1 I've spent an insane amount of time digging deep into the Sinatra discography, but after all these years, I keep discovering gems that had somehow eluded me. Here's a late-period ballad from 1974 worth savoring.
2 Sinatra was inconsistent in this period, still getting his voice back together after his 1971 retirement. Here, however, he's in command of his instrument.
3 The phrases aren't as long as when he first recorded this beautiful song (at a brighter tempo) 32 years earlier with Tommy Dorsey. But the storytelling is as rich as a novel, and the feeling of loss is almost overwhelming.
4 Listen to how he stretches out the word "cling" in the second A section at 1:22, with melismatic sigh into the next word; it's a brief erotic quiver.
5 He wrings maximum emotion and nuance from dynamics. In the last two bars of the bridge ("the deeper the doubts in my heart"), the slight drop in volume draws you further into the growing melancholy of the song.
6 Even more effective are the last four bars of the tune starting at 2:26 that fade slowly into a hush of longing that's all the more intense for being sung at a whisper. ("Then I'll kiss you my dear/Just as though you were here").
7 The song was written by John Benson Brooks (music) and Eddie DeLange (lyrics) and the arrangement is by Gordon Jenkins. It wasn't released until 1990 as part of a box set, and I discovered it via the digital release this month of a collection called "Reprise Rarities."
cc: @NancySinatra
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