music producer for Frank Sinatra

Phil Ramone, music producer for Frank Sinatra and Ray Charles, dies at age 72 

Phil Ramone, the Grammy Award-winning engineer and producer whose platinum touch included recordings with Ray Charles, Billy Joel and Paul Simon, has died at 72.

Ramone's son, Matt Ramone, confirmed the death. The family did not immediately release details of the death, but Matt Ramone says his father was "very loving and will be missed."

Few producers had a more spectacular and diverse career. Ramone won 14 Grammy Awards. He worked with Frank Sinatra and Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney, Elton John and Tony Bennett.

He produced three records that went on to win Grammys for album of the year - Simon's "Still Crazy After All These Years," Joel's "52nd Street" and Charles' "Genius Loves Company." He was a pioneer of digital recording who produced what is regarded as the first major commercial release on compact disc, "52nd Street," which came out on CD in 1982.

He thrived producing music for television, film and the stage. He won an Emmy for a TV special about Duke Ellington, a Grammy for the soundtrack to the Broadway musical "Promises, Promises" and a Grammy for the soundtrack to "Flashdance."

Ramone made an art out of the "Duets" concept, pairing Sinatra with Bono, Luther Vandross and other younger artists, Bennett with McCartney and Barbra Streisand, and Charles with Bonnie Raitt and Van Morrison. In Ramone's memoir, "Making Records," he recalled persuading a hesitant Sinatra to re-record some of his signature songs.

"I reminded Frank that while Laurence Olivier had performed Shakespeare in his 20s, the readings he did when he was in his 60s gave them new meaning," Ramone wrote. "I spoke with conviction. `Don't my children - and your grandchildren - deserve to hear the way you're interpreting your classic songs now?'"

A native of South Africa, he seemed born to make music. He had learned violin by age 3 and was trained at The Julliard School in New York. Before age 20, he had opened his own recording studio.Phil Ramone, the Grammy Award-winning engineer and producer whose platinum touch included recordings with Ray Charles, Billy Joel and Paul Simon, has died at 72.

Ramone's son, Matt Ramone, confirmed the death. The family did not immediately release details of the death, but Matt Ramone says his father was "very loving and will be missed."

Few producers had a more spectacular and diverse career. Ramone won 14 Grammy Awards. He worked with Frank Sinatra and Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney, Elton John and Tony Bennett.

He produced three records that went on to win Grammys for album of the year - Simon's "Still Crazy After All These Years," Joel's "52nd Street" and Charles' "Genius Loves Company." He was a pioneer of digital recording who produced what is regarded as the first major commercial release on compact disc, "52nd Street," which came out on CD in 1982.

He thrived producing music for television, film and the stage. He won an Emmy for a TV special about Duke Ellington, a Grammy for the soundtrack to the Broadway musical "Promises, Promises" and a Grammy for the soundtrack to "Flashdance."

Ramone made an art out of the "Duets" concept, pairing Sinatra with Bono, Luther Vandross and other younger artists, Bennett with McCartney and Barbra Streisand, and Charles with Bonnie Raitt and Van Morrison. In Ramone's memoir, "Making Records," he recalled persuading a hesitant Sinatra to re-record some of his signature songs.

"I reminded Frank that while Laurence Olivier had performed Shakespeare in his 20s, the readings he did when he was in his 60s gave them new meaning," Ramone wrote. "I spoke with conviction. `Don't my children - and your grandchildren - deserve to hear the way you're interpreting your classic songs now?'"

A native of South Africa, he seemed born to make music. He had learned violin by age 3 and was trained at The Julliard School in New York. Before age 20, he had opened his own recording studio.

Frank Sinatra did it his drunken

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Frank Sinatra did it his drunken, sex-crazed violent way, Paul Anka writes in new book filled with sordid details of Ol' Blue Eyes

Frank Sinatra (c.) and pals Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin ruled Las Vegas in the 1960s.

Paul Anka, in his new memoir "My Way," writes about his wild nights with Rat Pack.

In his searingly honest new memoir, “My Way,” Paul Anka tells tales and names names. And one that keeps cropping up is Frank Sinatra, the good, the bad, and the murderous.
The former teen idol had always been in awe of the uber-cool Sinatra, and when Anka got to Vegas in 1960, Ol’ Blue Eyes still ruled the Rat Pack and the town.
But Anka was around for the ugly years, too, when Sinatra’s star was fading and he was filled with impotent rage, once ordering a hit on a casino manager.
It was Anka who brought Sinatra back, writing what became the icon’s signature ballad, “My Way.” Its success relaunched Sinatra’s fabled career in 1969.
In the beginning, it was glorious.

Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images

Frank Sinatra and Dean Martin both called actress and singer Angie Dickinson "the best in bed."

“From the first time I heard about the Rat Pack, I wanted to be around these guys and amazingly, they took me in,” Anka writes.
Long nights on the town would end at the health club, open in the wee hours only to Sinatra and company. The boys all wore robes that Sinatra had given them, thoughtfully emblazoned with their nickname. Sammy Davis Jr. was Smokey the Bear, Dean Martin was the Dago and Anka was the Kid.
“The food was great, the girls were hot, tiptoeing into the steam room giggling,” Anka writes.
Show girls would come in, strip, and wait. Or Sinatra would hire pros for the night, he says, “These beautiful women, standing there stark naked.” Massage rooms were available for any of the guys who wanted to take advantage. But no gangbangs — Anka says Sinatra was not into that.
And then there was Angie Dickinson. In later years, casino owner Steve Wynn asked the infamous swordsman, who, of all the women he’d known, was the best in bed? Dean Martin was there, too, and, Anka writes, they both agreed: “Angie!”

Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images

Anka writes that sexy star Dickinson was also romantically linked to former President John F. Kennedy. 

Anka doesn’t mention it, but Dickinson had also been linked to John F. Kennedy. What Anka does write about is Kennedy as a “wild and horny” senator.
“I saw the reality: Kennedy and the hookers, the women who hung around Frank, and the mob. . . . The things I saw and witnessed, it was all part of show business, but it was pretty wild. All the JFK escapades with show girls happened in Vegas.”
Even Johnny Carson was obsessed with Sinatra. “He was also a big drinker and a bad drunk,” Anka reports. Carson would hang around Jilly’s Saloon on W. 52nd St. in Manhattan hoping to connect to Sinatra, but Sinatra never paid him any attention.
One night a drunk Carson started pinching the backsides of a couple of woman at the bar. Unfortunately, they were “side dishes” — girlfriends of gangsters. Their boyfriends threw Carson down a flight of stairs. When he landed, the mobsters started kicking him, Anka says, and only the intervention of Jilly Rizzo, a close Sinatra confederate, saved Carson from far worse bodily harm.
Sinatra always had time for the mob.

AFP/Getty Images

Sinatra, seen here with new bride Mia Farrow in 1966, took the actress on a wild ride.

Anka admits he himself had a cozy relationship with the boys. No one tried to take him over, to run him, but they were friendly. He says he felt just a little more secure when the guys were around, but Sinatra was “fascinated” with the Mafia.
“Frank was tied up with the mob to the degree where he did favors for them,” Anka writes. “He liked the thrill of being involved with gangsters. Jules Podell, the owner of the Copa, told me that he acted as a bagman for the Mafia a number of times, but they eventually stopped using him because he always got caught.”
There was that time in New York he got stopped at customs with $3 million in a briefcase. Sinatra tried to bluff the agent who had opened the case, but what saved him was the growing line behind him. When the other passengers realized it was Sinatra ahead of them, they turned into a mob of fans pressing to get close. Things were nearly out of control when the decision was made to wave Sinatra through.
Certainly the FBI was interested in Sinatra’s close associates. Anka recalls being with Sinatra in Florida when the singer was fuming. There were holes in the walls and the floorboards from the bugs planted throughout the suite. Sinatra would have new phones installed, then the bugs would be back, and so on.
Finally, in the middle of the night, he told his pal Jilly to “get rid of this s---.” Jilly took the furniture from the penthouse and tossed it over the balcony onto the beach.

AP

Frank Sinatra with John F. Kennedy at President's inauguration in 1961. Anka writes that Kennedy was "wild and horny" as a senator who had trysts with showgirls in Las Vegas.

As the ’60s wore on, crooners lost their appeal and even Vegas lost its cool. The always-volatile Sinatra turned ugly. Really ugly.
There was the night in 1967 when he ran up a $500,000 gambling debt at the Sands, where he was headlining, then disappeared for the weekend. He certainly didn’t come back apologetic.
Sinatra seized one of the golf carts used for luggage, plunked his wife, Mia Farrow, in the passenger seat, and drove it into the glass entryway, shattering it. Anka says Sinatra wasn’t angry at the moment, just very, very drunk. So drunk he kept trying to set fire to curtains in the lobby but couldn’t manage to start a blaze.
But soon afterward, Anka writes, Sinatra was furious enough to call for a hit on the manager of the Sands, Carl Cohen. Howard Hughes had taken over, and the game had changed. Sinatra was being refused his gratis markers, and he was used to getting $50,000 worth of free chips.
As Anka describes it, Sinatra jumped on a blackjack table, bringing all the action in the casino to a halt as he raged and cursed. Anka and Rizzo got him into the coffee shop, where Cohen showed up to make peace.

