[Pedro]

1. Watch What Happens
2. Didn't We
3. Hallelujah, I Love Her So
4. Yesterday
5. All My Tomorrows
6. My Way
7. A Day in the Life of a Fool
8. For Once in My Life
9. If You Go Away
10. Mrs. Robinson

all tracks arranged and conducted by Don Costa

Reprise CD

FRANK'S REPRISE JUKEBOX CONVERSION
(Code digits: 1&2 = Disc, 3&4 = Track)

http://www.sinatrafamily.com/forum/s...&threadid=8119

MY WAY

1406 Watch What Happens
1402 Didn't We
1409 Hallelujah, I Love Her So
1404 Yesterday
1401 All My Tomorrows
1311 My Way
1403 A Day in the Life of a Fool
1407 For Once in My Life
1405 If You Go Away
1408 Mrs. Robinson

This album, besides having the great, My Way, also has another gem on it, a remake of All My Tomorrows, which was originally made about nine years earlier. I prefer this version over the earlier one. I don't know why.

Didn't We is another great FS recording. He also did some great versions of this song live.

FS sounds real good on Yesterday & For Once In My Life. He sounded great even on these contemporary recordings.

The only song I wasn't crazy about was Mrs. Robinson. Then and again, I never thought much of it when Simon & Garfunkel did it either.

[Tony]

35th Anniversary of My Way, seems like it passed by without a mention.

This great song, by FAS arguably along with NY- NY the most requested `karaoke` song ever.

Do you know who else sang this gem, if not look......

HERE

MY WAY RELEASED-MARCH 1969
1. Watch What Happens
2. Didn't We
3. Hallelujah, I Love Her So
4. Yesterday
5. All My Tomorrows
6. My Way
7. A Day In The Life Of A Fool
8. For Once In My Life
9. If You Go Away
10. Mrs. Robinson

Arranged & Conducted By Don Costa
Produced By Don Costa And Sonny Burke



i just picked up this Cd on saturday. my dad had the vinyl, but we dont have a record player anymore. when i played the cd, i was like, whoa, he is really puttin a lot of energy in these songs. i never heard Frank sing For Once In MY Life in his young voice. i only heard him on Duets 2 and 80th live in concert. when he sang this song, i really enjoyed it. it really didnt blow me away like in his later recordings though.

[Greg]

Jason-- All My Tomorrows is one of my favourite Frank songs- he recorded it for Capital as well. Great melody!
There is already a thread set up for this album, so don't be surprised if it is moved. Read Adam's sticky note at the top-- we're trying to keep this room as "clean" as possible.
Greg

Watch What Happens
All My Tomorrows
For Once In My Life
Mrs. Robinson *

Oh, yeah, Jasong, young voice? Just funnin' you - you keep enjoying!

Randy


*Bless your soul, Jilly Rizzo.

bumping up

Hi Jason,

there already is a thread here for this album:
http://www.sinatrafamily.com/forum/s...011#post278011

I'd suggest yours to be merged to the older one.

Bernhard.

[Marty]

The phrasing on the recording of Yesterday seems to contain more than just a tipped hat in the direction of Matt Monro's 1965 recording of the song.
Don Costa seems unusally restrained in most of his writing for these tracks, with the exception of For Once In My Life which is the track I think works best from the whole collection and for my money is on a par with Stevie Wonder's version.

[Jeffrey Simmons]

Another perfect marriage of singer and orchestra. Don Costa's arrangements and FS's superb vocals give this collection of songs a theme of continuity that identify them all as part of one fabulous album. Costas arrangements are now classic and easily identifiable from just a first few bars. FS is superb throughout. His voice is brilliant on the title song - no question and he gives some great performances all the way through.

My favourites :-

My Way
For Once In My Life
(This Time) "Did'nt We" - as rightly corrected by Bernhard - How could I forget that - I must be getting old!)
Watch What Happens
All My Tomorrows
If You Go Away
.

My favourites from this album are "All My Tomorrows" (a brilliant recording that in my opinion even surpasses the excellent Capitol version recorded in 1958) and the marvelous "Didn't We" (I think that's the song you name as "This Time" in your list, Jeffrey).

From the perspective of "new/contemporary material" especially, "Didn't We" (words & music by Jimmy Webb) is the winner of this album. A wonderful lyric and a beautiful melody, orchestrated by Costa in a (thankfully so) very understated manner, no overload with beats and rhytms and no forcing, just soft ballad backgrounds as the song demands them. One of the best Sinatra-Costa-collaborations after "Sinatra and Strings".

"Didn't We" aside, another first-class gem on this album is "A Day In The Life Of A Fool" ("Manha de Carnival"), a Brazilian song that should have become part of one of the Jobim albums. Marvelous rendition and arrangement. (Actually, a Brazilian Reprise 2-LP-set of "Sinatra Jobim" DID include this song in the late 70s, fittingly so).

