Community Corner
How a Local Author Resolved to Capture Frank Sinatra
Hastings author James Kaplan describes how he captured the true genius of Frank Sinatra in his latest book.
James Kaplan is a writer's writer. In addition to publishing regularly in the most prestigious magazines in the country, including Vanity Fair, The New Yorker and the New York Times Magazine, he's produced a string of books successful enough to allow him to raise three children and pay off the mortgage on a house in Hastings, where he's lived for the last 26 years.
Now, he keeps the streak going with a new biography of Sinatra, Frank: The Voice, which has been well received by critics and garnered a steady stream of publicity, including radio and television appearances across the country and a forthcoming stint on the "Charlie Rose Show."
Irascible New York Times' book critic Michiko Kakutani wrote that Kaplan has "produced a book that has all the emotional detail and narrative momentum of a novel," while The Wall Street Journal concluded that he adopts a tone "just this side of hard-boiled: tough but fair, loose-tongued but not too chatty, cynical when necessary, and good for a few laughs when things drag or get too dire." Though the book covers well-trod ground, according to the Journal, "nobody has spun the old yarns with the raconteur's touch and attitude that Mr. Kaplan brings to the job,"
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Verbally, Kaplan is as adept at spinning yarns as he is in print and he appeared at the Hastings Library on Sunday. The idea for the book came after he wrote a tome with Jerry Lewis, who invited him to the star's annual telethon in Los Angeles. One night he attended a dinner with several musicians, who had all played with Sinatra.
"There have been a lot of biographies of Sinatra, but I found that they were often gossipy and concentrated on the women, the fights and the mob," said Kaplan. "At the dinner, we had a lot of fun and as we started to drink a little more they began to talk about Sinatra. I expected them to cover the usual gossip, but to a man, they spoke in hushed tones about what a musical genius he was. I knew he was a musical giant, but I didn't quite realize how other musicians regarded him."
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Kaplan says he has a good ear and "noodles" at the piano, but he's probably a pretty good player. He decided to analyze Sinatra's musical approach as he explored his public persona. "I had an opportunity to write about a man who had an unparalleled 60-year career as a celebrity and whose life was part of the fabric of America in the 20th Century, touching upon politics, movies, radio, television, records and pop music," he said. "I tried to do something different, to write an empathetic book and attempt to get the genius on the page."
Kaplan had a personal interest in the subject, as well. "I'm a huge music fan and Sinatra was part of my childhood," he said. "I grew up in '50s and came of age when rock and roll emerged. I was crazy about rock and roll when it came along, but I never felt that I had to reject the past. To me, the mark of great art and great music is simple: if I get goosebumps, I love it, and that's what I've felt across the board when I've encountered Sinatra's music."
Although he set out to write about Sinatra's music, Kaplan tried to avoid a dry musicological tone. Writing about music and keeping the narrative interesting for the non-musician can be difficult. The definitive study of Sinatra's music, Sinatra! The Song is You: A Singer's Art, by Will Friedwald, is "a little more on the technical side," said Kaplan, who overcame the challenges by focusing on things the layperson can understand.
"I wanted to write about music in a way that was compelling and accessible, not intellectual or dry, and that's a tough trick that gave me a lot of sleepless nights," said Kaplan. "I had a basic idea of what Sinatra did by recognizing how hard he studied the lyrics and how difficult it is to take long breaths between phrases, which let him tell the story, be communicative and convey a warm, intimate sound. I listened to a huge amount of Sinatra on iTunes; I also have a gigantic music selection so any moment I needed to listen to something, I could punch it up and think about what he was trying to do."
What put Sinatra in a category by himself was his ability to master breath control so that he could deliver the lyrics of any song "to a point where he is able to make you feel like he is singing to you and you alone," said Kaplan. "There were lots of big band singers of his era who had good voices, butt hey couldn't communicate a song the way Sinatra did. He had a magic that was not analyzable; he was in a category by himself."
Beyond the stages and studios, of course, Sinatra lived an outsized life. Kaplan intended to write a complete biography, but ended the book after the singer won an Oscar at age 40 for his role in "From Here to Eternity," resurrecting his career after several train-wrecks nearly derailed his time in the limelight. Kaplan is currently in talks with his publisher to write a second volume.
"During his 30's, he was a round peg in a square hole," said Kaplan. "He hung out with mobsters and got busted sitting with Lucky Luciano when he went to a major summit held in Cuba in 1947. His leftist politics hurt him during the anti-Communist 1950's and at the time, Italian-Americans weren't considered to be white, they were thought of as a minority. Worst of all, he left his wife and children for Ava Gardner; nowadays, that's common, of course, but celebrities didn't do that back then."
After World War II, his music also fell out of favor. "The ballads of tenderness and yearning that he performed with Tommy Dorsey worked during the war when troops were fighting overseas, but afterward, popular music was dominated by novelty songs," said Kaplan. "His movie studio, his agent, his record label and Ava Gardner dropped him, so his comeback and subsequent longevity is even more incredible and I ended the book at what seemed to be a logical dynamic pause."
During his talk at the library, Kaplan showed a clip of an early Sinatra movie, read from the book and take questions from the audience. He will also appear at the Jacob Burns Film center in Pleasantville on Nov. 10, where he will show more film clips and sit for an interview with "New York Times" book critic Janet Maslin.
After spending five years writing Frank: The Voice, Kaplan falls naturally into the sociable aspect of talking about his baby. "It's work, but it's good work, a different kind of work," he said. "Writers are generally solitary cats who spend their days in silence. Now I have to blab about myself and it can snap your neck a little bit, but it's enjoyable."
After the tour and the talking cease, he will be able to enjoy Hastings again. "I love that it's walkable and even though it's hilly, I like that," he said. "It's diverse architecturally and geologically; the houses aren't all ticky-tacky or look alike. It's small, but it's dramatic with the Palisades and the river. There's a funkiness and an artistic sensibility to Hastings that's hard to find in the other Rivertowns."