Remembering Frank Sinatra

Wednesday, April 09, 2008
Remembering Frank Sinatra


I never really knew much about Frank Sinatra as a kid. When you grow up in a place like Philly, you certainly hear it everywhere; but it just becomes a part of the landscape; like something you never notice until it’s gone. Sometimes you feel it when you move to another part of the country or the world. I joined the Marines at 17 and in the next ten years, I found myself in some strange places. Maybe it escaped me, at first, what was different about these new places because the soundtrack still played on in the background; familiar music always drifted from some café or lobby nearby and I felt at home, without even knowing the words.

I hated pop music as an adolescent, preferring to listen to Classical music and Americana; but when I saw the movie, "The Blues Brothers" something in the Music tugged at my core. Both Johnny Lee Hooker and Cab Calloway planted seeds in my soul and I couldn’t get over the dichotomy of Holiness and Criminal that the Blues Brothers embodied. A sympathetic chord vibrated throughout my being. There was something true underneath. I had an emotionally troubled childhood and although the Blues too had always been playing in the Philly background, I never heard it until that movie.

When I got into the Marines, I started to hear different music. I started to hear the blues in the places I was stationed. Dirty Blues from down south, Mississippi, Memphis, South Carolina, North Carolina etc, not to mention being around people who were very different than a white Philly Boy, wannabe Blues man who was knockin’ on their daughter’s doors courtesy of the USMC. I played harmonica back then, although I was horrible and knew virtually nothing about how to play the instrument. I searched for the blues (not knowing it was already inside me) and the social aspect that came with it. I tried to make it happen. I drank myself poor and stayed out all night. I heard the blues in my voice when I called running cadence for the Company and I felt an amazing wellspring of power that I tapped into when I sang it out.

Despite the comfort I felt in the blues, soon I began to yearn again for something. The blues wasn’t enough. The music was repetitive and I found that the only thing I was really listening to was the soul of the singer. I can remember saying to myself, "I wish some of these guys would sing classical music, it would be amazing" (Someone should have slapped me and given me an old gospel album.) About the time that Garth Brooks began to wail about low places and Whiskey rounds, I found Ray Charles. Without knowing it, I was beginning to yearn for Jazz. I didn’t understand what I thought was Jazz at the time: Way out ruminations by cats who were trying to be Dizzy or Coltrane. None of that made any sense to me. I was yearning for something though and yearning hard. I learned every Ray Charles Song from the Atlantic recordings, every one. I couldn’t afford the CDs so I shoplifted them out of a Marine Corps 7-day store on Cherry Point NC. That was the only time I had ever reverted back to my pre-Marine Corps Street Ethos and having just remembered that I’ll have to find a way to make amends. That’s how strong my need was for the music: I risked a Marine Corps Brig to get my hands on a 3 CD compilation of Ray Charles’ Atlantic Recordings, not even knowing what it would sound like. I read the liner notes on the back and whatever that Cat said was what I thought I needed, and we were right. I couldn’t wait for my roommate to leave so I could use his CD player. When no one was around, I tried to play along on a trumpet I had picked up in a pawn shop for $75 in Havelock NC. Later, Nat King Cole and a brief period of musical satisfaction. A couple of years later I was 21 and I found myself standing in front of a CD display looking for a Classical piece, "Romance For Strings No. 1 in G" by Beethoven; that never fails to bring tears to my eyes (except when it’s played too fast).

They didn’t have the conductor I was looking for. I glanced to my left (The Jazz section was next to the Classical) and there was Frank Sinatra tipping his hat to me from the cover of the "Best of Reprise" CD. I thought, "I should check this guy out. He’s got the right kind of hat, I’ve heard his name all my life, and I have ten bucks burning a hole in my pocket."

$8. 99 had never changed so much in a man’s life. Here it was: a man singing the "complicated Blues" tunes I was looking for, in a way I immediately connected with. It was the stepping stone for a young man who somehow missed the beginnings of Jazz while growing up in the town that produced the likes of Dizzy, Coltrane and Philly Joe Jones. Without Sinatra I would have languished in a musically unsatisfied existence, not sure where I fit in between modern pop, hip hop and soul/blues/R&B, drinking my nights and working my days without a musical compass and without a spiritual leader.

