,” “House
I Live In,” etc.), combining to give our
nation its most accomplished interpretive
singer.
(7) “Old Man River”
There are several types of songs Sinatra would
customarily include in his concerts, one of
which would be what I describe as a “concert
hall” or “big” song, usually serious and
anthemic in nature. (Sometimes the
self-referential and hagiographic “My Way”
played this role.31)
An equally worthy candidate would have been
“Soliloquy,” the marvelous Rogers &
Hammerstein song from Carousel about a
roustabout contemplating fatherhood. I have
chosen “Old Man River,” by Jerome Kern and
Oscar Hammerstein. I recall having heard
(noted Sinatraphile) Jonathan Schwartz relate
a story about how, after completing the
lyrics, Hammerstein immediately went to share
the song with Edna Ferber, the author of the
novel from which “Showboat” had been adapted.
Clearly aware of how special a song he had
written, he couldn’t wait to show it to the
author whose work had inspired it. Needless to
say, she loved it. In my view, it is simply
the best song ever written in the English
language. I remember hearing it at about age
seven, too young to understand the full impact
of its words, but somehow intuiting the
dilemma posed by the passage, “I’m tired of
living, but scared of dying.”
To anyone who has ever tried singing it
(whether in the shower or concert hall), it
presents a vocal challenge serious enough to
dissuade all but the most able and ambitious.
Prior to Sinatra’s first attempting the song,
it was most strongly identified with Paul
Robeson, an actor with a powerful bass voice
whose left-wing politics cost him dearly in
the 1950’s. The song requires not only a
strong low register, but covers a full two
octaves, all notes of which have to be
powerfully sung. Not only that, but
articulating the words is of special
importance, for this is as much a life lesson
as it is a song. FS first recorded the song in
late 1944 (reprising it in a 1946 film
somewhat based on the life of Jerome Kern,
complete with white suit, chorus, and fake
clouds). The version I am commending to the
reader is from an excellent album called,
appropriately, “The Concert Sinatra.” Nelson
Riddle served as arranger on the album, which
was recorded in early 1963 on Reprise. The
version of “Old Man River,” is marvelous, with
both low and high notes hit with authority.
Later in the 60’s, when Sinatra sang the song
in concert, he wowed the audience by, after
hitting the low note in jail (“You get a
little drunk and you lands in jay---ayl”),
dropping the note to a super-deep low g. As if
that weren’t enough, he held that note
and—without taking a breath—went right into
the next line “I get weary and sick of
trying.”32
Sinatra’s superb breath control was usually
exercised so deftly that no one (other than
his fellow vocalists) would recognize the
difficulty involved in something so apparently
effortless. In Old Man River, however, the
demonstration was there for all to hear and, I
suspect, something of which he wanted us to be
aware.33
No less a Sinatra authority than son, Frank,
Jr., recalls how stunned the audience at the
recording session was after Sinatra finished
“Ol’ Man River.”34
(6) “You and Me”
was written by two pop songwriters (Carol
Bayer Sager & Peter Allen), and was included
on the “Present” part of Sinatra’s Trilogy,
project, and arranged by Don Costa. Although
not released until 1980, and recorded in the
late ‘70’s (July 17, 1978, to be precise), the
song has always evoked an early-70’s feel for
me. Writer Tom Wolfe coined the phrase “the
‘me’ generation” to describe that special form
of “enlightened self-interest” (i.e.
“selfishness”) which characterized those
years. Society seemed to give license to
people to “follow their bliss,” even if it
meant cheating on (or even abandoning) spouse
and family. No longer could people comfortably
wrap themselves in blankets of responsibility
without somehow feeling they were missing out
on the very things they had either indulged
in, or previously missed out on, in the’60’s.
Whatever your recollection of the strain those
years put on conventional behavior, for me,
the lyrics of this admittedly pop
collaboration captured this spirit perfectly.
Sinatra (not exactly a slavish adherent to
convention) took the part of one member of a
once perfect couple, who sings about how this
couple “wanted it all, passion without pain,
sunshine without rainy days, we wanted it
always.” (What an interesting contrast with
the sentiment expressed in Irving Berlin’s
tribute to his second wife in “Always.”)35
He laments how “…we were once the best, back
when we were dumb, how did we become so smart,
and learn to break each other’s heart?” One of
the great qualities of Sinatra was his ability
to make you believe the lyrics. You do so
because he does. When he doesn’t either
believe or understand them (listen—if you
must—to his version of Paul Simon’s “Mrs.
