On the 12th day of December in a manger somewhere in Hoboken, New Jersey in 1915, a child was born.
He would grow up to be the King of the Great
American Songbook.
They who called themselves wise men (punks who did nothing but follow stars) would call him the greatest interpretative artist of the 20th century.
I do not possess the musical vocabulary to honor this artist in the manner he should be heralded so I am not even going to try.
“I only know what I know…..”
Francis Albert Sinatra never sang a bad song.
He could swing and he could croon.
My all time Sinatra favorite is: “I Got You Under My Skin.”
I was lucky to see Ol’ Blue Eyes in concert 3 times.
A girl never forgets her first time.
The orchestra started with the opening notes of the great Cole Porter classic with that superb Nelson Riddle arrangement “which climaxes in a startlingly out-of-control slide trombone solo by Milt Bernhart.” I believe the year was 1988 but deep in my heart… it was wartime America and I had morphed back into a bobby soxed teen age girl…… swooning at the Paramount Theater over that skinny boy singer who sold out performance after performance.
Sinatra appealed to everyone who loved good music.
The young and the old.
The rich and the poor.
The sophisticated and the most simple of us.
He left a legacy that began in the 1930’s and ended on that fateful day: May 14th, 1998.
There is a myth surrounding Sinatra arriving at the pearly gates which I believe is true.
God said: “Frank, a lot of people when they die, they try to bring things up here with them….you know things they owned down on earth.”
Frank was stunned….”I am alone, I came here on my own nothing to declare, my Lord.”
“No you didn’t.”
“The day you died, you took a little thing called the 20th century with you. The 20th century Francis…. belonged to you……and your music.”
Frank looked around heaven and liked what he saw…..and then grabbed a microphone and began to sing…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqH7VwpSwBo
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