About this product

Product Identifiers

PublisherRandom House Audio Publishing Group

ISBN-100307748480

ISBN-139780307748485

eBay Product ID (ePID)127345815

Product Key Features

TopicGeneral

Publication Year2010

Book TitleFrank : the Voice

LanguageEnglish

GenreBiography & Autobiography

AuthorJames Kaplan

FormatCompact Disc

Dimensions

Item Height1.6 In.

Item Length5.8 In.

Item Width5 In.

Item Weight16 Oz

Additional Product Features

Intended AudienceTrade

Reviews"Fascinating.... For anyone who wants to know what popular culture and celebrity felt like around the middle of the twentieth century, this book is the new bible." -Bill Ott,Booklist "This book may be the fullest account of Sinatra's first 40 years... His youth, persistence in pursuing a singing career, relationships with women, work with band leader Tommy Dorsey, the controversial reversal of his draft status during World War II, and relationships with musicians and mafiosi are all presented with panache and clarity." -Library Journal "The answer to 'what is there left to say about Sinatra' is staggeringly answered in James Kaplan's new book. This story has never been told with such incisiveness, care, research and respect. With so many new revelations, you might never really know who Frank Sinatra is until you read this book." -Michael Feinstein "Jim Kaplan's great gift is his own voice, in peak form-stylish, seductive, and richly resonant-that stands up to Sinatra's powerful baritone. This is a perceptive, passionate biography of an immense and immensely flawed musical figure whose life and legend continue to fascinate." -Bob Spitz, author ofThe Beatles "This is biography at its very best-the story of a fascinating character brought to life as never before through superb writing, impeccable research and penetrating insight. It is a terrific book." -Doris Kearns Goodwin,author ofTeam of Rivals "Sinatra was to 20th Century stagecraft what Churchill was to statecraft: the towering presence of the age. In this lyrical narrative, suffused with a mastery of popular culture, Frank is back-this time as a major figure in American history." -Jonathan Alter, author ofThe Promise: President Obama, Year One "James Kaplan succeeds not just in bringing Frank Sinatra alive in all his complexity, but in revealing in detail how he consciously, deliberately, and painstakingly transformed himself into a triumphantly successful entertainer and a national icon." -Michael Korda,author ofIke "At long last, we have a biography of Sinatra worthy of the man...a pop innovator whose influence remains incalculable, whose art remains undiminished. James Kaplan tells this story with the authority of a writer who inhabits his subject from deep inside. The pages fly by on the wings of song." -Gary Giddins, author ofBing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Warning Shadows From the Hardcover edition., "Fascinating.... For anyone who wants to know what popular culture and celebrity felt like around the middle of the twentieth century, this book is the new bible." -Bill Ott,Booklist "The answer to 'what is there left to say about Sinatra' is staggeringly answered in James Kaplan's new book. This story has never been told with such incisiveness, care, research and respect. With so many new revelations, you might never really know who Frank Sinatra is until you read this book." -Michael Feinstein "Jim Kaplan's great gift is his own voice, in peak form-stylish, seductive, and richly resonant-that stands up to Sinatra's powerful baritone. This is a perceptive, passionate biography of an immense and immensely flawed musical figure whose life and legend continue to fascinate." -Bob Spitz, author ofThe Beatles "This is biography at its very best-the story of a fascinating character brought to life as never before through superb writing, impeccable research and penetrating insight. It is a terrific book." -Doris Kearns Goodwin,author ofTeam of Rivals "Sinatra was to 20th Century stagecraft what Churchill was to statecraft: the towering presence of the age. In this lyrical narrative, suffused with a mastery of popular culture, Frank is back-this time as a major figure in American history." -Jonathan Alter, author ofThe Promise: President Obama, Year One "James Kaplan succeeds not just in bringing Frank Sinatra alive in all his complexity, but in revealing in detail how he consciously, deliberately, and painstakingly transformed himself into a triumphantly successful entertainer and a national icon." -Michael Korda,author ofIke "At long last, we have a biography of Sinatra worthy of the man...a pop innovator whose influence remains incalculable, whose art remains undiminished. James Kaplan tells this story with the authority of a writer who inhabits his subject from deep inside. The pages fly by on the wings of song." -Gary Giddins, author ofBing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Warning Shadows From the Hardcover edition., "Wonderfully vivid.... The story of Frank Sinatra's rise and self-invention and the story of his fall and remarkable comeback had the lineaments of the most essential American myths, and their telling, Pete Hamill once argued, required a novelist, 'some combination of Balzac and Raymond Chandler,' who might 'come closer to the elusive truth than an autobiographer as courtly as Sinatra will ever allow himself to do.' Now, with FRANK: THE VOICE, Sinatra has that chronicler in James Kaplan, who has produced a book that has all the emotional detail and narrative momentum of a novel. Kaplan writes with genuined sympathy for the singer and