Harry Langdon/Getty Images

Anka reveals the sordid details of the Rat Pack in his memoir. He writes that Sammy Davis Jr. became addicted to porn and had a threesome with "Deep Throat" star Linda Lovelace and her husband Chuck Traynor.

The first thing Sinatra did was hurl a chair at Cohen’s security guard. Still, Cohen tried to calm him, explaining that Hughes was in charge and certain things couldn’t be done. Sinatra responded by ripping away the tablecloth, spilling scalding hot coffee into Cohen’s lap.
So Cohen punched Sinatra in the face — and the singer’s dental caps flew out of his mouth. Anka helped hustle Sinatra out before the cops arrived; he was quickly on a Learjet to L.A., where he got his teeth done and plotted revenge.
“He puts the word out to the boys he wants Carl dead,” Anka writes.
But the boys said no.
“You have to understand, the mob still ran the place, and Carl was one of the boys from Cleveland,” Anka writes. “Frank was a singer, who may have all these mob connections but he wasn’t a mob guy. He was an entertainer.”

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Paul Anka came a long way from his teen-idol days.

Sinatra started talking retirement. He was fed up and done. There would be one more album. Over dinner, he reminded Anka that long ago he had promised to write a song for him.
So with a dispirited Sinatra ready to cash in his chips very much on his mind, Anka wrote “My Way,” using the melody to a French song that he’d bought the rights to. Sinatra released it in 1969 — and Ol’ Blue Eyes was back.
But Sinatra was older and drinking harder this second go-round on the world stage. He grew increasingly tense about being publicly linked to the mob — though he wasn’t closing down private ties, not at all.
Anka relates a tale Rizzo told him of the summer night at the Polo Lounge in the Beverly Hills Hotel: Things got out of control at Dean Martin’s birthday party, and a corporate executive came over demanding they quiet down. The guy ended up in the hospital, though he recovered and refrained from pressing criminal charges.
“Jilly, never one to rat on any situation, told me only just so much,” Anka writes. “He said Frank was very upset about it, very concerned that the guy was going to die, but not concerned enough that he tried to stop the beating up of the guy by his goons.”
Sammy Davis Jr., too, was in a strange place. He became addicted to porn, obsessed with Linda Lovelace of “Deep Throat” fame to the point that he got into threesomes with the actress and her husband, Chuck Traynor, Anka writes.
Davis would tell Anka about his bisexuality. “He would confide these things to me, how cool it would be to be involved with two women, with guys,” Anka says.
The show was definitely coming to an end, and the last act was sad. It got to the point where Anka stopped going to see Sinatra perform since it was too painful to watch him fumble for lyrics or forget to put on his wig as he did one night.
“It was a tragic end to a brilliant career,” he writes.
One of the last times they had dinner, Sinatra told him how much he had wanted to play Marlon Brando’s role in “The Godfather.” Sinatra got very worked up about it. “He had become a lost soul,” says Anka.

Frank Sinatra’s Las Vegas

There were no bright lights illuminating Nevada’s Arrowhead Highway in the 1940s, just a long dark stretch of road that passed through the desert on the way from Salt Lake City to Los Angeles. The place that would become known as Las Vegas was a stolid Western town like any other, replete with cowboy hats and Levi’s jeans, two dude ranches and a couple of casinos, known as “chuck wagons.” If you’re imagining tumbleweed, you aren’t far off.
Meanwhile, a 20-something Frank Sinatra had just started out as a solo artist. Even as most young men his age went off to fight in World War II, Sinatra—exempt from service because of a damaged eardrum, a souvenir from the traumatic forceps birth that permanently scarred the left side of his face and neck—made his name as a crooner amongst bobby-sock-wearing female fans.
Despite a somewhat hardscrabble upbringing, the blue-eyed boy from Hoboken, New Jersey, dreamed big, idolizing Bing Crosby and utilizing his charge account at a Hoboken department store so extensively that his top-shelf wardrobe earned him the nickname, “Slacksey O’Brien.” Sinatra’s early style sense would come to define his on-stage persona and ultimately the city of Las Vegas during the four decades he headlined there, beginning in 1951.
“Frank wouldn’t go out after dark without a sport jacket on, let alone perform out of a tuxedo,” says former Lieutenant Governor and 50-year Nevada resident, Lorraine Hunt-Bono, who remembers Sinatra from his early performances. “He was the spark that changed Vegas from a dusty Western town into something glamorous.”

