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TRIBUTE TO FRANKIE LAINE

Continued...

Frankie Laine came over and quietly introduced himself. We said “Hello” and introduced ourselves before going back to our seats for his performance. My first impression of him, therefore, was not entirely from the variety of LP's and hissing 78's my parents had played, rather by the larger than life presence of this artist for whom the term incomparable must have been coined. (Perhaps the ancients knew that one day, someone would be born who fully defined the meaning of the word they had conjured up.) He sang his hits; I Believe, Mule Train, Jezebel, That Lucky Old Sun, Rawhide, Cry of the Wild Goose in front of a band that, due to the size of the room, I do not believe used microphones, except for Frankie (not that he would have needed it.) That was my first experience with hearing a jazz band in a relatively acoustic setting — in fact, in a situation that I would learn years later was very similar to the Billy Berg Club at Hollywood and Vine where it all began for Frankie in the 1940's. Perhaps this is why I have an aversion to amplified sounds of any kind to this day — even of a conventional string quartet. He also introduced new material to the audience which included Making Memories, I'll Take Care of Your Cares... if memory serves me. He also took requests where the audience shouted out the craziest things.

When the show was over, he greeted our whole family and my parents hit it off, especially my Dad. A friendship began — a relationship all of us retained until the end. In retrospect, if my parents had decided to leave me at home with a babysitter that night, my life and its chosen path would have been extremely different. It seems that in that couple of hours, I had some idea that music was going to be my thing, so strong was the impression Frankie and the whole experience made upon me.

We went on to see him perform at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, in Brooklyn in an incredible — I mean INCREDIBLE — performance (more on that one in a moment), Westbury Music Fair, and all of his appearances in Eisenhower Park. He would always welcome any member of my family back to visit with him which was an incredibly generous thing to do. Of course, we watched all the TV appearances he made like the Dinah Shore Show, the Merv Griffin Show, the Mike Douglas Show, The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson (all of them — THESE were interviewing show hosts!!!!!), Hollywood Palace, the Ed Sullivan Show — even a celebrity bowling show. As great as these all were, Frankie Laine live was an experience to be remembered, treasured and cherished by all of us who were fortunate enough to have been there.

Getting back to the Brooklyn concert alluded to before, prior to the show, my Father got a note to Frankie backstage that we were in the audience. Could he sing a song my Mother particularly liked called Honey which he had just recorded on the album (truly one of his very best!) Take me Back to Laine Country? Following the opening act which consisted of comic Pat Cooper, followed by a couple of instrumental selections played by the orchestra, Frankie's portion of the show got underway as the second half. I don't even think that Ray Barr had written an arrangement for it, but Frankie announced that he had gotten a request, so, backed by Ray at the piano (and, at the very least, perhaps only the bassist, drummer and guitarist — the rest of the big band just sat there since they had nothing to play from, except for one saxophonist who picked out a line and joined it), Frankie sang it! MIND BLOWING? YOU ASK? I only have a one word answer for that one — UNFORGETTABLE!

We watched him introduce many of his later hits, like the two mentioned above as well as his seminal masterpiece You Gave Me a Mountain which had been penned for him by his friend, the legendary Marty Robbins. This recording with its majestic vocal caught the ears of Elvis Presley, a big fan of Laine's, who put that song into his act as soon as he could.

But there would be other memories from him. When my Father was ill and recovering from surgery, Frankie was set to appear on the Academy Awards broadcast since the theme song by Mel Brooks to Blazing Saddles had been nominated for Best Song. Frankie was performing locally but we could not attend for obvious reasons. Frankie called our house to see what was up and, naturally, he was brought up to date on the situation. As the conversation ended, Frankie said:

“Well, Bob, I'll be on the Oscars in a few weeks so when I look into that camera and point, that point’s for you!—

That was a truly special gesture of friendship, one which we have never forgotten.