Robinson), the message is equally clear.
Happily, FS went to great efforts to
understand and believe in (most) everything he
sang. His version makes this good song sound
great. I remember reluctantly going to see him
in concert at Carnegie Hall in 1980. I say
“reluctantly” only because I didn’t want to be
disappointed hearing the then 65 year old FS
(whom I hadn’t seen “live” for ten years) be
less than I was used to. Not only was it a
great concert for a 65 year-old, it was great
by any standard. When he performed the second
release of “look at how our dreams came true,
see how I’ve got me, baby, you’ve got you,” we
heard the end result of too much “enlightened
self-interest.”
(5) “The Gal that Got
Away/It Never Entered my Mind” -
She Shot me Down, was Sinatra’s final
“theme” album, in this case, a collection of
“torch” songs. I don’t know whose idea it was
to combine the two songs, but they fit
together seamlessly. “Gal,” (Ira
Gershwin/Harold Arlen)” was written for the
(first) remake of A Star is Born, Judy
Garland’s great tour de force. It was
originally recorded by Sinatra in 1954 as a
single, and was on the compendium Capital LP,
“This is Sinatra.” It is a great recording, as
is the version of “It Never Entered My Mind
(Rogers & Hart) which appeared on Sinatra’s
first recording of torch songs, “The Wee
Small Hours of the Morning,” in 1955.
Fitting that it should reappear on his last
such album.36
His voice is older, too, on this album, but
that only adds to the song’s success. The
variation on the old geometric theorem, the
whole is greater than the sum of its parts, is
fully realized in this mini-medley. Beginning
with “The nights are bitter…” (from “Gal”), FS
takes the song through the lines “and never a
new love will ever be the same,” and segues
into the opening chorus of “Mind,” (“Once I
laughed when I heard you saying…”) After
taking us through the words in which the
baffled, jilted lover wishes that, after
waking with the sun and finding himself
ordering “orange juice for one,” you can
almost see the singer shaking his head (as he
did in live performances) and saying “it never
entered my mind.” He then resolves into the
rueful “Good riddance, good-bye” (from “Gal”),
which takes him down the lonesome road of
regret and remorse, ending with “ever since
the world began, there ain’t nothing sadder
than a long-lost loser, looking for his gal
that got away.” Sinatra adds a “please come
back, won’t you come back,” then hums the
descending notes to close the song. It is good
to hear these two songs, so familiar to us
from their mid-50’s versions now being sung by
the 66 year-old Sinatra. The line “the wind
grows colder, and suddenly you’re (FS adds the
words “a lot”) older,” takes on an urgency far
different than when sung by a man not quite
forty. Implicit in this rendition is the
strong possibility that there will be no
replacement for the gal that got away. Anyone
even moderately familiar with Sinatra’s
biography knows that this was a song whose
lyrics had a special meaning for him.
(4) “Come Rain or
Come Shine”
 This song, composed by
Harold Arlen, with words by Johnny Mercer, was
part of the Sinatra & Strings LP,
beautifully arranged by Don Costa in his debut
association with Sinatra. The album drew its
title from a popular segment on disc-jockey
William B. Williams’s radio program on WNEW
(1130 on your AM dial). Just as some of
Sinatra’s songs lend themselves to brass
(“Birth of the Blues”), a completely different
mood can be evoked with strings. Albums like
the underrated Great Songs from Great
Britain come to mind. While brass and
woodwinds are not excluded from this album,
the string arrangements by Costa make it
special. “Come Rain or come Shine” is a song
in the “you can count on me” tradition. In my
selection of “Birth of the Blues,” I discussed
how the young Sinatra learned from Tommy
Dorsey to use his voice as an instrument. In
“Come Rain or Come Shine,” listen how Sinatra
runs around the melody when he sings the final
pass at “you’re gonna love me like nobody’s
loved me,” and takes off from there, building
to the ending, “but I’m with you baby, I’m
with you rain or shine,” bending the notes on
the final shine like a trumpet. The phrase
“jazz singer,” was often applied to Sinatra,
something which was a high compliment. I
believe one of the reasons Sinatra (like Ray
Charles) wanted tightly constructed
arrangements, was so he could work his way
around the melody. Listen to “Come Rain or
Come Shine,” and you’ll hear a jazz singer at
the top of his game.
