The Voice

Francis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Sinatra was Born in December 1915, Sinatra was the only child of Italian immigrants Natalie Della Garaventa and Antonino Martino Sinatra.  Frank Sinatra is one of the greatest singers of al time.  Sinatra got his first break in 1935 with a local singing group The Three Flashes.  With Sinatra, the group became known as the Hoboken Four, after appearing on his show, Major Bowes Amateur Hour, they attracted 40,000 votes and won the first prize — a six month contract to perform on stage and radio across the United States.  


On March 18, 1939, Sinatra made a demo recording of a song called "Our Love", with the Frank Mane band. The record has "Frank Sinatra" signed on the front.  The bandleader kept the original record in a safe for nearly 60 years.  In 1941, Sinatra was at the top of the male singer polls in the Billboard and Down Beat magazines.  Sinatra signed with Columbia on June 1, 1943 as a solo artist, and he initially had great success, particularly during the 1942-43 musicians' strike. And while no new records had been issued during the strike, he had been performing on the radio and on stage.In 1945, Sinatra co-starred with Gene Kelly in Anchors Aweigh. That same year, he was loaned out to RKO to star in a short film titled The House I Live In. Directed by Mervyn LeRoy, this film on tolerance and racial equality earned a special Academy Award shared among Sinatra and those who brought the film to the screen, along with a special Golden Globe for "Promoting Good Will." 1946 saw the release of his first album, The Voice of Frank Sinatra, and the debut of his own weekly radio show. 


Sinatra returned to the concert stage on January 12, 1950, in Hartford, Connecticut.  In 1953, Sinatra signed with Capitol Records, where he worked with many of the finest musical arrangers of the era, some of them were Nelson Riddle,^[19] Gordon Jenkins, and Billy May. With a series of albums featuring darker emotional material, Sinatra reinvented himself, including In the Wee Small Hours (1955).  By the end of the year, Billboard had named "Young at Heart" Song of the Year; Swing Easy!, with Nelson Riddle at the helm (his second album for Capitol), was named Album of the Year; and Sinatra was named "Top Male Vocalist" by Billboard, Down Beat and Metronome.  Sinatra started the 1960s as he ended the 1950s. His first album of the decade, Nice 'n' Easy, topped Billboard's chart and won critical plaudits. Sinatra grew discontented at Capitol and decided to form his own label, Reprise Records.  His first album on the label, Ring-A-Ding-Ding (1961), was a major success, peaking at #4 on Billboard and #8 in the UK.  


From his youth, Sinatra displayed sympathy for African Americans and worked both publicly and privately all his life to help them win equal rights. He played a major role in the desegregation of Nevada hotels and casinos in the 1960s. On January 27, 1961, Sinatra played a benefit show at Carnegie Hall for Martin Luther King, Jr. and led his fellow Rat Pack members and Reprise label mates in boycotting hotels and casinos that refused entry to black patrons and performers. He often spoke from the stage on desegregation and repeatedly played benefits on behalf of Dr. King and his movement. According to his son, Frank Sinatra, Jr., King sat weeping in the audience at a concert in 1963 as Sinatra sangOl' Man River, a song from the musical Show Boat that is sung by an African-American stevedore.


Sinatra's first live album, Sinatra at the Sands, was recorded during January and February 1966 at the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.  Sinatra started 1967 with a series of important recording sessions with Antônio Carlos Jobim. Later in the year, a duet with daughter Nancy, "Somethin' Stupid", topped the Billboardpop and UK singles charts. In December, Sinatra collaborated with Duke Ellington on the album Francis A. & Edward K.  With Sinatra in mind, singer-songwriter Paul Anka wrote the song "My Way", inspired from the French "Comme d'habitude" ("As Usual"), composed by Claude François and Jacques Revaux. (The song had been previously commissioned to David Bowie, whose lyrics did not please the involved agents.) "My Way" would, ironically, become more closely identified with him than any other song over his seven decades as a singer even though he reputedly did not care for it. 


On June 13, 1971 — at a concert in Hollywood to raise money for the Motion Picture and TV Relief Fund — at the age of 55, Sinatra announced that he was retiring, bringing to an end his 36-year career in show business.  In 1973, Sinatra came out of retirement with a television special and album, both entitled Ol' Blue Eyes Is Back. The album, arranged by Gordon Jenkins and Don Costa, was a great success, reaching number 13 on Billboard and number 12 in the UK. The TV special was highlighted by a dramatic reading of "Send in the Clowns" and a song and dance sequence with former co-star Gene Kelly.  In August, 1975, Sinatra held several back-to-back concerts together with the newly-risen singer, John Denver. Soon they became friends with each other. John Denver later appeared as a guest in the "Sinatra and friends" TV Special, singing "September Song" together with Sinatra. Sinatra covered the John Denver hits "My Sweet Lady" and "Leaving on a Jet Plane". And, as Denver puts, his song "A Baby Just Like You" was written at Sinatra's request.  In 1980, Sinatra's first album in six years was released, Trilogy: Past Present Future, a highly ambitious triple album that found Sinatra recording songs from the past (pre-rock era) and present (rock era and contemporary) that he had overlooked during his career, while 'The Future' was a free-form suite of new songs linked à la musical theater by a theme, in this case, Sinatra pondering over the future. The album garnered six Grammy nominations — winning for best liner notes — and peaked at number 17 on Billboard's album chart, while spawning yet another song that would become a signature tune, "Theme from New York, New York", as well as Sinatra's much lauded (second) recording of George Harrison's "Something" (the first was not officially released on an album until 1972's Frank Sinatra's Greatest Hits, Vol. 2).


     In 1990, Sinatra celebrated his 75th birthday with a national tour, and was awarded the second "Ella Award" by the Los Angeles–based Society of Singers. At the award ceremony, he performed for the final time with Ella Fitzgerald.  In 1993 Sinatra made a surprise return to Capitol and the recording studio for Duets, which was released in November.In 1995, to mark Sinatra's 80th birthday, the Empire State Building glowed blue. A star-studded birthday tribute, Sinatra: 80 Years My Way, was held at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. It was Sinatra's last televised appearance.


In recognition of his many years of association with Las Vegas, Frank Sinatra was elected to the Gaming Hall of Fame in 1997.  Michael Jackson can rival Frank Sinatra for biggest-selling solo artist of all time. His jazz-influenced singing remained internationally renowned whatever whims, fashions or innovations were introduced by new generations. In a solo career that included over 70 albums and hundreds of singles, from the late-30s until the mid-90s, Sinatra remained universally loved.