← Takin' A Walk - Music History with Buzz Knight
Takin' A Walk - Music History with Buzz Knight
Join Buzz Knight and Seth MacFarlane on Takin’ a Walk to Discover the Magic of Sinatra's Lost Orchestral Arrangements-Replay
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- [00:01]
Seth MacFarlane
Taking a walk. I remember my father standing in the doorway of my room at one point, which is. This is hilariously out of character for him because he's such a. He's such a progressive guy. He said, you like a good rock song now and then, right?
- [00:16]
Buzz Knight
What if you could step inside a time capsule, unlock a vault of never heard Sinatra treasures, and let the golden glow of the classic American songbook light the way? I'm Buzz Knight, and on today's episode of Taking a Walk, we're doing just that, taking you on a journey into the heart of Lush Life, the dazzling new project from Seth MacFarlane. That's right, that Seth MacFarlane. What an amazing talent he is. You know him for so many things, including Family Guy, but Seth is resurrecting the lost arrangements of Frank Sinatra. Get ready to stroll down memory lane with unreleased orchestrations and fresh stories as we dive into an album that promises to be as timeless as the chairman of the board himself.
- [01:06]
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- [01:09]
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- [03:13]
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- [03:41]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Taking a walk well, Seth, it's absolutely joyous having you on Taking a walk, discussing your joyous project Lush Life, the Lost Sinatra arrangements. I have to ask the opening question of my guests, which normally is who would you take a walk with, living or dead, and where would you take that walk? Answers go everywhere. Seth. Mothers, fathers, Bach, McCartney, Harrison. Jesus Christ. I assume for the purposes of this special episode, it's going to be Francis Albert Sinatra.
- [04:16]
Seth MacFarlane
Yeah, you know, that's probably a good, that's probably Carl Sagan would be high on that list. But, but I think it would be, it would be interesting to ask a few questions. I mean, certainly Nelson Riddle would be on that list. You know, how, how did you do it? What were you tapping into that that has somehow been lost from our world? But yeah, those, those are all people who are, who would be, you know, fun to take a walk with on a maybe not too hot day.
- [04:47]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Yeah, it's normally an impossible question, but that's why I like it. But what was your first memory back in the mean streets of the waterfall village of Connecticut, where music first impacted you?
- [05:03]
Seth MacFarlane
Well, music was everywhere in that town. It was a very artistic community. There were a lot of people who sang, a lot of people who played instruments. I was in a church choir when I was very young, if you can believe that. And that was kind of my first introduction to what that community had to offer musically. And the director of the Choir had kind of branched out into local theater productions and she was really into Gilbert and Sullivan. So I remember doing a lot of Gilbert and Sullivan in that town from about age 9 on. We did the Sorcerer when I was 9 and then followed up with the HMS Pinafore and the Mikado. So I was exposed to that music at a very young age, which is a nice way to kind of get a good grounding in the origins of what would eventually become show music of the 40s, 50s and 60s.
- [06:06]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Did your parents have concerns about your early obsession with the Great American Songbook and in particular Frank? And was there a support group that they tried to enroll you in of young kids who were wiser beyond their years.
- [06:24]
Seth MacFarlane
Concerns? I remember my father standing in the doorway in my room at one point, which is. This is hilariously out of character for him because he's such a. He's such a progressive guy. He said, you like a good rock song now and then, right? There's just so much subtext there that doesn't even need to be elaborated upon. But no, you know, I listened to the music that was popular at the time when I was, when I was growing up. I listened to what we were being fed. The problem that I always had was that I could see how they were making the soup. I could see how the gears were making the watch turn. And it wasn't particularly challenging. And so I gravitated to film music. The composers that were working regularly at that time, like John Williams obviously, who's still as prolific as ever, Jerry Goldsmith and Elmer Bernstein, James Horner, even Henry Mancini was still working then. And that music was what really grabbed me because it was so accessible and so impactful and yet at the same time I couldn't see how they were doing it. I couldn't see how these sounds were, or I couldn't hear rather how these sounds were being made. I couldn't see how the soup was being made. And that was just kind of magical to me. And I found a lot of that when I discovered Sinatra's music, that there really are a lot of links between film scoring, which is very, you know, closely related to classical music, and Sinatra's music, which was related to both. And it made sense. Sinatra was a big classical music fan, he had a huge record collection. And so it, it was, you know, a natural progression, I suppose.
