The Year of Tony Bennett

An Appreciation of the Art and Music of Tony Bennett

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Song of the Day: East of the Sun (West of the Moon)

The song of the day for Thursday, October 12, 2017 is “East of the Sun (West of the Moon).”

About This Song

Bruce Bowman wrote “East of the Sun” in 1934, while a student at Princeton University, for a student musical production called Stags at Bay, produced by the Princeton Triangle Club. The song had great reception and was noted by Princeton alumnus F. Scott Fitzgerald. After his graduation from college in 1936, Bowman worked briefly in Hollywood for the film industry, but decided to return to the East Coast. He was about to start a contract with a New York music publisher when he was killed in an automobile accident in 1937.

About This Version

Tony Bennett recorded “East of the Sun (West of the Moon)” in 1992 for his album Perfectly Frank. Ralph Sharon did the arrangement and recording engineer Frank Laico came out of retirement to record this album.

East of the Sun (West of the Moon)

Listen to East of the Sun (West of the Moon) on Spotify. Song · Tony Bennett · 1992


“East of the Sun (West of the Moon),” as well as Perfectly Frank, is available from iTunes.

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Song of the Day: Last Night When We Were Young

The song of the day for Friday, September 27, 2013 is “Last Night When We Were Young.”

About This Song

Written by Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg in 1936, “Last Night When We Were Young” may be one of the most perfect love songs ever written. Both Harold Arlen and Yip Harburg considered this their favorite of all their songs. The song had been originally written for a film called Metropolitan, but was cut before the film was released. Judy Garland recorded it for In The Good Old Summertime and Frank Sinatra recorded it for Take Me Out To The Ballgame, but it was cut from both films, mostly because it was considered “too sad.” No matter: it was a hit for both artists as well as many others, including Lawrence Tibbett, Carmen McRae, Sarah Vaughan, and even Carly Simon.

Alec Wilder, author of American Popular Song, said that:

Arlen told me that he wrote “Last Night While We Were Young” for Lawrence Tibbett. I can’t frankly imagine a less likely singer for this song. But, after all, once you have heard the Sinatra version, you can’t imagine anyone else singing it.

This is the most remarkable and beautiful song. It is one which goes far beyond the boundaries of popular music. For me, it is a concert song without a trace of trying to be it. It hasn’t any artiness about it or pretense. It’s obviously deeply felt, both by the composer and the lyricist E.Y. Harburg.

It is unlike any other Arlen song that I have heard. However, it is unmistakably his.

About This Version

I’m certainly in no position to argue with the late and great Alec Wilder, but I can definitely imagine Tony Bennett singing this song, which he does quite well on his tribute album to Frank Sinatra: Perfectly Frank. It was arranged and conducted by Robert Farnon and featured the Ralph Sharon Trio, with Paul Langosch on bass and Joe LaBarbera on drums. The extraordinary engineer Frank Laico came out of retirement to engineer this album for Tony Bennett.

http://open.spotify.com/track/1qgQmCZ3fUkG2dNSYI6OvN
“Last Night When We Were Young,” as well as the album Perfectly Frank, is available from iTunes and Amazon.com.

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Song of the Day: East of the Sun

The song of the day for Tuesday, July 9, 2013 is “East of the Sun.”

About This Song

“East of the Sun” was written in 1934 by Brooks Bowman. Bowman was a student at Princeton when he wrote this song for the university’s Triangle Club show, Stags at Bay. The song was recorded in 1935 and was a hit. This success earned Bowman a contract with the Selznik Studios in Hollywood. Tragically, Bowman died in an automobile accident before he could start his job. It’s widely thought that had he lived, Bowman may have been one of the great American songwriters.

About This Version

Today’s recording is from Tony Bennett’s 1992 album Perfectly Frank, which features songs made popular by Frank Sinatra. The album was arranged and conducted by Robert Farnon and Frank Laico came out of retirement to engineer the album.

http://open.spotify.com/track/3RyE6CY8JIaXzKrdf71pSS
“East of the Sun,” as well as the entire Perfectly Frank album, is available from iTunes.

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Frank Laico, RIP

Frank D. Laico, one of the greatest recording engineers of the 20th century, passed away on April 19, 2013 at the age of 95.

Frank Laico

Tony Bennett noted his passing:

Tony Bennett on Twitter

I loved Frank Laico. As engineer on a majority of my recordings, he’s a big reason my career has sustained thru the years. RIP.

The Seattle Times published this obituary.

This video interview from the Audio Engineering Society (AES) with Frank is from 2003 as he reminisces about the famous CBS 30th Street Studio and his methods of recording. His results were incredible. In this interview, he speaks about one of his last projects, Tony Bennett’s Perfectly Frank album, which won the 1993 Grammy Award for Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance.

In addition to his work on dozens of albums with Tony Bennett, he also recorded Frank Sinatra, Rosemary Clooney and the Dave Brubeck Quartet, among many others.