Frank Sinatra

Frank Sinatra  is one of the most recognizable jazz singers in history. Ask anyone who is a jazz singer and you will most likely find that they know of or have heard Frank Sinatra. 

Sinatra's vocal style represented a significant departure from the "crooning" style of his idol, Bing Crosby. Sinatra's generation represented the first generation of children that had grown up in the era of the microphone, and the amplification of sound enabled singers to sing in a much softer, personal and nuanced style. However Sinatra, as he himself once noted, sang more, by which he meant that he introduced a bel canto sound to the tradition begun by Crosby. And, more importantly, he might be said to have brought the Crosby tradition to artistic completion, taking it to levels of intensity and depth of feeling that, because of the displacement of the Crosby – Sinatra tradition by rock and roll and subsequent genres, are unlikely to be achieved again.

Sinatra made a point of studying Tommy Dorsey's trombone playing as a means of cultivating a more free-flowing vocal style — he noticed that Dorsey used a tiny airhole at the side of his mouth to sneak breaths when playing. Sinatra would employ a similar technique, and so be able to hold notes for incredibly long durations. In addition to this, Sinatra started to jog and swim underwater to develop his lung capacity — which enabled him to continue a musical phrase through a stanza without pausing, or breaking the note, for breath. Sinatra's legato-style of singing/phrasing took pop singing in new directions when most singers of the 1940s were keen to emulate Bing Crosby.

As happens with many singers, Sinatra suffered at least one period of major vocal difficulty, which he remedied with the help of Metropolitan Opera baritone Robert Merrill.

As a song-stylist, Sinatra's jazz-infused approach to singing seemed to occur with the end of the "Big Band" era and ushering in of an era that favored the vocalist and made him/her the focus, not the bandleader and his band.

Sinatra also possessed an outstanding vocal range. According to music critic Henry Pleasants “The voice itself was a typical Italian light baritone with a two octave range from G to G, declining, as it darkened in later years, to F to F and with greater potential at the top than he was commonly disposed to exploit. He could and sometimes did depress the larynx and ‘cover’ as classical singers do, to sustain a full rounded tone in moving up the scale. On his recording ‘Day by Day,’ for example he gives out with full-voiced, admirably focused E flats and F’s and even lands a briefly held but confident high A flat just before the end.” [1] His early recordings found him singing in near-tenor range, hitting a high F on "All or Nothing At All" (1939) or "Where's My Bess", whilst being equally adept in the lower register, the low E on his 1962 recording of "Ol' Man River" being a prime example of such. His phrasing was also impeccable, getting to the heart of a song by emphasizing words and lines in ways that made a song more personal, whilst his ability to hold notes, sing above or behind the beat and rest on a note were hallmarks of a singer fully in command of his instrument.

What a guy. This is a young Sinatra.

As he grew he was known as an amazing singer yet he definitely had a temper that would get him into trouble. Frank is a smooth singer and jazz musician that many still try to emulate!