Francis A. & Edward K.
Reprise Records (1968)
- I Like The Summer
- Yellow Days
- Poor Butterfly
- Come Back To Me
- Follow Me
- Sunny
- All I Need Is The Girl
- Indian Summer
A wonderful but underappreciated gem in the Sinatra discography. Sinatra's
instructions to Billy May were to just let the Ellington orchestra play
and not to worry about song length. Just hearing Johnny Hodges backing
The Voice on Indian Summer
is worth the price of admission. My favorite
track, however is All I Need Is The Girl
—virtually a Ph.D. dissertation
in slow swing.
By this time in his career, Sinatra had few mountains left to climb and many years of hard living had begun to erode his legendary instrument, but his considerable clout allowed him the freedom to engage in artistic pursuits purely for his own enjoyment. Namely, to partner with other legendary talents of the jazz world such as Count Basie, Antonio Carlos Jobim and Duke Ellington to make the kind of albums that interested him regardless of where the musical currents of the '60's drifted. Sinatra had a bit of a cold during these sessions and the Ellington orchestra preferred to take its lead from Duke and not Billy May, but even though the performances aren't top-shelf, they still have more than enough magic to warrant their consideration. As May described it in later interviews, there was some awful s*%t in there but some pretty good stuff, too.
Reportedly Sinatra showed up to one recording session quite well oiled after celebrating his birthday. When May asked if he was having trouble reading the charts, Sinatra responded that he couldn't even see the f*#@ing chart! At that, he called the session off and invited everyone back to his home for more celebrating.
Recorded on December 11, and 12, 1967.