To write anything less than praise about "My Way" (the title song I mean) may seem a sacrilege, it became one of Sinatra's biggest landmark recordings. Still, in my 'sacrilegingly personal' opinion, I don't think that Anka's lyrics were first-rate - for me, if anything, they work best with a much later Sinatra, say 80s and early 90s, when he build-up on these in his concerts to an irrestistably emotional, grand performance that would always make you shiver.

On the other hand, poetical-wise, the original studio recording as heard on this album has the advantage of leaving out that "trumpeting" of the last "myyyy wayyy" (which was grand when old Sinatra did it, of course), by including that very soft ending "yes, it was my way" which brings the whole lyric to quite a capturing slow self-recapturing thoughtful ending that lacks any of the "bombastic" declarations of the previous choruses.

Still, I remain among those crazy sort of Sinatra fan people (and I'm not alone, I think) that would *never* list "My Way" among their favourite Sinatra recordings (not to speak of "Strangers In The Night"). For me, there are many, many 'better' songs that better define what Sinatra was, or is, musically, to me than these.

Again, just some of my tuppence.

Bernhard.

Another wonderful album from our beloved Frank. I am extremely partial to All My Tomorrows, My Way and For Once In My Life.

[Adam]

Originally posted by bvo35


I'd suggest yours to be merged to the older one.

Bernhard.

Suggestion actioned, Bernhard.

Adam

[MMM]

Originally posted by bvo35
Still, I remain among those crazy sort of Sinatra fan people (and I'm not alone, I think) that would *never* list "My Way" among their favourite Sinatra recordings (not to speak of "Strangers In The Night"). For me, there are many, many 'better' songs that better define what Sinatra was, or is, musically, to me than these.

I agree. It's not that I don't like the song - I do. Whenever I hear it, I enjoy it, and occasionally it will even give me a little chill through my body, but I wouldn't even put it in Frank's top 100 songs if I had to try and assemble a list. That's not a knock on the song, I do think it's good, but I don't feel it should be counted among Frank's very best. "All My Tomorrows", from this album, would though.

[Jeffrey Simmons]

Berhard - thank you kindly for correcting me. I must be getting old or loopy or both. I don't know how I could forget that - although perhaps ('This Time') could have and should have been the title.

In the original lyric by Jimmy Webb, the song was written and sung with the words "did'nt we girl" It was FS who was the only singer (out of many who recorded it) who actually dropped the word "girl" from his recording of the song and I think that it was a brilliant move. It put the song into a different class.

I too love "All My Tomorrows" which has more emphatic reading of the lyric than on the excellent smooth 1958 Capitol version, which fitted well as the theme song for "A Hole In The Head".

"A Day In The Life Of A Fool" ("Manha de Carnival") is very well done, but to me it never really sounded like it fitted in with the Jobim set because Costa's arrangement was very much in line with all the others on the MY Way set.

As for "My Way" itself, the original recording is still glorious and still the best. The orchestration, the voice, tempo and that soft ending are for me still quite breathtaking. He performs it brilliantly and it will always be his song. I cannot denigrate this song in any way, although I do accept that it is perhaps not the most brilliant lyric ever. It is though a very personal Sinatra song which somehow can never sound as good when sung by anyone else.

******In the original lyric by Jimmy Webb, the song was written and sung with the words "did'nt we girl" It was FS who was the only singer (out of many who recorded it) who actually dropped the word "girl" from his recording of the song and I think that it was a brilliant move. It put the song into a different class.******

I agree - yet, ironically, when Sinatra performed the song in concert regularly through spring and summer 1975, to a new string arrangement by Costa, he would always sing "didn't we, girl" in all the refrain lines. It seems that at that time, he thought the original lyric to be more appropiate.

But as I said, I agree that leaving out the "girl" was a major move, Sinatrally, on the 1969 studio recording. It is a brilliant reading.

Bernhard.

[Jeffrey Simmons]

Originally posted by bvo35
I agree - yet, ironically, when Sinatra performed the song in concert regularly through spring and summer 1975, to a new string arrangement by Costa, he would always sing "didn't we, girl" in all the refrain lines. It seems that at that time, he thought the original lyric to be more appropiate. [/B]

Interesting Stuff, Bernhard.

Actually, as I recall, I don't think he added the "girl" to every single refrain at that time, but he certainly did to many. I saw FS do the song in concert around in 1975 and also after that time, when he would do a very fast dive into the first line of the song "This time we almost made the pieces fit....did'nt we."
I would have to hear some of these shows again to see if he added the "girl" later on.

I do think that this song would have been a great addition to any FS concert - it was perfect for him - but I think it was much omitted in later years - I don't know why.

From those 1975-1978 concerts I had the chance to listen to, he always sang "didn't we, girl" (including the two London ones in late May 1975 and the London shows of 1978), would be interesting to learn about a performance where he didn't, thus alternating the "new" approach with the original one, lyrical-wise. And Sinatra was the master of alternation. Wasn't he, g...uh Jeffrey?

Sinatra stopped singing "Didn't We" in September 1978, sadly forever. Would have been interesting to hear him repeat it later, say, in the early 80s as a guitar thing or such, when Falcone was at the baton.

Bernhard.

PS/Note: Corrected some dates here, sorry for the mistake.