Since that day, Frank has traveled with me all over the globe. It started with the song "Nancy" because I had just broken up with a girl named Nancy and I didn’t know anything about Nancy Sinatra or Jimmy Van Heusen, or Sammy Cahn, or Cole Porter or Frank’s Conductor/arrangers at the time Nelson Riddle and Billy May. His recordings and that music, American Standards, CHANGED EVERYTHING. Maybe it was the sum of all my circumstance and emotion. At 21 I’d already seen quite a few harrowing things and here was a guy whose voice said what I was feeling, perfectly, without remorse, in perfect pitch and effortless phrasing in a tonal quality that said "I love you" and "come and get me you bastards!" all at the same time. This was the "Me I wanted to be" singing to "the Me I was," only better, because I couldn’t sing like that (that didn’t stop me from trying though.)

His library of recordings is so extensive that even 15 years later I haven’t heard them all.

My favorites change from season to season, moment to moment. Sometimes as soon as I hear my favorite, it’s done and my new favorite is whatever is coming up next.

A couple of years ago, I picked up a recording from somewhere called "Only The Lonely" and it kills me, slays me dead, right there when I hear it. It’s too slow to sing at a show, people just gloss over and die; but that song catapults me into the nethersphere where I flop around and writhe on the floor of my mind from relating to that pain he’s laying down. I wonder if it’s Ava he’s thinking about, or Nancy Sr. or his own failures (or victories). He sure wasn’t immune to negative introspection. He called himself a "24 karat manic depressive" and it was true. You can hear it on the whole album but that song rips me to shreds, especially the last line and the last three notes: "the heartbreak only the lone-ly-know. "Frank Sinatra Sings for Only The Lonely" was another of his many stunning collaborations with Nelson Riddle.

I also love , "Just One Of Those Things" from "Songs For Young Lovers/Swing Easy!" arranged by George Siravo and conducted by Nelson Riddle. It’s a perfect arrangement and it swings while staying poignant. Listen closely to the way the horns float in and around his voice and phrasing. It is nothing short of brilliant. It’s also the first album after Sinatra’s "Great Slump" and the beginning of his work with Nelson Riddle. I believe it’s considered one of the first "Concept Albums"

With something like 1900 recordings of Sinatra, it’s pretty tough to nail down a specific album but that reprise single CD compilation is still a killer. "Only the Lonely" and "Songs for Swinging Lovers" as well as "Songs for young lovers/swing easy" are all magical albums and I seem to be a real fan of the Frank of the Fifties

For the record, I can’t stand the "Duets" albums, I’m against the whole idea of them. Frank didn’t want to do them either; but, he was prodded by a trusted advisor. I think his instincts were sharp for not wanting to; then again, what do I know? They sold a hell of a lot of albums. His best selling album as a matter of fact. I also can’t stand "The Theme from New York New York." Written for Liza Minelli, it’s a song which forever will be linked to his brilliant performance and arrangement of it (not to mention another huge comeback in the 80s); but as a song, it’s a lame duck. As Frank would have said, "Pallies, I think it’s about to rain."

You hear this phrase a lot: "The thing about Frank Sinatra is…" well that’s just it. Sinatra did it all; his life, his music, an Oscar, eleven Grammies, two Golden Globes, uncountable other awards, his philanthropy, his failures, his ups his downs, his pain, his love, his luck (both good and bad) and his success tell an amazing story. His was a full life and if you haven’t had a chance to read about it, you really should. You could learn a lot about livin’ from Frank Sinatra. He climbed to the top and landed at the bottom and pulled it back up to the top again several times in Global Proportions. He was loved and hated and revered and despised, sometimes by the same person. His actual life was a piece of art; simultaneously beautiful and ignoble in the making, sublime and terrible in the examination. I’ve never heard anyone discount Sinatra as an artist; they may say something like, "I like so and so better" or, "that guy was a real @$$@!" but I’ve never heard anyone say, "I don’t like Frank Sinatra." He was bonified. He was 100% real.

Musically, his phrasing is pure natural; and yet, tremendously difficult to duplicate without sounding contrived. He worked with the best musicians in history, and he sang songs written by the greatest songwriters and lyricists of all time. His was a voice that still touches everyone, in every walk of life in and out of America.

Often I hear people say they remember where they were on September 11th or when JFK was shot. I remember where I was when I first heard Frank Sinatra had died. I was married at the time and we were lying in bed as my wife was flipping the channels on the TV. When I saw a glimpse of his face and heard the word "was". I yelled out, "Wait! Go Back!" to the news which was briefly reviewing his life at 2AM (Frank would have smiled at that, "last call Fellas, did I ever tell ’ya about my friend, Frank?") I wanted to correct the reporter when she said, "Frank Sinatra was…" She should have said, "Frank Sinatra will forever be…"


DP