(3) “The Song is You”-In wanting to choose a
song emblematic of the best of the young
Sinatra, I was undecided between this and
“Without a Song.” After all, no selection of
songs by Sinatra would be complete without a
song about a song. Relatively late in his
career, FS “covered” a Barry Manilow hit “I
write the Songs,” with “I Sing the Songs,” but
I think “The Song is You” is a fitting choice.
Not only does it salute the title of Will
Friedwald’s masterful study of Sinatra, but it
is the name of the five-CD box-set of
recordings FS made with Tommy Dorsey (on which
this version appears).
This beautiful song, a collaboration of Jerome
Kern and Oscar Hammerstein (see “Ol’ Man
River,” #7 above) harkens back to the simpler,
more romantic years of the vocalist’s career.
To hear him do songs in this era is to listen
to someone with no vocal limitations other
than those attributable to youth and
inexperience. There was no note too high or
low, soft or loud, that he couldn’t hit and
hold for as long as he wanted. Apparently
Sinatra swam laps to build up his lungs so he
could sing long passages without taking a
breath. These recordings were, of course, many
cigarettes, and glasses of Jack Daniels ago.
It was standard in the big-band era, for
numbers to begin with an instrumental (since
the bandleader and his instrument—here,
Dorsey’s trombone—were the perceived main
attraction), followed by the featured
vocalist. Listen, on the final chorus, how
effortlessly he climbs the vocal ladder on the
words, “how can I let you know the song my
heart could sing,” then softens for “a
beautiful rhapsody of love and youth and
spring” (a lovely image, to be sure). He
closes the song with, “the music is sweet, the
words are true, the song is you.” But on the
closing “you,” he jumps an octave and hits a
falsetto worthy (two generations later) of
another Frankie (Vali, that is). There may
have been other instances of Sinatra hitting a
falsetto note, but this is the only one of
which I am aware.
I think this song (which Sinatra continued to
sing and record, albeit in a jazzy tempo)
reflected the singer’s life-long respect for
his audience, who truly comprised his muse. To
FS, the song was, of course, you, the reason
why people like me (and, presumably, you)
continue to pay attention to this singular
entertainer.
(2) “Come Fly with Me” -
 This
was a title of a great, mid-50’s album by
Sinatra, conducted and arranged by Billy May,
with words and music by Sammy Cahn & Jimmy Van
Heusen. If there was a single album which
epitomized the jet-setting swinger that
Sinatra had become, this was it. The album
cover was a painting of Sinatra standing on an
airport tarmac, dressed impeccably in a
light-weight suit, striped tie, topped off
with a summer-weight hat with an extra-wide
hat band. He’s smiling broadly and holding his
left thumb as if he’s hitching a ride and
wants you to join him. If you look carefully,
his right hand is holding the braceleted hand
of a woman, the rest of whom is outside the
borders of the LP.
Sinatra took to the long-playing record as if
it had been custom-made with him in mind.
While still a “singles” artist, and subject to
the unwritten law that no song could exceed
three-minutes, the LP freed him to not only do
longer songs, but to link them thematically
(e.g. “Wee, Small Hours of the Morning,”
“Songs for Swinging Lovers,” etc.).
This album is jam-packed with songs whose
arrangements became part of the Sinatra
repertoire, and frequently utilized in
subsequent concerts (“Let’s Get Away From it
All,” “Autumn in New York,” and “April in
Paris”). The title song is an example of a
song written for Sinatra by his “in-house”
team of Cahn and Van Heusen.
As good friends of the vocalist, they came as
close to being an extension of the artist as
did any composer or lyricist.37
“Come
Fly with Me,” is an up-tempo number which
swings from start to finish. Filled with
internal rhymes (“…if you can use some exotic
booze there’s a bar in far Bombay”) and hip
(perhaps still “hep”) references (“just say
the words and we’ll beat the birds down to
Acapulco bay”), you can almost imagine Sinatra
initiating someone into the “mile-high” club
to the beat of this song.
