Early Friday morning, it was announced that Tony Bennett died. He was one of the greatest singers of all time, and his music will live forever.
I saw Tony perform live dozens of times. My close friend Will Freedwald is one of his major biographers. Tony spent a lot of time in Italy and he and I had the same driver.
Bennett never succumbed to singing crap. He sang only great songs and he sang them as well, generally better than anyone else. Amazingly, he never had to re-key his music. He could hit the same note in 2010 that he hit when he first started singing.
Tony always had great musical directors and great musicians. Listen to his recordings with the great cornetist Bobby Hackett particularly “It Had To Be You” and “The Very Thought Of You”. He owns both songs, meaning no one could sing these compositions as well.
A particular favorite of mine, less well known, is “When Joanna Loved Me”. Tony could also do songs very difficult to sing and make it look easy. Listen to “Boulevard Of Broken Dreams. His version of “God Bless The Child” gives Billie Holiday a run for her money.
Bennett was also a very accomplished painter. His life was not without some major bumps in the road. However, most afficionados of The Great American Singers will put Tony Bennett on the top five male singers in history.
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At the risk of being accused of having too much time on my hands, it occurred to me that we could bring Donald Trump to his knees, totally break his spirit, if we confiscated his private jet and forced him to fly commercially. Just the idea of his having to go through airport security would be priceless.
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Judge Cannon set Trump’s document trial for May 1924, before the election. Expect Trump’s lawyers to try to move mountains to get the trial continued. No indication yet that the Judge is going into the tank for Trump, will he change his tune and start bad mouthing this Judge?
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The Alabama Legislature is thumbing it’s nose at the Supreme Court’s ruling to redistrict. Republicans are only law abiding when they like the law.
Really think about this people. The Blacks in Alabama have been disenfranchised. The highest court in the land said “fix it”, but fixing it could mean the Republicans losing control of the House. We cannot have that and not as single Republican has spoken out supporting the law.
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The last abomination I intend to discuss is the latest perpetuated by Governor DeSantis in Florida. In layperson’s terms, he has mandated that the children in Florida be taught the benefits of slavery. Florida has become a total adulterated shithole.
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The overall problem is the majority of Floridians do not care. Tomorrow the price of food will not have increased. One’s house will not have depreciated in value, and gas will not cost more. So few really care, and mark my words: if they can come for the Blacks setting them back decades, the Hispanics or the Jews of the Italians can come next.
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See you tomorrow. At least that is my plan.
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Go Ukraine
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