I think I am unusual in wishing that the greatest pop singers had sometimes sung modern art song - songs in which the words are so important. I’d love to hear Matt Monro sing Vaughan Williams’ “Let Beauty Awake”; or Sinatra or Andy Williams or Tony Bennett sing Ned Rorem’s “Early in the Morning”; or Judy Garland sing Britten’s “Before Feeling and After” or Samuel Barber’s “The Crucifixion”; or Rosemary Clooney sing Richard Hundley’s “Come Ready and See Me”. Amongst classical singers who sing in English, Peter Pears, Janet Baker, Benjamin Luxon and Frederica Von Stade do have a wonderful feeling for the words they sing. But such feeling is even more evident in the singing of the greatest pop singers.
I was very interested and surprised to discover that Frank Sinatra was apparently an admirer of Vaughan Williams.
In her autobiography, Peggy Lee is full of praise for Sinatra’s role in this recording. She describes him as a “marvellously sensitive conductor”, and says that the concept of the album was his. The fact that Sinatra and Lee were great friends may contribute to the effusiveness of her praise. But given the musicality of Sinatra’s singing and the force of his personality, I do not find it all that surprising that he could take on the role of conductor.
I have a vinyl album, "The Man I Love"..."Peggy Lee sings, Frank Sinatra conducts, the arrangements are by Nelson Riddle" where the sleeve note states "In his album 'Tone poems of Color' he (Sinatra) displayed impressive skill as the conductor of purely instrumental music." Well, some of us older ones will remember Danny Kaye gesticulating wildly in front of various top-rank orchestras without appearing to know exactly what he was doing....but Sinatra ? The accompaniments on the album are quite sensitively handled and I began to wonder what particular accomplishments Sinatra had to achieve such results. Was Nelson Riddle the "eminence grise" in the recording studio that the musicians were actually following ?
Perhaps some of the experts in the field of lighter music who post here occasionally might know the answer.
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