Personally, I always admired the fact that Frankie continued to champion new songs by a vast variety of songwriters from every style. Frankie was one of those singers who really sang everything from whatever genre — Country, Western (truly Western), Theme Songs, Folk songs, Love songs, Religious songs, Jazz songs, Standards, numbers from Broadway Musicals, Rock songs, Ditties, Jingles — you name it. One explanation for this may have had to do with his background. Growing up in an Italian-speaking household in the Little Italy section of Chicago (a section of that city which no longer exists), Laine listened to recordings of Caruso and Gigli his parents had. His musical interests expanded when he heard recordings of Louis Armstrong, Bessie Smith, Al Jolson, Carlo Buti, and Bing Crosby. Remember, this was Chicago between the Jazz age and the Great Depression. THESE were the NEW sounds that teenagers were listening to then. Things changed when he attended a live performance of Al Jolson in a Chicago theatre. Here was one of his idols performing on stage. Jolson, the legendary entertainer with that incredible voice — the one who gave us The Jazz Singer — being encountered in person. It was there; on that evening that Laine felt that he could do this, too. It took a lot of hard work and even harder knocks, but Laine remained relentless until one fateful evening at Billy Berg's via Hoagy Carmichael — and the rest is history!

It is a wonder why Frankie's songs have not been as present as those by his fourth cousin, Frank Sinatra. For both singers, the 1950's marked an artistically golden period for them. Beginning in the early 50's, both worked for producer Mitch Miller. The changes occurred around 1953/54, when Sinatra left, but Laine stayed. Sinatra landed on Capitol Records; Laine remained on Columbia. Sinatra decided to concentrate on recording many of the finest songs culled from what-is-now-being-referred-to-as-the-American Songbook; Laine forged his own road belting out signature songs written, in some instances, with his particular vocal talents in mind. Laine sold vast numbers of singles; Sinatra sold vast numbers of albums. Laine made movies; Sinatra made motion pictures, some of which are now considered classic (receiving an Academy Award along the way.) Laine starred in television programs under his own name; Sinatra starred in television programs under his own name. Laine lost his friend, songwriting partner and arranger Carl Fischer in 1954 leaving him at the mercy of whoever was assigned to write his arrangements (not that that was a second rate list of talent) while Sinatra surrounded himself with arrangers Gordon Jenkins, Billy May and Nelson Riddle. It would be with Riddle that Sinatra found a certain center that has remained unmatched in the annals of Pop culture to this day. While Sinatra sang titles by Cole Porter, the Gershwins, Alec Wilder, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Rodgers and Hart, Harold Arlen, Johnny Mercer, Matt Dennis, Sammy Cahn, Dietz and Schwartz... and so on and so on, Laine was forced to sing whatever crap Mitch Miller assigned him to record, most of which fell far short in the quality of songwriting greatness inherent to Sinatra's timeless catalogue. For some reason, there is a quality in those Sinatra recordings that has endured and been copied by other singers; Laine's hits, unfortunately, have not been so blessed. Perhaps Sinatra's voice possesses a common enough quality to it that the average person feels it is possible to emulate or impersonate his style. There are Sinatra-esque performances of tunes en masse by other singers, professional and amateur alike (some of which are truly frightening), while there are hardly any covers of songs like Jezebel, That Lucky Old Sun, Cry of the Wild Goose, Moonlight Gambler, etc... sung in the style or even close to it — of Frankie Laine. It took the English/Australian group The Ten Tenors, for example, to even approximate the intensity of Rawhide — and that's about it in terms of covers of Laine songs in recent years. On the rare occasion that someone has tried to copy the Laine style, it is most often as parody or as the supercilious butt of a joke.

There IS one exception to the “covers”? of Laine songs that has transcended his 21 hit records. Frankie Laine was also a lyricist with some pedigree to show for it. With the exception of the song It Only Happens Once, because he wrote the words and the music to that one, Laine supplied lyrics to a number of fine melody writers that included (or, includes — remember, songs are forever!) Michel Legrand, Mel Tormé, Hoagy Carmichael (the man who “discovered” him and set the whole thing in motion), Duke Ellington, Carl Fischer, and Matt Dennis. One song has been covered and covered and covered, more so than his hits have... but more on that specific title a little later on in this feature.

