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Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

When I was a kid, my first exposure to Sinatra probably came from old Warner Bros. cartoons like this one.

This chicken-crazed cartoon doesn't feature the real voices of Sinatra or Bing Crosby, but it shows you the effect they both had on the ladies (or, at least, the chickens). It also clues you in to their divergent swing-era styles -- Bing's short vocal lines were bubbly and upbeat while Sinatra was brooding, with longggggg, smooth phrases that held back languorously behind the beat.

People literally didn't know how Sinatra could hold notes the way that he did during this Swooner Crooner era. Musicians falsely assumed he found an Eastern swami who taught him the secret art of circular breathing. The truth is that the young, clean-living Sinatra was so dedicated to doing things differently than the reigning vocal star, Crosby, that he actively worked on building his lung capacity and breath control. During an era when exercise was literally considered freakish, the razor-thin Sinatra ran cross-country and swam laps while singing in his head between breaths.

While this isn't my favorite Sinatra period, it does feature the most flat-out beautiful singing of his career. People today often think of his string-laden ballads of this period as slick and "commercial," yet he and arranger Alex Stordahl created a revolutionary sound that nobody else had at the time; it's almost classical chamber music meets jazz. Sinatra also preferred to record older, quality songs by the greatest composers instead of the latest novelty numbers -- he was the first major star to curate what are now called "standards," or the Great American Songbook.

Ballads like "There's No You" helped define the World War II era by speaking of the pain of separation during this time. It is a truly haunting performance.

Unlike Crosby and even Louis Armstrong, Sinatra kept developing and refining his style and sound over the course of his career. The other artist who did this over a similar time frame was Miles Davis -- the two regarded each other's work with the utmost respect.

For more Crosby and bow-tied Sinatra from the razor-thin years, you can listen to my superlative Frank's World Rhapsody Radio Station, which now has "just-click" links for your Facebook and Twitter pages.



    

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe. That universe, of course, includes a galaxy of Dean Martin.

Frank Sinatra could be funny in movies and in the recording studio, but in concert his attempts at humor often came out as mean-spirited. That's because Frank lacked a certain something that his best friend, Dean Martin, had in spades.

Dean Martin was funny. He had such a knack for improvisation and throwaway lines that he didn't even rehearse for his long-running TV show (don't try this one at home, young actors -- Martin was a pro who memorized the scripts). Hey, even Dino's old record sleeves had a sense of fun about them, letting his fans know that he didn't take himself -- or his career -- too seriously.

Take 1957's Pretty Baby (pictured above). This one delineates the entire Dino ethos, minus cocktails. Then, once you uwrap the record, Martin croons romantic ballads such as Rodgers & Hart's "It's Easy to Remember."  For more Martin mythologizing, you can go to this old post I wrote a few years back.

We actually don't have the Pretty Baby album available on Rhapsody at the moment, but I'm working with the good folks at Capitol EMI to change this. That's part of my mission in particular and Rhapsody's mission in general. We aren't happy with having only 150 Dean Martin CDs available to Rhapsody users. We won't rest until they are ALL up (as you can see, we're doing pretty well; most of his Reprise albums are currently on Rhapsody, we just need Capitol to concentrate on putting out the original LPs instead of greatest-hits CDs). We do the heavy lifting so that you don't have to.

For more Martin and Sinatra, you can listen to my superlative Frank's World Rhapsody Radio Station, which now has "just-click" links for your Facebook and Twitter pages.



 
 


 

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

In 1969, the very same year that Woodstock took place, Sinatra hit the charts big with a song called "My Way." Concord Records has released a special 40th anniversary edition of the song's eponymous album.

Here is my Rhapsody album review:

"Unfortunately, the hit single 'My Way' has been interpreted as one of Sinatra's defining personal statements (despite the fact that his work is usually artful and subtle instead of self-aggrandizing). That said, the resulting album is strong, though arranger Don Costa is better on the ballads than the swingers and Sinatra is strong throughout. 'Watch What Happens,' 'Didn't We' and 'For Once in My Life' are all keepers; the stunner is 'All My Tomorrows,' which runs deeper and darker than Sinatra's previous Capitol recording. You may want to skip the run-through of The Graduate's 'Mrs. Robinson,' though it's worth hearing him ad-lib the line 'fooling with that young stuff like you do.' This anniversary edition adds two bonus tracks."

With my very first Frank's World post I inadvertently raised the ire of many a Sinatra fan by noting that I don't really feel the need to hear the song "My Way" again. While Sinatra was very happy to have an era-defining hit in the Age of Aquarius, he is described in Chuck Granata's fine book Sessions With Sinatra as always having reservations about the tune. Even if he wasn't too crazy about the number himself, he took the time to weave a solid album around it.

You can listen to every single album that Sinatra cut for RCA, Columbia, Capitol and Reprise Records during his decades-long recording career on Rhapsody. And you can also listen to all of these songs and more on my superlative Frank's World Rhapsody Radio Station, which now has "just-click" links for your Facebook and Twitter pages.
   

