Adam Gopnik, writing for The New Yorker Culture Desk:
For decades, there was a special connection between Sinatra’s music and what is now called “terrestrial radio.” A curious extravagance of disk jockeys spent entire careers spinning Sinatra records—partly because there were so many recordings and so many of them so good, partly because the range of emotion was sufficiently large that a single hour could pass from upbeat to deeply melancholy and still remain consistent in quality, and perhaps mostly because there was something . . . epic about every Sinatra take. Many of these radio personalities, like William B. Williams of WNEW-AM, who first called Sinatra “Chairman of the Board,” died long ago. Others have slipped on into silence. And, some, such as Mark Sudock, who has a fine scholarly program on the Internet radio station Metromedia, have emerged more recently. But some of the Sinatra standbys stayed on for a long time after the singer’s death, in 1998. Herewith, a brief summary of the twilight of Sinatra radio, and a quick salute to a couple of the hardier cases. (To read the rest of the story, click on the link below.)
The New Yorker: One More Spin Of Frank Sinatra
From DICK SUMMER
I grew up in Brooklyn, listening to Willie B. doing “The Bachelor’s Apartment.” I was, I thInk ,5 or 6. But I guess puberty hit me early and hard, and I identified with lots of the stuff Willie was saying and Frank was singing. One of the most incredible days in my life was the morning I started on WNEW-FM…9:30…the studio door opens, The Melachrino Strings hit a gliss, The sun shines down from the heavens, the tectonic plate under Fifth Avenue shifts, a new Mountain peak suddenly appears, and what to my wondering eyes should appear…but WILLIE B. Sanding atop said mountain. He looks down at me sitting in the chair, and in that husky bass-baritone usually resolved for national prime time TV voiceovers, he says, “Welcome to the staff kid. You sound fine.” I didn’t know if I should shake his hand or kiss his ring. I think I said somethin extremely intelligent like “Gezornenplatz…Mr. Williams…Willie…Sir.”
What a memory. Dick Summer