WELCOME toMark Steyn subbing for El Rushbbo.
Sinatra was another mob goon. Read his FBI files.
Sinatra was a truly talented craftsman, but I like Dino’s style.
When I was getting my DMA in the mid 70s, fellow grad students and I would sit around debating esoteric musicological questions, but one day we got into a discussion as to who was the best male singer of the 20th century. All the usual classical candidates were offered, Caruso, Fischer-Dieskau, Pavarotti, Domingo. Then I spoke heresy: I said that for all their talent and training, I was convinced that the best male singer of the 20th century was Frank Sinatra, especially during the Nelson Riddle era of the 1950s. He could never sing the male equivalent of bel canto, but his vocal control, which came to him naturally when he finally stopped trying to sound like a young version of Bing Crosby, puts all other vocalists to shame, and 40+ years later, I am still convinced of this.
Suddenly (1954)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047542/
I spent a youthful summer in Wildwood, NJ. There was a small hole in the wall bar just off the beach that played nothing but Sinatra. Dark inside, A/C on chilly, Sinatra album covers on the walls, beer arrived in a frosty mug with a layer of foamy ice.
A great place to escape the outside heat...and life in general.
Mark
Ping for later reading ... and wow, it’s hard to imagine the ‘stars’ who were in and past their prime when I was young, seeing them on the toob when they were once young. That has to have been an old, old movie.
Ping.
Thank you for the thread. Almost posted one yesterday, but could not find a great article like this one.
Watch the ‘kings of music’ - we lost the best 20 and 40 years ago.
my dad uses to spit every time he heard his name...