FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Press Contact: Miller Wright / Dan Fortune at (212) 977-7800
INTERNATIONALLY ACCLAIMED JAZZ SINGER AND GUITARIST
JOHN PIZZARELLI
RELEASES HIS FIRST EVER TRIBUTE TO FRANK SINATRA
“DEAR MR. SINATRA”
FOCUSES ON SONGS WRITTEN SPECIFICALLY FOR “OL’ BLUE EYES”
FEATURING THE CLAYTON-HAMILTON JAZZ ORCHESTRA AND ARRANGEMENTS BY JOHN CLAYTON, QUINCY JONES & DON SEBESKY
JOHN PIZZARELLI, one of the most celebrated performers bringing popular standards to a new generation, will release a very special recording from Telarc International this summer. His new CD, Dear Mr. Sinatra, pays homage to Frank Sinatra, perhaps the greatest entertainer of all time, by focusing on the songs that were specifically written for “Ol’ Blue Eyes.” Early in his career Pizzarelli opened for Mr. Sinatra on tour. His father, the jazz guitar legend Bucky Pizzarelli, played on many of Sinatra’s seminal recordings. Dear Mr. Sinatra is in many ways the most personal of all the Sinatra tributes available. The new disc, featuring the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, was released in stores nationwide on July 18, 2006.
Dear Mr. Sinatra, the singer and guitarist’s first-ever Sinatra album, follows Pizzarelli’s highly-acclaimed tributes to Nat “King” Cole (Dear Mr. Cole and P.S. Mr. Cole), Antonio Carlos Jobim (Bossa Nova) and The Beatles (John Pizzarelli Meets The Beatles). “Frank has always been one of my main musical influences. I love the way he transforms himself from song to song,” John comments. “In the early 1990s, I was honored to open for him with my quartet in Europe and around the states. Frank would appear in the wings during our final number, swinging and clapping and smiling. He would come onstage and cheer for us. It was an honor to play with him and we were thrilled he enjoyed our music.”
“We made a conscious effort to pick songs that lent themselves well to the jazz idiom,” John continues. “We wanted our CD to be less conventional than other Sinatra tributes. Many of the songs we chose were written for him and went on to become standards, rather than songs that he merely performed.” Dear Mr. Sinatra is John’s first major recording with the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra, even though he has known John Clayton and Jeff Hamilton for over 20 years. Fresh off the success of the smash success of Christmas Songs, their collaboration with jazz superstar Diana Krall, their scintillating performances and word-class arrangements add to the cohesiveness of the record.
Many selections come from the men Sinatra considered his own personal songwriters, such as “Ring A Ding Ding,” the rarely-recorded song by Sammy Cahn and Jimmy Van Heusen. “’Ring A Ding Ding’ was something that Frank would say all the time,” John says, ”so he asked Sammy to write a song using the phrase. Just like Dean Martin used to hear something and say, ‘hey, ain’t that a kick in the head?’ and they wrote a song about it. These words were just part of their vocabulary.”
This collection includes several unique performances. “Nice And Easy,” written by Lew Spence and Alan & Marilyn Bergman, features a new added set of lyrics never recorded by Sinatra or anyone else (the new lyrics will be performed by Mr. Bergman himself on an upcoming album, but John has beat him). The classic “In the Wee Small Hours” features a special arrangement by Quincy Jones originally written for Sinatra and the Count Basie Band. They performed it for two nights in Chicago but it was never recorded. John discovered the chart after legendary radio personality Jonathan Schwartz recommended it for a recent tribute to Mr. Jones.
The song “Witchcraft” was included after John heard a story about how Sinatra originally selected it. “Sinatra was over at Cy Coleman’s house listening to demo records one day,” relays John. “‘What’s at the top of the pile?’ asks Frank. ‘Oh that’s nothing,’ Cy replies, ‘I have much better stuff down further.’ ‘No, no, just play the one at top of the pole.’ He discovered the now familiar song then and there, which led to the famous recording.” This arrangement was written for John’s big band by Don Sebesky as a nod to Coleman after the composer’s surprise passing in 2004.
John recorded the song “Can’t We Be Friends?” as an homage to the late guitar innovator George Van Eps. A pioneer who first invented the concept of the 7 String Guitar, Van Eps played on Sinatra’s original recording of the song. John’s father Bucky, who played not only with Sinatra, but with Peggy Lee, Tony Bennett and many major orchestras, takes the part on John’s version.
Other songs come from Pizzarelli’s favorite Sinatra records: “I See Your Face Before Me” (from In the Wee Small Hours), “You Make Me Feel So Young” (from Sinatra at the Sands), “How About You?” and “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” (from Songs For Swingin’ Lovers), “If I Had You” (from Songs from Great Britain) and “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby” (from Strangers in the Night). Dear Mr. Sinatra, recorded over three days in Los Angeles, is John’s seventh release for Telarc International. The disc includes special guest Bucky Pizzarelli on rhythm guitar and arrangements by John Clayton, with contributions from Don Sebesky, Dick Lieb and Quincy Jones.
JOHN PIZZARELLI has been impressing audiences for over 25 years by singing classic standards and late-night ballads, and by playing sublime and inventive guitar. His cool jazz flavor has made him one of the prime revivalists of the great American songbook. On television he is recognized from national appearances on “The Tonight Show,” “Late Night With Conan O’Brien” and in the famous commercials for Foxwoods Casino. He has appeared in films like The Out-Of-Towners with Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn and has been seen on performance stages from Radio City Music Hall to the Hollywood Bowl to festivals around the globe. He has been heard, of course, on numerous recordings and now on his nationally syndicated radio program, Radio Deluxe with John Pizzarelli, for which he’s interviewed such stars as Tony Danza, Liza Minnelli and Regis Philbin. Please visit www.johnpizzarelli.com for tour schedule, discography, radio guests and much more.
TELARC INTERNATIONAL, now in its twenty-eighth year as one of the world’s most distinguished independent recording companies, has been honored with forty-nine Grammy Awards for performance, production and engineering. Other important awards have included the French Grand Prix du Disque and Diapason d’Or; Japan’s Record of the Year; and Germany’s Audiophile CD of the Year. Although it began as a classical label, the Cleveland-based company now boasts a catalog of over 600 recordings in a variety of genres, ranging from classical and classical-crossover to contemporary blues and jazz. Telarc releases approximately fifty-five recordings each year, working with a host of jazz headliners including Dave Brubeck, The Manhattan Transfer, McCoy Tyner, Ann Hampton Callaway, Tierney Sutton and Janis Siegel.