One thing we've noticed over here at Rhapsody is how current events and the news affect people's listening habits. This shouldn't come as much of a surprise -- if Michael Jackson dies or Herbie Hancock wins a Grammy or a Johnny Cash biopic comes out, people instantly want to listen to some of their music.

That brings us to music from Roman Polanski movies. Now, I am going to take the coward's way out and sidestep the issues about why music from Polanski movies has suddenly picked up on Rhapsody.

I don't even want to go there.

After all, I get enough angry emails when I make the (theoretically) bland statement that the Pretty In Pink soundtrack has aged much better than the Breakfast Club soundtrack. Also, being a music critic means that you actively try to avoid the real world as much as possible -- it's scary out there, people!

But Roman Polanski being very much in the news of late means that people are searching for his movie themes on Rhapsody a heckuva lot more than they were a month or two ago.

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

Frank Sinatra blazed a lot of trails in his career, including being the first star to break away from the majors and start his own label, Reprise Records.

At heart, Sinatra was a keen listener who was obsessed with music -- all kinds of music. In Will Friedwald's definitive Sinatra! The Song Is You, jazz and classical musicians recall looking at Sinatra's vast record collection and talking with him about big band recordings, jazz cuts and modern symphonic music.

With Reprise Records, Sinatra got to record not only friends like Dean Martin and Sammy Davis, Jr., but also jazz artists such as Duke Ellington and Shorty Rogers. As a matter of fact, the very first Reprise release was The Warm Moods by Ben Webster, the saxophone giant who more than earned his status as King of the Tenors. Webster even played on a Sinatra date, getting some solo space on the classic "I'm Beginning to See the Light."    

Though Reprise Records is still with us, Sinatra only ran the label for a few years before it was bought out by a larger concern. Since Rhapsody is such an easy portal to music discovery, it's a snap to click on the playlist below and catch the initial blast of music that Sinatra put out on Reprise.

Play Sinatra & Friends Start Reprise Records
 

You can also listen to all of these songs and more on my superlative Frank's World Rhapsody Radio Station, which now has "just-click" links for your Facebook and Twitter pages.
 


 

AMC's Mad Men is a show that people either love, hate or have never watched. We love it over here at Rhapsody's "all things 1950s and '60s" desk, and we even put together a playlist of songs from the show's first season, which was its most musically rich (so far). There are actually a couple of modern numbers mixed in here (including the show's theme song by RJD2), though mainly the playlist gives you a good idea of the E-Z listening jazz and pop that was a vital part of the early 1960s.

Play the Mad Men playlist now  and be sure to sign up for your free Rhapsody trial membership today.  

At Rhapsody, we love Frank Sinatra. We have every official album Sinatra ever recorded in one easy-to-find place, as well as the Frank’s World radio station and a series of blog posts that deal exclusively with the man. So, yes, we have a passion for Old Blue Eyes and his music.

So when the news went out that Martin Scorsese was planning a biopic of Frank Sinatra, it was met with both relief and anxiety. Relief because Scorsese is a brilliant director who has shown a rare ability to artfully use popular music in his movies. Anxiety because Marty could knock out the music and just make the movie about (overblown) mob connections, the vocalist's alcohol-fueled altercations and his endless list of celebrity girlfriends.

It's not that Sinatra’s life story can’t be told -- it's just that if the movie doesn’t actually deal fully with his art, then it doesn't have a reason to exist. It should be about music.

It is hard to think of one person who has shaped so much of popular music, in so many different ways, as the legendary Les Paul.

Since music was so central to Paul's life, we thought nothing would be more appropriate than a playlist of the great man's music to play as you read on.

Les Paul played beautiful guitar that influenced jazz, country, EZ listening, electronic experimentation and rock ’n’ roll. He invented the solid-bodied electric guitar (a massive seller, the Les Paul Gibson is still favored by many famous guitarists like Jimmy Page). Paul also helped create many modern recording techniques (including multi-tracking). He led a weekly television series with his wife Mary Ford (with whom he had dozens of hit singles) for most of the 1950s. When he shattered his arm in an accident, Paul had the nearly immovable limb set in the “guitar playing” position so he could still perform. He won two Grammys at age 90 -- for new material. Wow. Les Paul ruled!

Beloved by fans and (especially by) his fellow musicians, Les Paul played a weekly club gig until he passed away at age 94. If you need a life to serve as an example, you may want to ask yourself, “What would Les Paul do?”

Mocky's new album, Saskamodie, makes great use of the Paris studio in which it was recorded, channeling the spirit of artists who have previously recorded there -- Nina Simone, Serge Gainsbourg -- into a wonderfully warm and intimate take on '60s lounge pop. The presence of friends and co-conspirators like Jamie Lidell and Feist only enhances the Canadian musician's ample, obvious talents as a songwriter, arranger and multi-instrumentalist.