(l) “Night and Day”
- Last but not least, is a masterful song by
Cole Porter. While noted for his wit, this is
a beautiful, and serious, love song. With five
studio versions dating from 1942 to a (not
bad) disco treatment in 1977, there are many
from which to choose.38
My selection is the 1961 version from
Sinatra and Strings, (see #4 above), the
only studio recording on which Sinatra sang
the verse. The verse in performed in a
heartbeat like monotone, which slowly ascends
what sounds like a chromatic scale, ending
with the final “you, you, you.” Once again,
Sinatra displays his still-legendary breath
control by segueing in the opening “Night and
Day, you are the one” without taking a breath.
His sense of drama is never better
demonstrated than when he sings “Night and
day, under the hide of me, there’s an oh such
a hungry, yearning burning inside of me.”
Listen to how he lowers his voice on the
“inside of me.” This song tells the story of a
man (or woman) possessed by the torment of
love, a thirst that can only be quenched by a
passionate life spent together. It may be
difficult to sustain such a romance, but not
hard to imagine (and yearn for) when you don’t
have it. Once again, no one could express (or,
arguably, feel) the pain of unrequited love
more deeply than Sinatra. I picked this song
as number one not because it is necessarily
the best, but one which provides the
opportunity for the listener to hear it
performed over a thirty-five year period, from
crooner to swinger, to balladeer and, yes,
disco man. As an interpretive master of the
American songbook of standards, Sinatra was a
man for all seasons, something never more
clearly demonstrated than when he sang his
various versions of “Night and Day.” They’re
all great, but this one, to paraphrase Cole,
is “the top.” As, of course, is Sinatra.
_____________________
1 “Exhibit A—Graph of Sinatra Performances of
‘Night and Day’ from “Sinatra, the Song is
You,” by Will Friedwald, Da Capo Press, 1997.
2 “Frank Sinatra’s Artistry and the Question
of Phrasing,” Sam’s Home Page, “Sam the Fan,”
6/18/07.
3 Columbia Records, 1992. This album, although
a salute to the older man’s artistry, was not
an imitation of Sinatra songs. Rather, Bennett
used different arrangements and
interpretations. As such it stood on its own,
and won a Tony for Traditional Pop Vocal in
1992.
4 “For my money, Tony Bennett is the best
singer in the business.” “Sinatra, The Life”
(Anthony Summers and Robbyn Swan, 2005, Random
House.)”
5 Sinatra recorded the song, (written in 1949
by Irving Taylor and Ken Lan) in 1964. When
Dean Martin’s version became an enormous
success, Martin telegrammed his fellow “rat-
packer” with the words “That’s the way you do
it.” (Wikipedia: Everybody Loves Somebody.)
6 (Wikipedia, “Nelson Riddle.) “What’s
New,” (1983), Lush Life (1984) and “For
Sentimental Reasons,” (1986), the first two of
which resulted in Grammys for Riddle and
nominations for Ronstadt.
7 “Nine Sinatra Songs,” (Sinatra),
Movin’Out” (Billy Joel) & “Times they are a-Changin’”
(Bob Dylan)
8 Friedwald, ibid at 302.
9 “As I Remember It,” Frank Sinatra Jr.,
(1996, Angel Records). Yes, I know that one
could ask why bother with a Sinatra
retrospective by his son when excellent
recordings of the songs exist by his late
father, a much better singer. I saw the live
performance and own the CD, and found Frank,
Jr. to be both a good vocalist, and a very
knowledgeable musician. As conductor of his
father’s orchestra, he knew all the songs and
their history, and relates it in an
interesting manner, albeit with little humor
and much gravitas. It is, however, worth your
attention. For all the Sinatra imitators,
Frank, Jr. is better than most at musically
capturing the essence of his father’s music.
What he lacks, not surprisingly, is that
ineffable something that enabled his father to
rise above all his contemporaries, something
Frank, Jr., alas, cannot do either.
10 “It Had to be You,” (2002), “As Time
Goes By” (2003),”Stardust” (2004) and “Thanks
For the Memory” (2005). Rod’s “Stardust,” by
the way, made it to #1 on the charts,
something FS never achieved with his “own”
songs.