a deep appreciation of his musicianship, and devotes the better part of his book to an explication of Sinatra's art: the real reason readers care about him in the first place. " -Michiko Kakutani,The New York Times " Monumental... FRANK: THE VOICE is a timely reminder of what all the fuss over Sinatra was about in the first place. Kaplan follows in the footsteps of Peter Guralnick, whose magisterial two-volume biography of Elvis Presley was a landmark excavation of the artist from the dead-celebrity junk pile. Striking a similar, though more stylized, note, Mr. Kaplan offers a retelling of the early life of Francis Albert that illuminates the incredible-but-true origins of a 20th-century phenomenon. " -Wall Street Journal "Fascinating...compelling...marvelously thoughtful [and] readable. Kaplan brings something valuable and new to this account of Sinatra's first four decades, culminating in his cinematic triumph inFrom Here to Eternityand stunning vocal comeback in the early 1950s. First and most valuable, Kaplan gives us an illuminating portrait of a serious artist who helped revolutionize his medium. Kaplan also does a brilliant job of suggesting how the way Sinatra sang the song grew out of the life of an artist every bit as confounding and conflicted as his era - a man by turns generous, attentive and immensely decent, then ugly, violently abusive and self-absorbed to the point of cruelty." -Los Angeles Times "Sinatra lovers will be enthralled by Kaplan's generous approach to the guy who sang about 'how little we know.'" -O, The Oprah Magazine "Fascinating.... For anyone who wants to know what popular culture and celebrity felt like around the middle of the twentieth century, this book is the new bible." -Bill Ott,Booklist, starred review "Riveting... Kaplan's enthralling tale of an American icon serves as an introduction of "old blue eyes" to a new generation of listeners while winning the hearts of Sinatra's diehard fans." -Publishers Weekly, starred review "This book may be the fullest account of Sinatra's first 40 years... His youth, persistence in pursuing a singing career, relationships with women, work with band leader Tommy Dorsey, the controversial reversal of his draft status during World War II, and relationships with musicians and mafiosi are all presented with panache and clarity." -Library Journal "The answer to 'what is there left to say about Sinatra' is staggeringly answered in James Kaplan's new book. This story has never been told with such incisiveness, care, research and respect. With so many new revelations, you might never really know who Frank Sinatra is until you read this book." -Michael Feinstein "Jim Kaplan's great gift is his own voice, in peak form-stylish, seductive, and richly resonant-that stands up to Sinatra's powerful baritone. This is a perceptive, passionate biography of an immense and immensely flawed musical figure whose life and legend continue to fascinate." -Bob Spitz<, "Fascinating.... For anyone who wants to know what popular culture and celebrity felt like around the middle of the twentieth century, this book is the new bible." -Bill Ott, Booklist, starred review "Riveting... Kaplan's enthralling tale of an American icon serves as an introduction of "old blue eyes" to a new generation of listeners while winning the hearts of Sinatra's diehard fans." -Publishers Weekly, starred review "This book may be the fullest account of Sinatra's first 40 years... His youth, persistence in pursuing a singing career, relationships with women, work with band leader Tommy Dorsey, the controversial reversal of his draft status during World War II, and relationships with musicians and mafiosi are all presented with panache and clarity." -Library Journal "The answer to 'what is there left to say about Sinatra' is staggeringly answered in James Kaplan's new book. This story has never been told with such incisiveness, care, research and respect. With so many new revelations, you might never really know who Frank Sinatra is until you read this book." -Michael Feinstein "Jim Kaplan's great gift is his own voice, in peak form-stylish, seductive, and richly resonant-that stands up to Sinatra's powerful baritone. This is a perceptive, passionate biography of an immense and immensely flawed musical figure whose life and legend continue to fascinate." -Bob Spitz, author of The Beatles "This is biography at its very best-the story of a fascinating character brought to life as never before through superb writing, impeccable research and penetrating insight. It is a terrific book." -Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of Team of Rivals "Sinatra was to 20th Century stagecraft what Churchill was to statecraft: the towering presence of the age. In this lyrical narrative, suffused with a mastery of popular culture, Frank is back-this time as a major figure in American history." -Jonathan Alter, author of The Promise: President Obama, Year One "James Kaplan succeeds not just in bringing Frank Sinatra alive in all his complexity, but in revealing in detail how he consciously, deliberately, and painstakingly transformed himself into a triumphantly successful entertainer and a national icon." -Michael Korda, author of Ike "At long last, we have a biography of Sinatra worthy of the man...a pop innovator whose influence remains incalculable, whose art remains undiminished. James Kaplan tells this story with the authority of a writer who inhabits his subject from deep inside. The pages fly by on the wings of song." -Gary Giddins, author of Bing Crosby: A Pocketful of Dreams and Warning Shadows

