I was moved the other night listening to Frank Sinatra’s performance of “Ol’ Man River” at his 1962 concert in Paris. He first sang the 1927 Kern-Hammerstein anthem from Showboat on his inaugural tour as a solo artist in 1943, then performed it on the radio broadcast of Broadway Bandbox on October 10 of that year. He recorded it for Columbia on December 3, 1944, and the following year sang it in the Jerome Kern biopic, Till the Clouds Roll By. Kern was impressed. After seeing the scene (he died before the film was completed), he told him, “My idea with that song was to have a rabbity little fellow do it, somebody who made you believe he was tired of livin’ and scared of dyin’. That’s how you do it, Frankie.” It’s been widely reported that Martin Luther King, Jr. wept at hearing Sinatra sing it at a Carnegie Hall benefit concert. This outstanding performance, complete with the verse, is from his 1967 TV special.
