Music Monday ~ Sinatra Centenary This Week

12 December 2015 will be the 100th anniversary of the birth, in 1915,
of Francis Albert Sinatra. As stated in my post about Sinatra in 2011, I have idolised him since the 1960s. Appreciation of his singing was possibly the only thing I took from my first short and disastrous marriage to an Italian guy. Fortunately, both of my subsequent long-term partners have shared my love of Sinatra's music. It wasn't a prerequisite, it just seemed to happen that way - and it worked out well both times!

More from the 2011 post:

Sinatra turns every song he performs into a work of art. I use the present tense advisedly. For me, he will never die. The wonderful lyrics of Sammy Cahn, Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter and their ilk come instantly to life sung by Sinatra. His magic embellishes less classic offerings with a quality they perhaps do not deserve. He is able to take modern classics by Lennon and McCartney, George Harrison, Neil Diamond, Kris Kristofferson, etc. and turn them golden in a different way.

Frank Sinatra, in my eyes, could do no wrong. I am not interested in the scandals. What he did and does for his audience, while singing or acting (he was no slouch as an actor too, by the way) is all that matters.

"That old black magic" has me in its spell again and again whenever I watch a DVD of his shows or listen to one of his albums.

I have a theory that people are attracted to entertainers, writers, musicians, actors, well-known figures whose charts contain some correlation with their own. By some peculiar means we are able to "sense" the connection, even via screen, audio, or literature. I've found in my own experience that the clearest and longest lasting attractions involve the closest astrological connections.

Note: when commenter mike recently alerted me to the fact that there were several links between my own natal chart and that of Frank Sinatra, I'd forgotten that I'd been aware of these, or some of them, when writing the 2011 post.

My theory holds good in Sinatra's case. His Sun was at 19.13* Sagittarius conjoins my Venus at 19.59* Sagittarius ! His Mercury is at 17* Sagittarius too. His Moon at 5.07 Pisces conjoins my natal Jupiter at 6.03 Pisces.

"It's such an ancient pitch, But one I wouldn't switch, 'Cos there's no nicer witch than.........."

Commenter Gian Paul, back in 2011 observed that

"Neptune conjunct his MC early in Leo certainly must have "had a word" in him becoming a singer (instead of maybe a trumpetist). No doubt the songs he left us with (and especially the more sensitive women in this world) were engulfing. And they were not just "illusion" (Neptune). His unfortunate Saturn in 69, opposing his natal Venus, but trine Jupiter in Pisces, give him that heartfelt quality which pardons all the "Frankie he was".

The videos I posted back in 2011 have now all gone dark, possibly due to more stringent copyright purges since then. A few replacements - not yer usual Sinatra numbers, but some I especially like which may be generally less well-known:


The Song of the Sabia

I first heard this on a set of 3 cassette tapes I had, back in the UK, but lost them in our Great Fire of 1996. I never did find an exact replacement. This song remained in my memory; I was so happy to find it again on YouTube:

"All the plans I made to deceive myself, all the roads I made just to lose myself, all the love I made to forget myself, those mistakes I made just to find myself..."

Cycles

Astrology buffs know a thing or two about these!

A lovely song featured on one of his later CDs

You Will Be My Music

Music was Sinatra's highlight, movies were but a side-light for him, and they weren't all glitz and fizz. He starred in some darn good films, think From Here to Eternity, The Manchurian Candidate, The Man with the Golden Arm, The Joker is Wild, None but the Brave.....

Music Monday 12 December: Sinatra's Birthday

It's 12 December - and it was the birthday of Sinatra! I have idolised Frank Sinatra since the 1960s. Appreciation of his singing was possibly the only thing I took from my first short and disastrous marriage to an Italian guy. Fortunately, both of my subsequent long-term partners have shared my love of Sinatra's music. It wasn't a prerequisite, it just seemed to happen that way - and it worked out well both times!

Sinatra turns every song he performs into a work of art. I use the present tense advisedly. For me, he will never die. The wonderful lyrics of Sammy Cahn, Johnny Mercer, Cole Porter and their ilk come instantly to life sung by Sinatra. His magic embellishes less classic offerings with quality they perhaps do not deserve. He is able to take modern classics by Lennon and McCartney, George Harrison, Neil Diamond, Kris Kristofferson, etc. and turn them golden in a different way.

Frank Sinatra, in my eyes, could do no wrong. I am not interested in the scandals. What he did and does for his audience, while singing or acting (he was no slouch as an actor too, by the way) is all that matters.

"That old black magic" has me in its spell again and again whenever I watch a DVD of his shows or listen to one of his albums.