11 The recent HBO special on the
Brooklyn Dodgers’s final years actually played
the song (to great effect) in the background.
(Friedwald, at 352, clearly believes Sinatra
sang it with the Dodgers in mind.) “Ballpark”
was included in Sinatra’s “coming out of
retirement” album “Ol’ Blue Eyes is Back.,”
While it is difficult to footnote a negative,
it was—to my recollection—the first time
Sinatra (who undeniably had blue eyes) was
referred to in that way. In an enormous
tribute to a relatively unknown composer, it
is but one of four songs on that album by
Raposo, who died far too young at age 52.
Although a number of song titles begin with
connective conjunctions (e.g. “But Beautiful,”
“And I Love Her,” etc.), “Ballpark” is the
only one of which I’m aware in which the
lyrics begin with one; i.e. “And there used to
be a ballpark…”
12 For those Sinatra buffs who revel in
trivia as much as I do (and our legions are
many) Sinatra does sing in the movie, but only
briefly. There is a scene where Sinatra (as
Maggio) and Montgomery Clift (as Prewitt), are
accompanied by a couple of his buddies singing
a drunken version of “The Re-Enlistment
blues,” in which Sinatra slurs through a
fragment of a line. The
song was written by author James Jones, and
has been recorded by, among others, the late
Merle Travis (of “Sixteen Tons” fame) and
Jorma Kaukonnen of Hot Tuna.
13 Friedwald, ibid at 191-92.
14 While Sinatra reportedly left the recording
studio in tears, producer Mitch Miller (later
of “Sing along with Mitch” fame), claimed this
was “bull shit,” and that FS was drawing on
the listener’s emotion, not his. (ibid,
Friedwald, also 191-92)
15 “The Man I Love,” and no, music fans, the
super-macho Sinatra never sang this song, but
check out Judy Garland and Barbra Streisand,
both of whom have recorded marvelous versions
of this (George and Ira) Gershwin masterpiece.
16 Sinatra 101, Ed O’Brien with Edward
Wilson, p. 92
17 While my generation was the first to
disdain the value of “interpretive” singers in
favor of “singer-songwriters,” I think that
misses the point. What a singer does with a
lyric is a far more meaningful contribution
than insisting on only the songwriter singing
it. While I clearly recognize Bob Dylan’s
idiosyncratic vocal abilities (e.g. “Like a
Rolling Stone,” “Ballad of a Thin Man”), I
believe the artistry of Peter, Paul & Mary is
what made “Blowing in the Wind” the anthem it
became, much as the Byrds later achievement
with “Mr. Tambourine Man.” The same could be
said of the Kingston Trio’s version of “Where
Have All the Flowers Gone” as opposed to the
very spare Pete Seeger original. To refer to
those, or any of Sinatra’s songs as “covers”
seems absurd. Sometimes the “cover” version is
the song.
18 To the best of my knowledge, the 1976
version of this song was first only available
on the so-called “suitcase” or complete
Reprise studio recordings which, while a great
package, would set you back more than it would
be worth for one song, I believe this later
version can be found on the CD entitled “
Sinatra Reprise-The Very Good Years.”
19 There is, by the way, a lovely verse to the
song, which Sinatra never recorded or, to my
knowledge, performed. Barbra Streisand
performs a lovely version of the song, with
verse, on her album, “Color me Barbra,”(
Columbia). See how nicely the verse sets up
the familiar chorus. “Sometimes you think
you’ve lived before all that you live today.
Things you do come back to you as if they knew
the way. Oh, the tricks your mind can play.”
20 Sinatra did a very appealing rendition of
this song on his second duets CD, digitally
paired with Linda Ronstadt. While his breath
control was not as it was in 1957 (whose is?),
this was, after all, 1994, and Sinatra nearly
79!
21 The fourth, “Flowers Mean Forgiveness,” was
a ballad, and deserves mention as the only
song written by a family friend, Eddie White,
which was recorded by Sinatra. While a nice
ballad, it would have been out of place on “A
Swinging Affair.” That said, it was part of a
memorable session.
22 “Sinatra’s coup de grace of up-tempo
masterpieces,” Friedwald, ibid at 233, and
“The single greatest recording of Sinatra’s
career,” Sinatra 101, by Ed O’Brien with
Robert Wilson at 72-74
23 “Sinatra 101,” ibid at 73.
