Here is the third and final volume of "Sinatra Live In Italy". This time around, you get three great entertainers for the price of one! Recorded in Milano on April 6, 1989, this concert features not only Frank but Liza Minnelli and Samy Davis, Jr. as well! And out of the three volumes of the Italy recordings, this one is the best. One of the highlights is an incredible medley of some of Frank's biggest hits that seems to go on forever! You will love this one! Here is "Sinatra Live In Italy Volume III". Enjoy!
After yesterday's re-post of Sinatra's Duets, I thought it would be cool to do a feature on the Duets album from 1993. For those of you who don't know, this album was the last big firework in the Chairman's display. And what a firework it was! It was advertised as “The Recording Event of The Decade.” It features duets between Sinatra and other guest star singers from various genres; Sinatra personally chose the performers. Some of the performers appearing on the album were Luther Vandross, Aretha Franklin, Barbara Streisand, Bono, Anita Baker, Carly Simon, Tony Bennett and Gloria Estefan. The only problem in this whole "duets" album was that the songs were not originally recorded that way. In fact, the songs were recorded in their entirety by Frank first. After the songs were already recorded, that's when the "duet" partners came in and did their part. The actual "duets" were just the guest artists singing along to a pre-recorded track. Think of singing along to your favorite song and taping it on a tape recorder and you get the gist. It was because of the way this album was recorded that my father actually boycotted it. He felt that it was a sham. Sham or not, the album was a commercial success, selling over 3 million copies in the U.S and reaching #2 on the Billboard albums chart. Here for you now is not the completed Duets album but rather the recordings made by Frank before the "duet" partners were added. Here is "Frank Sinatra's Duets: Solo". Enjoy!
BONUS: Here's the video for "I've Got You Under My Skin" that was a duet with Bono. They made no bones to cover up how they recorded the album by emphasizing it with the way they produced the video!
I had the immense honor of meeting Liza Minelli back in January of 2007 and could not help but think that I had spent time with Hollywood Royalty! The ironic twist to the whole thing is that on the way home, I was listening to the 1950 Lux Radio Theater production of The Wizard of Oz and at the very end of it, Judy Garland talks about her four year old daughter, Liza! As a way of celebrating my irony and meeting of Miss Minelli, I posted that very same radio show that accompanied my ride home. Here is the Lux Radio Theatre production of "The Wizard of Oz" from Christmas Day, 1950. Judy Garland, then aged 28, was the only original cast member of the MGM film to be in this Lux program. Rounding out the cast were: Herb Vigran (Tin Man), Hans Conreid (Scarecrow), Ed Max (Lion), Herb Butterfield (Wizard), Betty Lou Gerson (Good Witch), Noreen Gammill (Wicked Witch) William Johnson (Uncle Henry), Ruth Perrott (Auntie Em), Gil Stratton (Mayor) and David Light was the voice of Toto. Enjoy!
Judy Garland is one of my all time favorite performers and one of two of my favorite holiday themed-traditions are listening to her sing her beautiful rendition of "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" and the other is watching her Christmas special. It actually was an episode of her television show. The show ran only one season on CBS (1963-64) due to a lot of behind the scenes turmoil and Judy sometime showing up after having a little bit too much to drink. This may or may not have been true of The Judy Garland Show's Christmas episode, guest-starring daughters Lorna Luft, Liza Minnelli, son Joey Luft, Mel Torme, and Jack Jones, but producers were minutes away from calling off the show because no one knew where the star was. Apparently, the night before the Christmas show taping, Garland had been on a major bender. Mel Torme's guest spot was a point of contention on the day the Christmas show was filmed. Torme had signed a contract with Garland's production company guaranteeing him a certain number of guest appearances during the season. Judy wasn't committing to those dates quickly enough and "The Velvet Fog" was very upset about it. Her introduction to Mel Torme on the program was noticeably awkward for that reason. First, Judy mistakenly calls Mel Torme 'Mort,' then flubs a line in Torme's , "The Christmas Song". When Torme good-naturedly points it out, Judy purposely changes the word "reindeer" with "rainbow" - alluding to her signature tune. The tension on the set seemed to bring out the best in everyone as they maneuvered around the spacious multilevel living room set - singing and dancing like their lives depended on it. Here is the opening to that great Holiday episode.
Here's one more Judy moment. This is from the Tonight Show.