Mocky's recent performance in his current hometown, Berlin, didn't feature any of those names, and the setting couldn't have been more different from the celebrated Paris studio. The show took place at Badeschiff, an artificial beach along the banks of the Spree river, where the band performed beneath a plastic tarp while the crowd sat in folding hammock chairs or sprawled on damp sand. Berlin's clockwork summer showers had begun shortly after soundcheck and let up, more or less, right about the time the band came on stage. (Serendipity, or something more?)

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

There have been some news items up recently about Apollo 11 landing on the moon 40 years ago. Probably not enough headlines -- we could all use some good news right now, even about something that America did four decades ago. We could use some good music now, too. Sinatra fan and all-around man's man Buzz Aldrin played Frank Sinatra and Count Basie's stellar version of "Fly Me to the Moon" on the actual trip to the moon. The Apollo 10 astronauts also played the song when they orbited the moon. Bottom line: astronauts, like jazz musicians, dug Sinatra.

The tune can also serve to show how special Sinatra's knack was for bringing his own style and musicality to his material. The English composer Bart Howard wrote the number in the '50s, and it was recorded by a number of vocalists. Everyone from Nat "King" Cole to Peggy Lee, Bobby Darin and Annie Ross cut readings of it (here's June Christy's version).

Here's the difference: everyone before Sinatra's definitive recording sang the tune the way the composer conceived it -- as a very sincere and kind of drippy love song. On the surface, Sinatra changed the ballad into a romantic swinger. But, he also changed the entire approach of the lyrics and the entire feel of the song.

Everybody else sang "Fly Me to the Moon" like it was about the dreamy way you feel when you're really falling in love. With Sinatra, the song becomes about the ridiculously great way you feel when you fall for somebody -- it's so good, in fact, that maybe it's not even real. Whatever happens, enjoy the ride while it lasts -- which in this case is 2 minutes and 30 seconds.

And Sinatra is perfectly in synch with Quincy Jones' sublime arrangement and the Basie Band's euphoric playing. Everything comes together on this one. Can you imagine actually flying to the moon while listening to a song that makes you feel like you're flying to the moon?

To listen to these songs and thousands more by Sinatra, Basie, Q and their pals, go directly to Frank's World, my superlative Rhapsody Radio station.  

Welcome back to Frank's World, where I get to bore complete strangers by waxing rhapsodic about the vast Sinatra universe.

Music critics sometimes debate whether Sinatra was a jazz singer or not, but jazz musicians never seem to care what he was -- they just love the music he made.

Sinatra was the favorite male vocalist of pretty much every jazz artist out there -- Duke Ellington and Count Basie, Miles Davis and Stan Getz, Oscar Peterson and Lester Young (pictured).

Ahhh ... Lester Young.

Here's Young fronting the Oscar Peterson trio on "These Foolish Things."

Young and Sinatra never recorded together, but they adored each other's music. Young called Sinatra his "main man" and would often interpret standards through Sinatra's version of a tune.

For his part, Sinatra studied the sides that Lester cut with Billie Holiday and Count Basie and always said that he took from Lester Young as much as the tenor sax titan took from him.

Joe Lovano, speaking about Sinatra and Young, said, "There's a lot of similarities in the presence, the purity, the way they deliver a tune." Lovano also recorded his own tribute to Sinatra, titled Celebrating Sinatra. Here's Lovano laying out on "This Love of Mine," one of the few standards that Sinatra actually wrote.

Rhapsody has Sinatra fronting a sublime small jazz combo, but almost all of his recordings -- like this recently unearthed reading of Rodgers and Hart's "This Can't Be Love" -- swing with the pulse of jazz. To listen to more Sinatra, Lester & Lovano, go directly to Frank's World, my superlative Rhapsody Radio station. 
 

When word went out that Clint Eastwood was producing a documentary feature on the life and music of jazz pianist Dave Brubeck few were surprised. After all, Eastwood is a lifelong jazz fan (and pianist) and his movies have long featured jazz scores or plots, including a feature on Charlie Parker and biographies of Thelonious Monk and Tony Bennett.

Click here to listen to a batch of tunes and film themes from Clint Eastwood movies -- many written by the man himself -- and to discover the music of his son, Kyle, who is a fine jazz bassist.

The tough Eastwood & the bookish Brubeck actually have a lot in common -- both are from the San Francisco Bay Area, fell in love with jazz early and have a life long connection to nature. They're both continuing to work at a feverish pace at an age when they could be phoning it in or sitting back collecting honorary degrees. 

Something else that connects the two is that for decades they were often scoffed at by the critical establishment. Today, old Eastwood "violent entertainments" like The Good, The Bad & The Ugly are often studied classics. Likewise, Brubeck is now celebrated for creating the kind of unorthodox, highly personal jazz that he was once berated for making.