Number of Volumes18 vols.

Edition DescriptionUnabridged edition

SynopsisBestselling author James Kaplan redefines Frank Sinatra in a triumphant new biography that includes many rarely seen photographs. Frank Sinatra was the best-known entertainer of the twentieth century-infinitely charismatic, lionized and notorious in equal measure. But despite his mammoth fame, Sinatra the man has remained an enigma. As Bob Spitz did with the Beatles, Tina Brown for Diana, and Peter Guralnick for Elvis, James Kaplan goes behind the legend and hype to bring alive a force that changed popular culture in fundamental ways. Sinatra endowed the songs he sang with the explosive conflict of his own personality. He also made the very act of listening to pop music a more personal experience than it had ever been. In Frank: The Voice, Kaplan reveals how he did it, bringing deeper insight than ever before to the complex psyche and torbulent life behind that incomparable vocal instrument. We relive the years 1915 to 1954 in glistening detail, experiencing as if for the first time: Sinatra's journey from the streets of Hoboken, his fall from the apex of celebrity, and his Oscar-winning return in From Here to Eternity. Here at last is the biographer who makes the reader feel what it was really like to be Frank Sinatra-as man, as musician, as tortured genius. From the Hardcover edition., Bestselling author James Kaplan redefines Frank Sinatra in a triumphant new biography that includes many rarely seen photographs. Frank Sinatra was the best-known entertainer of the twentieth century--infinitely charismatic, lionized and notorious in equal measure. But despite his mammoth fame, Sinatra the man has remained an enigma. As Bob Spitz did with the Beatles, Tina Brown for Diana, and Peter Guralnick for Elvis, James Kaplan goes behind the legend and hype to bring alive a force that changed popular culture in fundamental ways. Sinatra endowed the songs he sang with the explosive conflict of his own personality. He also made the very act of listening to pop music a more personal experience than it had ever been. In Frank: The Voice , Kaplan reveals how he did it, bringing deeper insight than ever before to the complex psyche and turbulent life behind that incomparable vocal instrument. We relive the years 1915 to 1954 in glistening detail, experiencing as if for the first time Sinatra's journey from the streets of Hoboken, his fall from the apex of celebrity, and his Oscar-winning return in From Here to Eternity . Here at last is the biographer who makes the reader feel what it was really like to be Frank Sinatra--as man, as musician, as tortured genius. From the Hardcover edition.