- [08:13]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
I saw this quote of yours. I love the lush orchestration and old fashioned melody writing. It just gets you excited, that kind of music. It's very optimistic and it's fun and it's the one thing that's missing for me from popular music today is fun guys like Bing, Frank and Dean and Mel Torme, they sounded like they were having a great time.
- [08:36]
Seth MacFarlane
Yeah, yeah, they weren't. And by the way, it's deceptive because, I mean, it's like seeing a standup comic who just seems like they're having the time of their life and it seems so easy for them. But the fact is, it's an illusion because that's the result of thousands of hours of training and workshopping. And it's the same thing for Frank and Dean and Sammy and those guys. They made it look so easy, but it's because they really were just that good. And, yeah, I do miss that. I do miss that sense of lightness coupled with undeniably great musicality. I feel like music now takes itself a lot more seriously and perhaps has less of a reason to do so.
- [09:25]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
That's an understatement. Tell me about the initial interest in the Lost arrangements, how the idea for Lush Life first took shape. I know you previously had connected with Frank Sinatra Jr. Because he was on a few episodes of Family Guy.
- [09:43]
Seth MacFarlane
Yeah, I remember seeing him on the Sopranos and thinking, gosh, maybe he'll do our show. And so we reached out to him and he agreed to come on and agreed to sing. And he was just a. He was just game for anything. He was a real true participant in the process of making an episode. And he was an encyclopedia of not just great vocalists, but orchestras. I had never heard of the Sauter Finnegan orchestra, and Frank Jr turned me on to those guys. And he was just a walking encyclopedia of the most obscure but undeniably great arrangers and composers from that era. And, yeah, we were very sad to lose him. He was a great friend to the show. And in many ways, I've become even closer with Tina Sinatra, who is just a truly wonderful person and just a great hang. She's a magnificent steward of her father's legacy and also someone that you just love having a drink with. So she's been great, and she's been such a great partner and supporter in this project and in giving us access to all of these charts that have just been a luxury to play.
- [11:09]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
What was your first reaction when you knew you were being given this access to this private. A group of arrangements, this collection?
- [11:22]
Seth MacFarlane
It was. I mean, anyone who loves music would salivate over something like this. The biggest question for us was, what's in there? What's in these boxes? There were a few unplayed gems that we had been alerted to by Charlie Pinion of Sinatra Enterprises. So we knew that certain songs like Shadow of youf Smile, which actually is not on this record, it'll be on the next one, Flying down to Rio. That song in particular, he had alerted us was Somewhere in the Files, the song that was cut from the Come Fly With Me album. So that was really exciting. Really. The most thrilling part was hiring an orchestra, going over the Fox lot, setting up on the Newman stage, and just playing what was in these boxes and having no idea in many cases what it was. We were about to hear, you know, that arrangement of Gimme the Simple Life, which is the first song on the record, was one of the first songs that we played. And, you know, Joel McNeely raised his baton and the orchestra started playing. And instantly, you know, it's Nelson Riddle. Instantly, you know, it's. This is. This is going to be great. And it gives you chills because you're. You're hearing something that was written, I mean, what, 75 years ago, and you were in that moment, hearing it played for the first time by one of the greats.
- [12:50]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
I got chills when I first that, you know, as the lead track when I heard that one. But all of them. I mean, that one just is. I can't get it out of my head. I mean, and I. I challenge somebody. If you're in a damn bad mood and you put on the whole collection, but start right there. You're not going to be in a bad mood. You're going to be in a great mood. You're going to be, you know, just walking with some pep in your step.
- [13:16]
Seth MacFarlane
It was very selfless music. It was very. That's probably the big difference that I encounter even. Even in just watching these guys perform. Like, I. You watch Sinatra perform live, you watch, you know, somebody like Nancy Wilson, who was a. Was a phenomenal jazz vocalist. You watch Crosby or. Or Rosemary Clooney or, you know, any of these vocalists perform. They're. They're performing for the audience. There's a very. There's a very selfless dynamic to. To what it is that they're offering up that I don't see as much of now. Oftentimes when I. When I see a live performance, I get the sense that the performer is performing for the performer, but there's a little bit of kind of musical masturbation going on. That's. That's. That if the audience were there or not, this person would still be loving themselves. And I think that's A fundamental stylistic difference that has evolved and changed over the years when it comes to the art of, certainly of live singing and in some cases, recording.