Frank Sinatra comparisons in stride

Singer Steve Lippia takes Frank Sinatra comparisons in stride

In previous seasons, the Louisville Orchestra has focused the music in its opening concert on classical repertoire. This season, the lineup is a bit different, with part of the evening featuring singer Steve Lippia, who sang with the orchestra in early 2011.

This time, Lippia is back to be part of a celebration of Bob Bernhardt’s 30th anniversary with the orchestra. Lippia, whose voice is often compared to Frank Sinatra’s, talked recently about how he got into singing, launched his professional career and interprets how people compare him to Sinatra.

What did you sing when you were growing up?

I sang in glee clubs and choruses and then was into music that my peers were into, rock ’n’ roll. But I sang a lot of liturgical and classical music in the church choir, and I went to a Catholic high school with a very robust choral program.

We sang contemporary music, but it was mostly Bach and Mozart and contemporary classical artists. I think it was good for me from ear-training, and being confident in one area of music can always help in another. Singing classical music requires a certain technique and that helped me, even though I never really studied music professionally. It was a good foundation for me.

When was the first time you sang solo onstage?

I did some solos with the chorus, but my junior year I performed in the school variety show. Until then I had been singing choral or rock music, but had decided to sing an American standard. I got a great response. It was 1973. My friends were shocked because I was more known as an athlete. I also got a great write-up in the local newspaper.

When do you remember first becoming aware of music known as the American songbook?

I was always aware of it because my mother was a professional singer for a few years before she met my dad. She still sang that music around the house, and so it was always there. It was good music, I thought. I wasn’t really in this musical family, but even when I was 2 or 3, she would teach me some of these songs. So, I’d sometimes be walking around the house, snapping my fingers and singing Bobby Darin tunes.

Joe Piscopo on Frank Sinatra

Joe Piscopo on Frank Sinatra and Saturday Night Live

Joe Piscopo joined the cast of Saturday Night Live in 1980, after honing his stand-up chops at New York's Improv; he stayed with the show until 1985. During his SNL stint, he became known for such original characters as the Sports Guy, as well as celebrity impersonations of David Letterman and Frank Sinatra.
Piscopo will be in Denver this weekend for shows at Lannie's tomorrow, August 10, and Sunday, August 12. We recently caught up with Piscopo to talk about what fans can expect at those shows, as well ssd Sinatra, working on SNL, playing multiple instruments and his forthcoming musical comedy, How Sweet It Is.
Westword: You're going to be doing comedy, impressions and singing at your shows at Lannie's...what else can fans expect?

Joe Piscopo: I got out with a live band, which you don't really see much of anymore when it's a comedy kind of show. We do the music in a big way. It's kind of a retro-style from Vegas that I was kind of brought up on. I've always wanted to do a show like this, so I accidentally reinvented myself and just got into this. I get to work with these really great musicians and do a lot of the Frank Sinatra music.
I do the comedy stuff. I do everybody from Dave Letterman to Rodney Dangerfield and James Brown. We just have a blast on stage. You can pour it all on stage. It's something different at Lannie's Clocktower Cabaret that you're not going to see anywhere else. And Lannie's is so intimate. That's what I dig because I'm always playing casinos. We just did a casino out there, The Reserve. That was great up there because they kept that intimate for me because I always prefer those intimate audiences so I can just wail on the instruments, do some jokes and just have a blast.
I knew you were a singer, but I was surprised to find out that you play guitar, tenor sax, keyboards, flute and drums as well.
I know. I'm a frustrated rock-and-roller from the early days. I studied piano formally and then when the Beatles and the Stones came in, a great era of rock and roll came in, I was just totally smitten with that. Of course, I picked up the guitar. And then I listened to the drums and I tried to emulate the classic drummers like Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa. I also dug the riffs of Mitch Mitchell who played for Jimi Hendrix. There are great drummers now -- Nick Menza's a great drummer from Megadeth -- but Mitch Mitchell just filled in. People don't understand that as brilliant as Hendrix was on guitar, Mitch Mitchell is on the drums. I really heard that. I could hear that when I listened to all those rock tunes. Now I just kind of jump on stage and make a living of living out my fantasies a little bit -- well, not all my fantasies, but almost all of them.
I heard that you were a big Jethro Tull fan in high school, which is one of the reason you started playing the flute.
There it is. Baby, that was it. That's so funny. Ian Anderson... You know what, I listened to that and thought, "How creative is that?" The '60s, man, I'm telling you, they had the greatest music of all time. It was just the base of rock and roll. After Elvis did his thing and all the great rock and rollers did their thing early on, those monster rock groups like Jethro Tull... Flute, a freakin' flute? I said, "What, are you kidding me?" I went down to the music store and said, "Gimme the flute." I learned that Blood, Sweat and Tears did a great song called "Flute Thing," which was based on a classical music piece by Satie. I learned that and I put that on that. We do it in a comedy way. It's always with a comedy riff to it.
I tell you what, man, there was some great stuff out there and I was fortunate enough to be part of a generation that had this great eclectic mix of great rock and roll, but always true to the standards because people want to hear the Frank Sinatra stuff.

