Singer / Actor
1940s through the 2000s
- He was in about a dozen Movies and TV Shows and made almost 50 Record Albums!
- He sang song Rawhide!
- He sang Ghost Riders in the Sky!
AKA
- Francesco Paolo LoVecchio
Frankie Laine
Television Category Star
- Ceremony was on February 8, 1960
Frankie Laine
Recording Category Star
- Ceremony was on February 8, 1960
Golden Hits
Frankie Laine's impact upon modern music is important. No other singer of the last 25 years was more the catalyst that made the transition from the smooth musical chemistry of the ballad singing era of the Thirties and Forties to the more intricate and heavier beat emphasis of rock 'n roll.
Look back to 1940 and trace the top singers and you'll find that the "Mr. Rhythm" monicker that Hollywood publicist Red Doff slipped on Laine was pertinent. Laine admits to ten years previous to 1947-48, during which time jobs as marathon dancer, factory worker, cab driver, etc., kept the wolf from his door. Nothing happened vocally until Laine became a Louis Armstrong trumpet fan. When Frankie decided to utilize the same marvelous drive and phrasing that characterized the Armstrong trumpet, his career swung into high gear. While working the intermission job at Billy Berg's, a wartime Hollywood jazz boite, a Mercury Records artist and repertoire man sought out Laine to do a single side for which the firm had high hopes. Today that single side is forgotten, but the "B" side chosen by Laine to fill out the side, All of Me, launched a meteoric rise for the one-time Chicago choir boy.
Laine truly bridged the chasm between the Crosby-Colombo sweet ballad style and rock'n roll, for he, like today's rock 'n roll stars, made music with his vocal chords, but he synchronized his physical mannerisms with the all-important beat. Immediately after his first "smell" of a hit, Mercury went into recording studios for a dozen sides, first of which off the line was "That's My Desire," which became his all-time theme. Every side in this album represents the peak work of Laine. And to prove his versatility, try a side like Music Maestro Please, wherein he does a dramatic opening presaging his success today on dramatic shows like Rawhide and Checkmate. Laine, coincidentally, sings the theme for Rawhide, the CBS weekly TV-er. Mitch Miller, of the "Sing Along" fame, can splice his upsurge career-wise with Laine's, for both were still fighting for recognition when Miller brought Laine his biggest and most important hit, "Mule Train." While Frankie warbled the western epic, Miller made with the realistic bull-whip cracks on the record.
And Laine's still singing and these select Mercury sides are the nucleus of any program he does, be it in a Las Vegas plushnitery or a top TV gambol. And when the former choir boy at Immaculate Conception Church on North Park Avenue, Chicago, looks back over the years, he points to the cooperation and musical genius of the late Carl Fisher, his Cherokee Indian piano accompanist and close friend, who, along with arranger Harry Geller helped select so many of these songs and arranged them to hit proportions. For Laine has maintained his singing supremacy because of his versatility. Seek out any other singer who can leap nimbly from a "Wild Goose" cry to an intimate "Mam'selle" rendition and then just as capably turn to "That Lucky Old Sun" and make it a hit.
- That Lucky Old Sun (Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day)
- The Cry of The Wild Goose
- That's My Desire
- Shine
- Two Loves Have I
- September in The Rain
- Mule Train
- Music Maestro Please
- By The River Sainte Marie
- All of Me
- Mam'selle
- On the Sunny Side of the Street
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I Wanted Someone to Love
Arranged and conducted by Peter DeAngelis
Radio Station WDSU in New Orleans called him, "Really sensational... a true star." The city's Times-Picayune printed, "He flashes magic." Jacksonville, Florida's Times Union reviewed, "A socko voice... vitality and distinctive style as commanding as twenty years ago." "Vital and expressive" (Spokesman-Review, Spokane, Washington). These are just a few of the superlative critical comments flooding the explosive return of an almost-legendary singing star to the pinnacle of success-perhaps a pinnacle even higher than his previous years of stardom.
Sitting on top of it all, smiling down from this lofty perch is a big, healthy, happy man named Frankie Laine. Celebrating his twentieth year in show business, Frankie approaches his work with even more enthusiasm than in the beginning, but with a talent shaped by the passing years into one of the most professional ever to come before the public.
Frankie's current success was sparked by his first record for ABC, I'll Take Care of Your Cares, which soared to hit status and occasioned an album of the same name that climbed into the top ten in the music trade charts. The second Laine single, Making Memories, did even better, and by this time Frankie was back in the full warm glow of the spotlight in clubs and on TV shows throughout the nation. His third and fourth single releases are included here (You Wanted Someone to Play With - I Wanted Someone to Love and Laura, What's He Got That I Ain't Got). Oh yes, they were also smash hits!
The familiar lilting hit sound of Peter DeAngelis' arrangements adds an extra sparkle that molds Frankie's singing style into a much different pattern than in the days when Mule Train and High Noon were everyone's favorite Laine recordings.
Frankie makes his home in California, but he's one of the busiest entertainers today and is constantly on the move. Watch for him in your city or on television, because time spent with the Laine talent is an exciting experience. It's a certainty that Frankie will be heading your way either in a club, on a TV show, or in concert, because he's riding the crest of a wonderful wave of success that promises to roll on forever.
It couldn't happen to a nicer, more talented guy - and ABC is proud to help make his twentieth show business year a great one - Happy Anniversary, Frankie! May there be many, many more!
Side One
- You Wanted Someone to Play With
- Ev'ry Street's a Boulevard (In Old New York)
- Sometimes (I Just Can't Stand You)
- There's Not a Moment to Spare
- The Gypsy
- The Real True Meaning of Love
Side Two
- Laura, What's He Got That I Ain't Got
- I Heard You Cried Last Night
- Give Me Your Kisses (I'll Give You My Heart)
- You, No One But You
- You Taught Me How to Love You Now Teach Me to Forget