24 Lose F.S.’s duet version of “House” with
Neal Diamond on “Duet’s II.” Trust me.
25 Whatever the political sympathies of the
writers behind the song and the film, there is
nothing in “The House I Live In” which would
have threatened any of our cherished
institutions. It is far less a protest, than a
celebration of what makes America special.
“Popular Front” politics notwithstanding
(whereby the Communist Party urged all
sympathizers—communist or otherwise—to support
the allies in the war against Fascism), this
song stands the test of time as a salute to
what is best about America. In a footnote to a
footnote, the composer of this song, Lewis
Allan, whose real name was Robert Meeropol—who
also wrote the anti-lynching song “Strange
Fruit”—adopted the children of Julius and
Ethel Rosenberg, following the latters’
execution as spies convicted of having stolen
atomic secrets for the U.S.S.R.
27 Lewis, as indicated on www.info.net, was a
lyricist who enjoyed enormous success during
the first third of the 20th centuryand
deservedly won election to the Songwriters
Hall of Fame. Among his more familiar titles
were Jolson’s “Mammy,” “Rockabye Your Baby
with a Dixie Melody,” “Five foot Two, Eyes of
Blue,” Sitting on top of the World,” and “For
All we Know,” just to name a few.
28 (Wikipedia) The late Jimmy Durante, at the
age of 70, charted with both a single of
“September Song,” and the album of the same
name. As with Huston, Durante’s raspy voice
imparted a special tenderness to the lyric.
While Sinatra had done a version of the song
as a young man, his version as a middle-aged
man had far more believability.
29 Wikipedia. The women who recorded it
comprise a virtual Hall of Fame, and include
Ella Fitzgerald, Dinah Washington, Billie
Holiday, Rosemary Clooney and Dolly Parton.
30 I can do even worse in a nautical motif-
“Some like the great bounding main, I’m sure
that if I sailed even one skiff, it would bore
me terrifff--ically too.” That’s enough to
make Frank and Cole role over in their
respective graves.
31 A tour de force, but I still winced every
time I heard the line “...and let me state,
not in a shy way.” Sinatra introduced the song
at “The Main Event” with the words “And now
for the national anthem, but you needn’t
stand.” Not shy, no, no, not him.
32 Ibid, “The Song is You,” Friedwald, at 19 &
23
33 Look for the CD called “Sinatra and Sextet,
Live in Paris (Reprise), complete with an
introduction in French by Charles Aznavour. On
it, Sinatra does a beautiful rendition of “Ol
Man River,” on which he reaches the
aforementioned new low—in the positive sense.
By the way, fully 7 of these” top 25” songs
are performed on this “Live in Paris” CD—one
definitely worth owning.
34 “As I Remember it,” ibid. Frank, Jr. does a
respectable version on the CD—low g and all.
35 (“The Song is You,” Friedwald,
ibid)“Always, by Irving Berlin (1925) “I’ll be
loving you always, with a love that’s true,
always…” “Always” was recorded by FS several
times, both up-tempo and as a ballad. Sinatra
pointed to this song as an example of Berlin’s
genius. The lyrics, though disarmingly simple,
express the depth of love by demonstrating
that “always” is not just an hour, a day, or a
year.
36 Also see “Duets” (Capital, 1993), in which
Sinatra and Carly Simon combine nicely on a
medley of “Wee Small Hours,” and “It Never
Entered my Mind,” done, in part, as
countermelodies.
37 Examples of such personalized songs
are, “My Kind of Town (Chicago is),” “I Like
to Lead When I Dance,” “The Tender Trap,”
“Come Blow your Horn,” and, of course,
“Ring-A-Ding-Ding.” Not only does one think of
Sinatra when hearing these titles, one thinks
of no one but Sinatra.)
38 (Wikepedia, “Night and Day”) Also available
are recordings from 1942 and 1947 with Axel
Stordahl, a 1956 Nelson Riddle arrangement
from “A Swingin’ Affair” and the Don Costa
arrangement discussed above. The Wikepedia
entry has an interesting discussion on the
unusual length and harmonies used in the song.
Also see Friedwald’s graph of “Night and Day”
performances on pp. 56 &57 of “The Song is
You.”
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