1967 Hollywood
K4815 Once I Loved (O Amor En Paz)
(Antonio Carlos Jobim/Ray Gilbert/Vinicius De Moraes)
Duchess Music Corp./New Thunder Music (BMI)
Arranged & Conducted by Claus Ogerman
-10 (2:36) CD: 46013-2 The Complete Reprise Studio Recordings Disc 11
CD: 9-26340-2The Reprise Collection
CD: 1021-2Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim
LP: FS1021Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim
K4816 How Insensitive (Insensatez)
w/Antonio Carlos Jobim
(Antonio Carlos Jobim/Norman Gimbel/Vinicius De Moraes)
Duchess Music Corp./New Thunder Music (BMI)
Arranged & Conducted by Claus Ogerman
-7 (3:15) CD: 46013-2 The Complete Reprise Studio Recordings Disc 11
CD: 9-26340-2The Reprise Collection
CD: 1021-2Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim
LP: FS1021Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim
REVIEW
Revisiting A Masterpiece: When Frank Sinatra Collaborated With Antonio Carlos
Jobim
NATE CHINENTwitterFROM Frank Sinatra and Antonio Carlos Jobim in the
studio.Courtesy of Frank Sinatra EnterprisesFrank Sinatra was well into his Rat
Pack era, the reigning American embodiment of masculine suavity and aplomb,
when he teamed up with a maestro of Brazilian music to make one of the most
exquisitely tender albums of his career. That album, Francis Albert Sinatra &
Antonio Carlos Jobim, has lost none of its luster since it was first released
50 years ago. In fact, a newly remastered anniversary edition extracts
additional depth from Claus Ogerman's orchestrations, which frame Sinatra's
voice like a Rolex on a velvet cushion.
Jobim, a pianist and guitarist as well as a composer, was the beating heart at
the center of a worldwide bossa nova craze, following the success of
Getz/Gilberto. A joint effort of the American tenor saxophonist Stan Getz and
the Brazilian guitarist and singer João Gilberto, that album also served as a
showcase for Jobim's songs, including "The Girl From Ipanema," a runaway
smashThe album, recorded in Hollywood in the winter of 1967, captures both
Sinatra and Jobim at an apex, flush with creative and popular success. Sinatra
was coming off a knockout run of albums on his Reprise label — including
Sinatra at the Sands, recorded with the Count Basie Orchestra; That's Life, a
Top 10; and Strangers in the Night, whose title track became an unstoppable
hit. Enlarge this imageFrank Sinatra with Antonio Carlos Jobim in 1967.Ed
Thrasher/Courtesy of Frank Sinatra EnterprisesThe 50th anniversary edition of
Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim has just been released in various
formats, including two vinyl packages. And along with the music from the
original album, it includes two previously unreleased tracks: A live medley
from a television special, and part of a session reel for "The Girl From
Ipanema," which Sinatra and Jobim sing as a duet."Don't let it run away,
fellas, with the tempo," Sinatra cautions at the top of the first take. "Just
hold it down, let it settle down. Because it's got a lot of — it's got a gang
of words." After the take is finished, he calls for another one, "right away."
His decisive brusqueness strikes a jarring contrast to the singing, which is as
delectably airy as a soufflé.The commercial relevancy of bossa nova is one way
to explain Sinatra's keen interest in Jobim: He was aware of his tenuous
position within a cultural moment increasingly defined by The Beatles. But his
treatment of this music belies any charge of opportunism. While bossa nova
presented a new angle for him as a singer — "I haven't sung so soft since I had
the laryngitis," he quipped during the sessions — he clearly regarded the style
as something more than a novelty."No other American pop star would so
thoroughly immerse himself in the world of bossa," writes Will Friedwald in his
fine critical biography Sinatra! The Song is You: A Singer's Art. "He not only
recorded two whole albums' worth of the stuff but sacrificed his signature
stylistics in order to more smoothly fit into the new vernacular."Consider the
sensitivity of Sinatra's phrasing on "Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars," a version
of Jobim's "Corcovado" with English lyrics by the critic Gene Lees.The balance
of voice and orchestration is so impeccably calibrated that it has effectively
been canonized: When Diana Krall made her own bossa nova album in 2009, she
named it Quiet Nights, enlisting Ogerman as arranger (who won a Grammy for his
efforts).In its original iteration, Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos
Jobim broke into the Top 20 and spent 28 consecutive weeks on the Billboard
album chart. According to Michael Bourne, the host of Singers Unlimited on
WBGO, it marked another layer of validation for bossa nova in the American pop
mainstream. "Even after the album Getz/Gilberto won a Grammy as album of the
year," said Bourne, "the Sinatra/Jobim album was a musical apotheosis, a
blessing of Jobim's songs from America's musical Pope."There was, however, one
distinction that eluded the album. Sinatra had won album of the year at the
previous two Grammy Awards — for September of My Years (1965) and A Man and His
Music (1966) — but he wasn't destined for a threepeat. While Francis Albert
Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim was nominated, and perhaps even the frontrunner,
the top honor went to another album that has stood the test of time: Sgt.
Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.<!--#yiv1842305586 filtered {}#yiv1842305586
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