While I do not wish to diminish his vocal achievements on recordings, for me, Laine's jazz recordings remain some of the very finest EVER made by anyone! So individual do some of these sides remain, they stand alone without compare. I DO NOT agree with Laine being described as the “talentless hack” the critic Will Friedwald dismissed him as in his book Jazz Singing. That observation is absolutely and completely preposterous since, frankly, NO ONE could have sung those tunes that way, not even the vocal stylists Frankie himself admired. Only a master vocalist could have done what Laine did! It should be mentioned that Laine did not earn the nickname “Mr. Rhythm” by accident!!!!

Laine WAS a huge influence on a variety of singers — and you can hear it in their work. Bobby Darin (one of the very greatest entertainers ever!) admitted that it was Laine, not Sinatra, he was copying when he laid down his signature masterpiece Mack the Knife on December 19, 1958. It was Laine who Gene Pitney (he was great, too! if not underrated) emulated for the theme song of A Town Without Pity to serve the tastes of its songwriters Dmitri Tiomkin and Ned Washington — the team that wrote the Rawhide theme for TV, and the movie themes for Gunfight at OK Corral and High Noon, all of which had been given the Laine stamp. (True, Tex Ritter sang the theme of High Noon for the motion picture of the same name — you know, the one which starred Gary Cooper for which he won an Oscar — but it was Laine's mega hit of that song which topped the charts.) When asked in a BBC interview about whom he tried to emulate the most when he was starting out, Sir Tom (you're the bomb, dawg!) Jones answered with one name — Frankie Laine. (He later covered I Believe when he hosted his own TV show, This is Tom Jones — you can view it on YouTube.) Jimmie Rodgers, you know, the guy who sang songs like Honeycomb and Kisses Sweeter Than Wine, singled out Laine as one of the singers he most admired. Even Ringo Starr was a huge fan, as were Andy Williams, Pat Boone, Lou Rawls, Mario Lanza and James Brown. When a then unknown songwriter told Laine that he had written a song perfect for him, Laine met with the young man and encouraged him to pursue his ambitions, Although Laine did not record the youngsters song, that young man took Laine's advice — his name was Sonny Bono. Pleased by the singer he heard on his test disks, Laine suggested to Mitch Miller that he hire the kid singing on them — “He's really good”, he said. Miller took Laine's advice. The singer was — and is — the legendary Tony Bennett — the Eveready Battery of Song. Even his idols, Al Jolson and Louis Armstrong extolled their admiration for Laine.

While countless others were influenced by Laine, one has to wonder why so little attention was paid to him or achievements during the past 20 years? When I petitioned NARAS to present him with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Grammy's no less than three times (over a period of five years) they couldn't be bothered! That's how much an organization like that respected one of its founding members. And where were these tribute compilation albums? On a collection of CD's devoted to Hoagy Carmichael, not a single track of Frankie's was on it. On a collection of the great singers, no Frankie Laine. On a collection of great jazz recordings, none of those great jazz sides to which I alluded to before were on them. On this new movie theme song compilation, I don't think there is a single Laine entry to be found, a genre for which he sang some of the most significant theme songs, from Blowing Wild in 1953 to Blazing Saddles in 1974. There was some book published on American Popular Song (I refuse to mention it by name because I find that their summation about Bobby Darin is incorrect, inaccurate and insulting) in which there were features on several singers. There was NO feature on Laine — except for one sentence regarding his having had a hit with High Noon. A SENTENCE? THAT'S ALL? It was as if he had vanished. Even on the crawl of his death notice, WCBS-TV — the one time parent network for the label on which he recorded and the network on which the television series Rawhide ran from January 9, 1959 until January 4, 1966 — improperly printed his name as Frankie Lane. Was it really too difficult to research the fact that he spelt it LAINE ?

