Frankie Laine
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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Frankie Laine, born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio (Chicago, March 30, 1913 – San Diego, February 6, 2007), was a successful American musician, singer and songwriter whose career spanned 75 years, from his first concerts in 1930 with a marathon dance company to his final performance of "That's My Desire" in 2005. Often billed as America's Number One Song Stylist, his other nicknames include Mr. Rhythm, Old Leather Lungs, Mr Steel Tonsils, and Old Man Jazz. His hits included "That's My Desire", "That Lucky Old Sun", "Mule Train", "Cry of the Wild Goose", "Jezebel", "High Noon", "I Believe", "Hey Joe!", "The Kid's Last Fight", "Cool Water", "Moonlight Gambler", "Love is a Golden Ring", "Rawhide", and "Lord, You Gave Me a Mountain". He sang well-known theme songs of notable movie soundtracks such as 3:10 To Yuma, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, and Blazing Saddles, although he was not a country & western singer. He was a singer's singer who sang an eclectic number of songs, stretching from big band crooning to pop to western-themed songs to jazz and blues, all bent around his inimitable singing style. He did not sing the soundtrack song for High Noon, which was sung by Tex Ritter, but his own version was released and became a hit.
Balladeer
Recorded in 1959, "Balladeer", is a folk-blues album that was (and still remains) years ahead of its time. Laine had helped pioneer the folk music movement a full ten years earlier with his hit folk-pop records penned by Terry Gilkyson and others, and it was only fitting that he release a hard folk album now that the movement was becoming more popular. Orchestrated and arranged by Fred Katz (who'd brought Laine the innovative "Satan Wears a Satin Gown") and Frank DeVol, this album has a truly timeless feel to it. Laine and Katz collaborated on some of the new material, along with Lucy Drucker (who apparently inspired the "Lucy D" in one of the songs). Other songs are by folk, country and blues artists like Brownie McGhee, James A. Bland, Huddie "Leadbelly" Ledbetter, and Hungarian composer Rudolf Friml. The closing track, "And Doesn't She Roll" (co-written by Laine), with its rhythmic counter-chorus in the background foretells Paul Simon's celebrated Graceland album two decades later.
Included are powerful renditions of "Rocks and Gravel", "Careless Love", "Sixteen Tons", "The Jelly Coal Man", "On a Monday", "Lucy D" (a chilling, original melody that sounds like the later Simon and Garfunkel hit, "Scarborough Fair", but depicts the murder of a beautiful young woman by her unrequited lover), "Carry Me Back To Old Virginney", "Stack of Blues", "Old Blue", "Cherry Red", and "New Orleans" (better known as "The House of the Rising Sun", which would become a hit for the British rock group, The Animals a few years later.