- [14:28]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
I couldn't help but thinking about this and listening to the collection. Frank and the rest of the. The Rat Pack, they had this. This unmistakable knack and art for. For breaking balls. And, you know, it was an art form.
- [14:45]
Buzz Knight
The.
- [14:46]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
The Don Rickles factor alone, the Dean Martin factor. Jackie Gleason. Did you channel any of that vibe when you were in the middle of this work? And are there any favorite Frank moments that you think of that exemplified his master class in breaking balls?
- [15:08]
Seth MacFarlane
I mean, it's a. You know, it's a good question. I was kind of on my own here. It's not like I was part of a group. I was. I was. I mean, I have these magnificent musicians who had. Each one has so much of a history that is unique to them specifically. But that's a tough one. Certainly when I recorded my Christmas album with Liz Gillies, it was much more of that feel because we're were two people who were essentially the same person in two different bodies. Yeah. I mean, one of my favorite stories is you bring up Don Rickles is that story. I'm sure this is the game of telephone at work, where I'm not gonna tell it exactly right, but it's something to the effect of Don Rickles was out with a woman. He went up to Frank Sinatra beforehand. He said, listen, I'm having dinner with this lovely woman, and I, you know, would you come over and say hi? And just so you know. Cause I feel like if she sees that I know you, it's going to make me look really cool. And, you know, I have a good night. And so during the middle of dinner, Frank walks over and says, don, hi. How are you? And Don goes, frank, please, I'm in the middle of dinner. I can't remember exactly where that was or who tells that story, but I'm probably butchering it. But that's like. That's a great. That's probably more Rickles breaking balls than Sinatra, but it's. Balls were broken.
- [16:27]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Yes, but you had a lot of work to do, so there was no time for this. You had to go about selecting which over the 1800 arrangements in the archive would be. Would be brought to life. So there was no time for much Tom Foolery there. How did you ultimately decide on what made it on at least this.
- [16:49]
Seth MacFarlane
This first collection, it was really just gut instinct. There are only two or three songs that we trimmed just because we Had a. A limit for the LP that we, we were given by the label. But there were songs that were very obviously not even in question. Songs like how did she look or Give me the Simple Life or who's in your arms Tonight or even Shadows. Songs that were just obviously, of course, flying down to Rio. Songs that were just no brainers. This has to be on the album. So you want a mix of tonality, you want some ballads, you want some uptempo tunes. Joel McNeely is very good at seeing an album and obviously he's a truly great film composer, but also a really fantastic producer. He's really great at zooming out and seeing an album in its entirety. He's always the one that decides the order of the songs on the album when we release them because he just kind of has the ability to let it marinate in his brain and he always seems to be right. It's just kind of gut instinct to cut us song like Shadow of your Smile. A Nelson Riddle arrangement of a Johnny Mandel song from an album like this is certainly difficult. But, you know, we look at it this way. Look, it can be the censorpiece in the next record.
- [18:11]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
I love that. Now, how important was it for you to record the album live with the musicians from both, you know, LA and London versus any digital or overdub methods?
- [18:24]
Seth MacFarlane
Impossible to do it any other way with this kind of music. Impossible to do any other way. Mainly, certainly for the uptempo stuff, but without question for the ballads. You cannot record a rubato ballad like how did she look? Or even something like Hurry Home or When Joanna Love Me. You can't record those songs in isolation. You have to be in the room with the orchestra. The orchestra has to be looking at the conductor, the conductor has to be looking at the singer, the singer has to be looking back at the conductor. It's like trying to shoot a movie and shooting your two actors individually in two different cities. You will not get a performance. You'll get two people delivering lines who have no idea what the other person is doing and a complete inability to make adjustments. It's exactly the same. So it was the only way to do it. It's how they did it back then, and that's how we did it today.
- [19:22]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
How did you balance sort of honoring, you know, Frank's classic sound, but putting your twists and your team's twist on it.