Back to our story —

As for me, growing up, he always asked how I was doing, how my music was progressing, etc. Largely fueled by hearing those great Ray Barr, Carl Fischer, Michel Legrand, Frank Comstock, Jimmie Haskell, Paul Weston, Billy May, Artie Butler, and John Williams (yes, that one! — but he was Johnny Williams then) arrangements (among others) that backed Frankie's vocals, my dream was to become an arranger. Fate seems to have taken me into a different direction, away from Jazz/Pop and into more serious forms of composition. (Why? If I had the answer to that I would patent it, create a pill from the formula and sell it on TV.) We stayed in touch and I always sent him my best wishes. Eventually, I sent him a few audio recordings of some of my output since I wanted him to have some idea as to what my work sounded like.

During all of this time, and throughout his entire career, for that matter, Frankie Laine was active in many causes and charities for the benefit of others, including Meals on Wheels and The Salvation Army. He organized a nationwide drive to provide shoes for the homeless called OLD SHOES named after one of his songs. He donated a large portion of his time and talent to many San Diego charities, homeless shelters, and the St. Vincent de Paul Village. He was also an emeritus member of the board of directors for the Mercy Hospital Foundation.

In 1993, just after his 80th birthday, Frankie's wife Nan Grey died after 43 years of marriage. Frankie kept on performing and recording, marrying Marcia Ann Kline in 1999. He continued to work and record well into his 87th /88th year around which time he began to experience vocal problems. The diagnosis was throat cancer. It is not uncommon for singers to acquire this disease that has proven to be the death for the likes of Sammy Davis, Jr., Gordon MacRae, Matt Munro and, only two days before Frankie's passing, Barbara McNair (a truly underrated singer whose death seems to have been completely overlooked.) But Frankie stuck it out, going through the treatments, successfully surviving the cancer that could have proven fatal. As his 90th birthday year was approaching, Frankie had recovered with the intention of singing again.

In the summer of 2002, I received a call from Mary Jo Coombs asking me if I would like some song titles from Frankie that he had thought up. My answering machine took the initial call since I had been away in Europe teaching. I returned her call so I could tell her YES. Within a week, the list arrived. One title caught my eye which seemed appropriate for immediate use — Alive and Kickin'. Knowing that his 90th birthday was set to occur within a matter of months, festivities to which I had already made plans to attend, I let Frankie's people know that I wanted to write some appropriate music for the band that was set to perform at the event. I was told to contact Benny Holman, which I did, got the instrumentation and set to work.

The rehearsal occurred about two weeks after I sent the music off in March, 2003 in San Diego. We held the rehearsal of the non-vocal pieces in the morning before people, including Frankie, arrived. Since this and other works were now rehearsed, I joined some of the early attendees, which included my parents, Ms. Coombs and Marcia Laine. Not too many were able to hear Frankie sing Happy Birthday to Marcia, but he did which was quite significant given the events which he had just overcome. He came over and we spoke for a couple of moments. I reminded him of where we had met and he filled in the details from there. Yes, he remembered, too! The birthday festivities DID occur a few days later. Alive and Kickin' was performed by Benny Holman and his Orchestra before an audience that included fans and well wishers from all over the world, Patti Page, Kay Starr, and Herb Jeffries, the latter who, at age 91 as he was at that time, performed.

While we had planned to have an interview during that week, it could not be scheduled, so I told him that I would be happy to come out at a later time. That July, our interview occurred. I decided to walk from my near by (?) hotel to the Laine house — which I did. It took an hour to arrive at the gate. I rang the buzzer and was allowed entry. Little did I know that their house was on top of a hill. After the first pass, I felt like I was on the “Mountain I may never climb ” (like the lyric in the song.) After getting up the next pass, I thought that this would be my end, BUT, mercy have it, at the top of the pass I saw a golden flat topped fire hydrant! I made it to there and sat down to catch my breath before continuing on. I heard someone calling me. It seemed that their dog, Matt, knew I was coming but, having not arrived, went to the door to look for me. I acknowledged that I had arrived and saw Marcia and Matt. Frankie was standing at the door, looking well and delighted to see me. We shared a warm embrace and I entered. After a few words of greeting, Frankie and I proceeded to the back porch where we sat down. I set up my little tape recorder, Marcia Laine brought out a little plate of cheese and apple slices and once I turned the tape recorder on, off our conversation went — accompanied by the light sound of wind chimes, just Frankie Laine and me (oh, and Matt, too — who kept trying to get a piece of cheese off the tray.)