Frank Sinatra

Frank Sinatra Jr. - Seminole Casino Coconut Creek - July 12 

 

Frank Sinatra Jr.
Seminole Casino Coconut Creek
July 12 

Last night at the Seminole Casino in Coconut Creek, about 1,200 people filed into the Pavilion Theater to get a good look at the offspring of Ol' Blue Eyes, Frank Sinatra Jr.

Some, like Irene Brenner and Iris Rosenstrauss, both 81, had to settle for a squint. "I wish they would install some TV monitors in here," said Rosenstrauss of Fort Lauderdale. "We can't see a thing."

Complaints aside, it was hard not to notice that the average age at the concert last night was probably somewhere in the mid-60s. But these things you come to expect in South Florida, especially at a concert featuring music that hasn't been played on the radio for half a decade.

But for the people who came to see him last night, Sinatra Jr. isn't just another toupee-wearing Sinatra impersonator to catch after the early-bird buffet. He's a link to the real deal, a corporeal relic with ties back to that Golden Age of American Song when dance bands traveled to cities around the world, when men wore fedoras and smoked indoors, when pictures of Sinatra lined the walls of every girl's bedroom.
And so, as Frank Sinatra Jr. walked onto the stage last night singing the first few lyrics of "That Face," the audience prepared itself for a trip back in time. And Sinatra certainly took them there, recreating the aura of his father's generation down to the smallest details. Unlike other Sinatra impersonators, who have to learn to walk and talk like the Chairman of the Board, Jr's mannerisms were the real deal, encoded into his DNA.

As he crooned his way through classics like "Love Is Just Around the Corner" and "Don'cha Go 'Way Mad," you got the impression that his voice had been crafted by nature to sound like his father's. But what most people don't know is that Sinatra Jr is a trained musician. He even went to music school for a little while and was the musical director of his father's band. Being the son of Frank Sinatra might have endowed him with some natural talent, but it took years of study and hard work to become the musician he is today. 

And for a man who is famous for championing live music (and condemning all things digital), he certainly brought the band to back his statements up. His musicians were superb, with trumpet players who screeched into the stratosphere on "I Wanna Be Around" and sax players who cried through their instruments on "More than You Know."

And even though you might think a man with such negative opinions of modern music would be as dry as burnt toast, he is actually quite funny. His "resurrection" of a Dean Martin lounge act, complete with a nasally, radio-voiced introduction and a few sips from a glass of scotch, was one of the lighter moments of the show. And when he began the first few bars of "When You're Smiling" with the lyrics "When you're drinking," the audience appreciated the subtle jab. It was like watching a younger brother tease his older brother out of love.

Moments like those were the highlights of his show. His stories about Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr. just seem truer than everyone else's. They're not being read out of some cheesy biography or looked up online. They're not rumors or anecdotes he picked up second hand. They're experiences he actually lived, and he simply has to remember them.

But Sinatra Jr. wasn't the only one reminiscing in the theater last night. As he belted out tunes like "I've Got the World on a String" and "Strangers in the Night," the audience became visibly nostalgic, clapping along before the first four bars had been played, before a single word had even been sung.
And by the time the show concluded with "New York, New York," the audience, it seemed, was fully immersed in the past. A few ladies crowded the front of the stage, fawning at Sinatra's feet like the teenagers they were fifty years ago. There was even one couple swing dancing in the aisles. Sure, their leg kicks and twirls might have been a little slower and lower, but the feeling was still the same.

"I saw his father do this number in Carnegie Hall," Brenner shouted as the familiar brass introduction blared from the front of the theater. Her face was beaming. And while the faces onstage might have been blurry to her, the memories were as clear as ever. 

Of course, it was impossible not to draw some parallels between Sinatra Jr and his father. The two men are, after all, bound by blood and name. But Sinatra Sr was in a class by himself, untouchable. There is no one who could follow in his footsteps.

His son, however, did an admirable job. His voice isn't quite as rich as his father's, and his eyes will never be as blue. But if you cock your head and squint just the right way, you'll see he's the closest thing we have.