- [19:31]
Seth MacFarlane
It's. It's why I'm glad I did this album today and not, you know, 10 years ago or 15 years ago when I started Recording these records because I've reached a point where I. My style is my style. I sound how I sound. I interpret lyrics the way I interpret them. And I've settled into something that feels comfortable for me. This one, there was a little bit of at times putting some of that aside because you are really trying to honor the intention of the arranger more than anything else. I mean, certainly something like Lush Life itself. That was the only recording where we had any kind of a guideline. There was that half recording of lush life from 1958 that Sinatra abandoned. And so certainly his vocal choices for the first half of that song I tried to stay pretty faithful to. I couldn't think of any single reason that I was gonna second guess what it was that he was going after. Cause you know, I mean, his instincts were. He was just never wrong. That was sort of a paint by number part of the record. But once that recording dies off, you run out of train tracks and you're kind of on your own in the wilderness. The arrangement itself kind of guides you. You take something like Flying down to Rio or any Billy May chart where he always has those scoopy saxophones. It gives you a hint as to what the tempo of the song wants to be. And in many cases I did choose a tempo that I felt like was the most comfortable for me vocally. But I think in most cases it's a pretty good guess that's where they would have landed back then as well.
- [21:23]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
You're bringing the project to the stage at venues like the Walt Disney Concert hall, the Venetian. What can folks expect when they go to these great lush life experiences?
- [21:37]
Seth MacFarlane
You know, we'll do some songs from the album, but I think it's also a celebration of great orchestration period. You know, we'll do some songs from the record, but also some classic charts that people know that you just want to hear live. And that orchestra is. I just saw them last night actually at the Hollywood Bowl. That's a world class orchestra and I'm very excited to be playing with them.
- [22:05]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Are there any other lost projects by. Well, you mentioned there's going to be a follow up, so there obviously are by Frank or any other artist you would dream of exploring.
- [22:17]
Seth MacFarlane
You know, I think at some point I would love to record an album of Axel Stordahl arrangements from the Columbia years. Because there are some stunning and lots of them stunning arrangements from that era, which was obviously the younger Sinatra's career when he was in his 20s and maybe early 30s. Those charts only exist in old mono recordings that don't even. They don't have the richness of the engineering breakthroughs of the 1950s and early 60s. They're very compressed. And it would be nice to hear those arrangements in a larger scope. I used to travel to London from time to time to record and do live shows with the John Wilson Orchestra, which was at the time they were specializing in reconstructions of these MGM charts that have been lost from things like Singing in the Rain or Brigadoon or the wizard of Oz. These were orchestrations that were gone. You know, Hollywood assumed that this was always going to be something that was going to be part of our culture. And I think a lot of these charts were destroyed. The building where they were all kept was bulldozed to make a parking lot. And so what John Wilson and his team did was to reconstruct all of these charts from existing conductor fragments of conductor scores that remained in their own ears. And they did it. And I remember landing in London and going to the soundstage and they were right in the middle of playing. I think they were playing Somewhere over the Rainbow from the wizard of Oz. And I got chills. Cause I was like, I've never heard this in any other form than in the film in its 1939 monoform. And it was just astonishing to hear. And that's why I think the Storedahl arrangements would be really interesting to record today, because I think it's a whole library of music that was so beautifully played, but deserves to be played with a bit more fidelity behind it.
- [24:38]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
Seth, it's 37 minutes of pure joy on Lush Life. Is that right? I think it's 37 minutes, yeah.
- [24:47]
Seth MacFarlane
Sounds good to me.
- [24:49]
Buzz Knight (Interviewer)
I absolutely love it, and I know the audience loves it, or those that haven't picked it up will love it. I'm so grateful, Seth MacFarlane, for you giving us this music and giving us everything that you do. Thanks for being on Taking a Walk.
- [25:04]
Seth MacFarlane
Thanks for having me.
- [25:07]
Taking a Walk Podcast Host
Thanks for listening to this episode of.
- [25:09]
Seth MacFarlane
The Taking A Walk podcast.
- [25:10]
Taking a Walk Podcast Host
Share this and other episodes with your friends and follow us so you never miss an episode.
- [25:16]
Seth MacFarlane
Taking a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts.
- [25:25]
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