Will Friedwald
Author of Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons
About the Author
Image credit: Why I Write: Will Friedwald
Works by Will Friedwald
Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies: A Complete Illustrated Guide to the Warner Bros. Cartoons (1989) 190 copies, 1 review
Frank Sinatra: Concepts 1 copy
Associated Works
The Carl Stalling Project, Vol. 2: More Music from Warner Bros. Cartoons, 1939-1957 (1995) — Contributor — 18 copies
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1961
- Gender
- male
- Occupations
- music critic
- Organizations
- The Wall Street Journal
- Nationality
- USA
- Associated Place (for map)
- USA
Members
Reviews
Rather than a straightforward biography, which in the case of Francis Albert Sinatra would include a lot of drama and scandal, Sinatra! The Song is You : A Singer's Art focus on Sinatra as a singer. Because of the musicological approach, I found the book challenging to read - and indeed have been reading it on and off for 4 months - but nevertheless still enjoyed it.
Friedwald has an encyclopedic knowledge of seemingly every song in Sinatra's discography, including rare recordings only made show more for the military in WWII and recordings from Sinatra's radio programs. He discusses the creation, innovations, and effects of Sinatra's music in a largely chronological order. The book is arranged in era's of Sinatra's career mainly based on collaborations with others like bandleaders Tommy Dorsey and Axel Stordahl and arrangers Nelson Riddle, Billy May, and Gordon Jenkins.
The book discusses Sinatra's role in performing the types of songs of that became known as "standards" and the singers role as interpreter (not to mention the challenges Sinatra faced when the music business shifted to a model where songs were "covered" rather than interpreted). Sinatra lead the shift in prominence of bandleaders to singers during WWII and achieved unprecedented stardom. But Sinatra's real strength was reinventing himself consistently so that he could be a hitmaker over six decades.
I found this a unique and informative book. If you're interested in the work of Sinatra, or in musicology in general, I recommend it.
Favorite Passages:
Friedwald has an encyclopedic knowledge of seemingly every song in Sinatra's discography, including rare recordings only made show more for the military in WWII and recordings from Sinatra's radio programs. He discusses the creation, innovations, and effects of Sinatra's music in a largely chronological order. The book is arranged in era's of Sinatra's career mainly based on collaborations with others like bandleaders Tommy Dorsey and Axel Stordahl and arrangers Nelson Riddle, Billy May, and Gordon Jenkins.
The book discusses Sinatra's role in performing the types of songs of that became known as "standards" and the singers role as interpreter (not to mention the challenges Sinatra faced when the music business shifted to a model where songs were "covered" rather than interpreted). Sinatra lead the shift in prominence of bandleaders to singers during WWII and achieved unprecedented stardom. But Sinatra's real strength was reinventing himself consistently so that he could be a hitmaker over six decades.
I found this a unique and informative book. If you're interested in the work of Sinatra, or in musicology in general, I recommend it.
Favorite Passages:
"Sinatra, on the other hand, positively celebrates his unhappiness. It seems totally typical of Sinatra that he recorded a song called “Winners,” which is dark and somber, highly depressing. The flip side of this is "Here's to the Losers," which is joyful and upbeat ... The implication is that winning is something to be taken seriously, something that carries with it grave responsibility; but losing is something you can have fun with. The real joy in life is in losing."
Where other singers, at best, work with lyrics and melodies, Sinatra dealt in mental images and pure feelings that he seemed to summon up almost without the intervention of composers, arrangers, and musicians as vital as their contributions were. (In fact, Sinatra was so sure of his relationship with his audience that he gladly acknowledged orchestrators and songwriters in spoken introductions to each number. How could it take away from what he did to mention the men who put notes and words on paper when it was he who imbued them with all their meaning?)show less
The idea is good. Instead of Hollywood gossip, tales of slugging reporters, and bouts with Ava, why not write a book that focuses entirely on his output as a singer? However, the execution is about as bad as you can get. It is full of bad puns, clumsy sentences, non sequiturs, and any excuse to use a reference to a song lyric. He insults any rock-era musician or songwriter, despite the author's not looking older than mid-40's when this was published (sometime in the early 90's). How many show more people born after 1945 think of the Beatles as "kiddie pop"?Just to give you an idea of how bad this is, when discussing Neil Hefti, who after working with Frank wrote the Batman theme, he actually writes "Holy foreshadowing!" It's really too bad, because the author knows a fair amount about music--possibly getting a little too technical for non-musicians, but great for people who are musicians. And the facts that he's gathered from interviews are exceptional. It's just hard to believe that he could write this, read it, and still think "Yes! This is great writing!" And that the editor and publisher went along with it! If you ask me, this guy can't write a book. show less
The idea is good. Instead of Hollywood gossip, tales of slugging reporters, and bouts with Ava, why not write a book that focuses entirely on his output as a singer? However, the execution is about as bad as you can get. It is full of bad puns, clumsy sentences, non sequiturs, and any excuse to use a reference to a song lyric. He insults any rock-era musician or songwriter, despite the author's not looking older than mid-40's when this was published (sometime in the early 90's). How many show more people born after 1945 think of the Beatles as "kiddie pop"?Just to give you an idea of how bad this is, when discussing Neil Hefti, who after working with Frank wrote the Batman theme, he actually writes "Holy foreshadowing!" It's really too bad, because the author knows a fair amount about music--possibly getting a little too technical for non-musicians, but great for people who are musicians. And the facts that he's gathered from interviews are exceptional. It's just hard to believe that he could write this, read it, and still think "Yes! This is great writing!" And that the editor and publisher went along with it! If you ask me, this guy can't write a book. show less
Straighten Up and Fly Right: The Life and Music of Nat King Cole (Cultural Biographies) by Will Friedwald
This 527 page (not counting notes or index) book focuses more on the music of Nat King Cole with just a small amount of biographical information spread throughout. The author is thorough in examining Cole's music, his contribution to jazz and popular music, and how Cole's contributions influenced many other artists. I was familiar with Cole's piano career and still consider him one of the best jazz pianists ever. He also had one of the smoothest voices of any singer with precise show more pronunciation that no one else comes close to. I would have rated the book five stars except for two things: 1) There is no discography. While the author covers each album or single and lets us know when it was recorded and for albums, what is on them, I would have liked to have seen this in list format for each album, the track listings, the date issued, and also, if it is still available on cd; and 2) as with so many biographers, there was no follow-up to let us know what happened to his wife Maria, his first wife Nadine, his children - including adopted children Cookie and Nat Kelly as well as the twins and even a follow-up on Natalie. show less
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Statistics
- Works
- 14
- Also by
- 3
- Members
- 815
- Popularity
- #31,298
- Rating
- 4.2
- Reviews
- 8
- ISBNs
- 32
- Languages
- 2