I have a theory that people are attracted to entertainers, writers, musicians, actors, well-known figures whose charts contain some correlation with their own. By some peculiar means we are able to "sense" the connection, even via screen, audio, or literature. I've found in my own experience that the clearest and longest lasting attractions involve the closest astrological connections.





My theory holds good in Sinatra's case. His Sun was at 19.13* Sagittarius conjoins my Venus at 19.59* Sagittarius ! His Mercury is at 17* Sagittarius too. His Moon at 5.07 Pisces conjoins my natal Jupiter at 6.03 Pisces.

"It's such an ancient pitch, But one I wouldn't switch, 'Cos there's no nicer witch than.........."

I could wax lyrical all day about favourite Sinatra renditions. I'll post a couple of possibly lesser known songs, I never tire of hearing these (or anything by The Guv'nor):

There Used To Be a Ballpark (written by Joe Raposo)~~~

"And the sky has got so cloudy, when it used to be so clear"...........

....."For the old team isn't playing
and the new team hardly tries"~ (Don't get me started!!!!)

The song literally refers to a sports stadium, but it's also a metaphor, for all good things from the past, things we can no longer see.

Wave (composed by Antonio Carlos Jobim)

Late addition - a winter-appropriate favourite I forgot to include:

Music Monday ~ The Song Not the Singer ~ It Was a Very Good Year ~ 7-year Cycles

Frank Sinatra fans (like me) will easily recall this song. It was written by Ervin Drake in 1961 , not for Sinatra but for Bob Shane of The Kingston Trio whose more stripped down folksy version is said to be more in line with the writer's original intention. Sinatra's Grammy-winning version from 1966 has lush orchestral arrangement, not at all folksy but equally attractive in the hands of The Guv'nor and Gordon Jenkins.


From the opening paragraph of a New York times article on the occasion of Ervin Drake's 90th birthday in 2009:

“STORY of a guy’s life, told in wine vintage terms.”
As Ervin Drake tells it, that was the note to himself that led to his writing a song, back in 1961, that earned a Grammy for Frank Sinatra.

Whenever I hear the song astrology springs to mind. There are 7 year cycles in life, thanks to certain celestial rhythms. Our Moon's cycle of 28 days (4 x 7)provides a backing and, possibly more significantly, Saturn's cycles and aspects coming around every 7 or 8 years provide the "beat". See article at Matrix Software website Saturn: The "Cosmic Chiropractor" by Bernie Ashman.


Although the first verse of It Was A Very Good Year (describing life at age 17) doesn't fall within the 7 year pattern, following verses do:

When I was seventeen......
When I was twenty-one It was a very good year.....
When I was thirty-five It was a very good year....etc

YouTube has lots of versions of the song on video, as well as Sinatra's.
Some links:

The original by Bob Shane, Kingston Trio.
http://youtu.be/yjW9WVfkVfU

Nice jazz instrumental by Ira Sullivan.
http://youtu.be/BJYbFfbbKS4

An interesting piano version by Josh Charles in the style of Chopin+New Orleans
"inspired by James Booker, Ray Charles and Chopin-- it's musical GUMBO"
http://youtu.be/jCwbyT41XAw

SUNDAY SUPPLEMENT

The movie "Across the Universe" - a story written around, and drawing in, many of the Beatles' songs spawned a similar movie, which actually originated on stage, and centers around the songs of Abba: "Mamma Mia". I recently read that there's another, initially stage-bound show in the same genre coming soon:

"American musical theater's latest collaborators – Twyla Tharp and Frank Sinatra.......Atlanta's Alliance Theatre says it will present "Come Fly With Me" – a new musical conceived, directed and choreographed by Tharp. The show, which concerns four couples who fall in and out of love, uses more than a dozen classic Sinatra vocals backed by an on-stage 17-piece band." (Here.)

How long, I wonder, before that one hits the silver screen? I'll be waiting! I wonder, too, if this type of movie/show is something we'll be seeing more of. I can imagine stories being written around the songs of Simon & Garfunkel, Beach Boys, Neil Diamond.....and several others.



The BBC published a list of 100 of the the nations best-loved novels. I'm not an avid novel reader these days, but was surprised to note that I'd read about one fifth of them.

I wonder how a list of the USA's favourite novels would match up? I suspect quite a few would appear in both lists, "Little Women" and "The Grapes of Wrath" for instance.


Brian May's website and blog often has interesting input - click on "Brian's Soapbox" for the blog proper. He had something to say about the asteroid impact on Jupiter recently. (PS: Don't forget that he's an astrophysicist as well as an ace guitarist.)
Brian's opinion of astrology might leave a lot to be desired, but his views on guns are spot on ! See his entry of 20 August about the song "Put Out the Fire".



Lastly, a website where handmade items of all kinds can be bought and sold:ETSY.
More about it at Wikipedia, here.