Celebrating 100 years of Frank Sinatra
NEW YORK -- The life of the past century's most celebrated singer - Frank Sinatra - is being celebrated at the New York Public Library of Performing Arts to mark the upcoming centennial of his birth. The exhibit opened to the public on Wednesday and features items from Ol' Blue Eye's life, including his Grammy's and his Oscar.
I spoke with his daughter Nancy, and his granddaughter Amanda Erlinger, who saw the exhibit for the first time this week.
"I think he'd be humbled," said Amanda. "He'd be amazed."
The family lent some of their most intimate mementos to the exhibit, curated by the Grammy Museum: early photos and his first Hoboken identification card. They wanted fans to see the human side of Sinatra.
"Maybe see that he played the ukulele, you know I'm not sure how many people know that," said Amanda.
One of Amanda's favorite photographs of her grandfather is of a young Frank Sinatra at age nine or ten.
"It sort of foretold the future," said Nancy, referencing the photo of Frank wearing a hat cocked to the side.
Grammy Museum's Bob Santelli says Sinatra was known for his swagger, but it all came back to the music.
"He's known as 'The Voice' and boy did he have a great one," said Santelli. "His ability to phrase, his ability to wrap a lyric around a melody line -- that's what Sinatra's really all about."
He was the envy of his peers.
"Frank Sinatra is a singer who comes along once in a lifetime," Bing Crosby said. "But why did he have to come in mine?"