Once our conversation had been completed, we sat down to lunch. Frankie excused himself once he had finished so he could take a nap. Marcia drove me back to my hotel. That was the last time I actually saw Frankie. (Ironically, I do not have a photograph of us, nor did I bring along a camera to take one on that, our last occasion.)

I made sure that I called him on his birthdays, numbers 91 and 92 in which I would leave him a message. He had suffered some health set backs during this period so I made sure that I got these messages to him. But, on the date of birthday number 93, something remarkable occurred. It was March 30, 2006. I had to make my call in the evening to make sure it was just late enough to get a hold of him — or his answering machine. As soon as I got home from work, I phoned and Marcia answered telling me to hold on, Frankie had something he had wanted to say to me.

It seemed like forever, but I waited. The next voice I heard was Frankie's. I expressed to him all my best wishes for the day. Speaking slowly, he thanked me then proceeded to tell me that he was thrilled and honored that he had anything to do, if even in a small way, with inspiring me in the music I had done. Following that magical moment, we spoke a little more about his future plans, wished each other our best and love. We said goodbye and hung up our phones.

That was our final conversation.

For me, in the moment I hung up my phone, Frankie Laine passed from mortality into immortality.

Prior to that, in November of 2005, Frankie taped his last performance for Public Television in which he sang, That's My Desire. Because the program was set to air later in 2006, it would prove to be 60 years from the time he introduced it on the memorable recording (the recording session of which occurred on August 27, 1946) that launched his international career, to his last opportunity to stand on a stage and perform before a live audience. From start to finish, those 60 years represents a circle of unparalleled excellence. After all he had been through, this last, televised time allowed Frankie the opportunity to say to his fans for one final time, THANK YOU — which he did at the end of his performance.

It is us who should thank you, Mr. Laine!

Frankie Laine's funeral service was held on February 12, 2007 in a poetic church service at the Immaculata Parish Church on the campus of the University of San Diego. The following day, his ashes, along with those of his late wife, Nan Grey and two of their pets, were scattered over the ocean that he so dearly loved.

And there it came to pass, a noble and quiet finale befitting the man himself.

Well, this brings me nearly to the end of this tribute to Frank. Rest in Peace? Yes, include me in with that gesture along with countless fans from around the world that have already expressed it. I send my love and best wishes out to Frankie's wife Marcia, his family and the friends who were around him and kept him going. It pleases me to know that the Frankie Laine Society has planned to continue and there are excellent profiles and materials regarding him all over the internet. There is even an official website for those who wish to log onto it, it is: frankielaine.com

But I REFUSE to say goodbye since I well know that music, especially POP music, is eternal.

As I alluded to earlier, Frankie wrote the lyrics for one song that has gone on to grace the pages of the Great American Songbook. Set to the music of Carl Fischer, Frankie's first significant accompanist and arranger, this song has been recorded by a luminous list of greats including Sinatra on one of his very best albums Songs for Swingin' Lovers), Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday (one of Frank's idols), June Christy (on her last recording sessions), Diane Schurr (one of Frankie's personal favorites among its recorded renditions), Lena Horne (on her tribute album to Billy Strayhorn), Tony Bennett and most recently, Rod Stewart. The legendary Barbara Cook concluded her history making performance with it on the stage of no less than the Metropolitan Opera House (which is available on CD. What would Frankie's Father have thought of that?) Because of this song, Frank was awarded entry into the Songwriters' Hall of Fame, which marked the last time he performed in New York City during his induction ceremony. On November 3, 1947, backed by Carl Fischer at the piano playing his inaugural arrangement of it, Frankie sang its premiere recorded version, which remains one of his very best. Ironically, it was this very recording that I was just releasing from my computer when I received the news of his passing. He could not have foreseen that he had written his own epitaph in as simple and true a way as has ever been expressed thru the lyrics of a song. It remains a pure statement. Even though I am using this in a manner different than its original intent, what better way to close this tribute than in the words he penned all those years ago.