NOTE: I am not too terribly pleased with the graphics on this and the preceding musical offering. But then again, beggars can't be choosers!"September Song" was written in 1938 by playwright and lyricist Maxwell Anderson with music by the then recent German refugee Kurt Weill for their stage musical "Knickerbocker Holiday" in which actor Walter Huston sang this memorable song about a May/Decemb...
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According to Will Friedwald in his book "Sinatra! The Song Is You," Friedwald writes most poignantly about the "POint of No Return" recording sessions. "He [Axel Stordahl] must have been proud of his final project with his greatest collaborator and of its wonderful twilight feeling, so appropriate for a fareweel album. Stordahl's presence allowed Sinatra to say good-bye to both the Columbia and...
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To understand the popularity of Frank Sinatra during the 1940's, you would have to go to his recordings with both the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and those he made as a solo act for Columbia Records. The young many had, by this time, and under Dorsey's guidance, became one of the most popular artists with people of all musical tastes. The beautifully tender legato style with ballads were his calling...
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The Capitol Years of the Sinatra legend were magical years when music wasn't segmented into so many categories as we have now and Ol' Blue Eyes was recording one magical album after another, always exploring to its depths his emotional, colorful way with a song. In 1957, he recorded his first stereo album "Come Fly With Me" with Billy May writing the charts and leading the orchestra in his own ...
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The recording sessions for "Point of No Return" had an overt tension that had an under current of care and understanding. The overtly callousness at these sessions were a method to hide the fact that Frank Sinatra was deeply concerned about his old music director's health which was deteriorating slowly from the ravages of cancer. Outwardly, Sinatra would do only one or two takes of each song. T...
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Anyone who writes, lectures or talks about 20th century pop music will always have to have something to say about Frank Sinatra. So pervasive was the image and vision of Frank Sinatra that he became an indelible part of the American musical scene. Many have, over the years, tried to explain this influence but usually suffer a mental blow-out when explaining in one word the meaning of Sinatra. S...
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"I'm a Fool to Want You" was created in 1951 by Frank Sinatra, Joel Herron and Jack Wolf. It was created during the temultuous affair that involved both Ava Gardner and Frank Sinatra. The affair was at first squashed by studio heads at MGM and Sinatra's managers but became big headlines when Sinatra left his first wife for Ava. Ava Gardner, at that time, was one of the most perfectly beautiful ...
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One of a series of films starring Olympic skating champion Sonia Henie and John Payne inspired lyricist Mack Gordon and composer Harry Warren to create "There Will Never Be Another You" (from the 1943 movie musical "Iceland").This is another great example on a great recording session in which Stordahl write an unbelievably beautiful and poignant score that brings out the best in Sinatra and ind...
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No other singer put as much pain into his "saloon songs" than Frank Sinatra. The mixture of pain and ecstacy of past memories would make for a toxic cocktail yet these are revelations of the pain of love lost and never found again. "Where Are You" was written in 1936 by lyricist Harold Adamson and composer Jimmy McHugh for their stage musical "Top of the Town." The large body of strings is a tr...
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From 1942 through 1951, Axel Stordahl (1913 - 1963) was Frank Sinatra's music director and arranger. Together, they made much beautiful music. In fact, when a giant multi-CD set was released in 1995, it showed that the greatest artistic successes of Frank Sinatra at Columbia Records were those where he was teamed with Axel Stordahl. The down turn in Sinatra's career at Columbia and his dismissa...
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Harry James discovered Frank Sinatra singing in a New Jersey restaurant both as a presenter of other acts as well as singing and waiting on tables. It took Tommy Dorsey's tremednously positive influence to mold and shape the young man's public persona into that of a suave ballad singer that set the stage for one of the most remarkable careers in music that lasted far beyond anyone's expectation...
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Released on January 5, 1959, "Come Dance With Me" consisted of songs long associated with the big bands and aimed primarily at those in their thirties and early forties (the prime marketing group) who remembered the big bands. And those who loved great music. Again, Sammy Cahn and Jimmy Van Heusen contributed a great song treated to a propulsive, vibrant arrangement by Billy May that literally ...
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Written in 1947, lyricist Alan Jay Lerner and composer Frederick Loewe's stage musical "Brigadoon" tells the story about a magical village in the Scottish Highlands which becomes visible only once every 100 years. Add two American hikers and you have yourself an interesting musical. Out of this magical score is the song "Almost Like Being In Love" which comes from the last Capitol release in 19...
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Believe it or not, Frank Sinatra - the king of crooners, the Chairman of the Board, perhaps the greatest American pop singer of the 20th century - made his share of duff recordings. Few in number for sure, but there's definitely the whiff of toxicity to that handful of missteps/clinkers.Since it's the first St. Patrick's Day to fall on a Toxic Tuesday, you might think that I'd spend a post deri...
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One of the most controversial of all of Frank Sinatra's recordings was his 10 inch LP "Sing And Dance With Frank Sinatra." Recorded in April 1950, it came at a time when Sinatra was in poor shape both physically and vocally. He was involved in an affair with Ava Gardner which the studio chiefs at MGM film studios wanted to break up due to Sinatra's ugly brawls with the tabloid press and his pos...
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