THE SINATRATHON: THE WORLD'S LONGEST AND BEST CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION OF FRANK SINATRA

Frank Sinatra, born a century ago in 1915, was not only the greatest singer in all of American culture, he was also the most prolific. Over a career that spanned nearly 60 years, he recorded over 1,600 songs, starred in over 50 movies, and made innumerable concert, radio, and TV appearances. No single tribute is big enough to do justice to the full length and breadth of Sinatra's contribution to music, so the Cutting Room is announcing the SINATRA-THON. On Saturday, May 9th , New York's newest and hippest music venue will present a day-long celebration of the greatest of all musical icons, the legendary Frank Sinatra, in honor of the centennial of this celebrated singer and actor.
The event will involve the talents of more than 50 of New York's finest singers and musicians (including a full big band) and will continue for over 14 hours.
The show will take place on the day before Mother's Day, 2015, in honor of the singer's legendary devotion to his mother, Dolly Sinatra.
The Sinatra-Thon will begin at ten in the morning on that day, and will continue at least until midnight - or quite possibly even later, into Sunday morning. The event will be curated and produced by Cary Hoffman (singer, composer, and producer, whose one-man show My Sinatra has been played in long runs in New York and at Performing Arts Centers and other venues in and around New York City and the United States) and Will Friedwald (columnist for the Wall Street Journal and the author of the well-received book on the singer, Sinatra! The Song is You.

A sampling of the featured talent slated to perform include:

Internationally known bassist, bandleader, composer, and raconteur, CHRISTIAN MCBRIDE.

Tony-winning actress, CADY HUFFMAN—comedienne, singer, and dancer, and the original "Oola" in The Producers.

Star of television's Shameless and Desperate Housewives, as well as Broadway's Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, EMILY BERGL.

Award-winning, French, jazz singer, CYRILLE AIMÉE—star of City Center Encores and numerous concerts at Jazz at Lincoln Center.

STEVE ROSS—"eternally dapper singer and pianist” (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

Award-winning singer, MARISSA MULDER, whose Tom Waits show The New York Times called, "Far and away the season’s best cabaret show, it is everything the genre can be but almost never is." (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

Ascendant cabaret star CAROLE J. BUFFORD—"If an award for “most likely to succeed” was up for grabs among the younger generation of New York cabaret performers, she’d would be high on the list of contenders." (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

Incomparable jazz singer GABRIELLE STRAVELLI—"directed by the singer Marilyn Maye, she received the kind of tumultuous ovation I haven’t seen at the Metropolitan Room since Ms. Maye’s initial appearances there more than five years ago." (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

MATHEW SALDIVAR—Star of Broadway's Peter and the Starcatcher, The Wedding Singer, Grease, Act One, A Streetcar Named Desire and currently appearing in Honeymoon in Vegas.

CHRISTOPHER RIDDLE—director of the Nelson Riddle orchestra and son of Sinatra's most famous collaborator, Nelson Riddle, along with BRYAN ANTHONY, vocalist with the Nelson Riddle Orchestra.

JON WEBER, host of NPR's Piano Jazz, and brilliant pianist whose recent solo set at the Metropolitan Room was called "a fascinating and essential show" (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

The first couple of New York cabaret, ERIC COMSTOCK & BARBARA FASANO—"Mr. Comstock & Ms. Fasano are turning the neighborhood into a hotbed of pleasure." (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

Irish vocalist, MAXINE LINEHAN— "On her latest album, “Beautiful Songs,” she takes favorites that you thought you knew and infuses them with an intensely personal point of view." (Stephen Holden, The New York Times)

A LEGENDARY CONTEMPORARY JAZZ PIANIST – whose name we are not at liberty to mention – will make a surprise appearance playing the classic Sinatra saloon song, "In the Wee Small Hours."

SCHEDULE:

10 AM: WILL FRIEDWALD’s CLIP JOINT presents: SINATRA : THE RIDDLE CONNECTION, a compilation of rare clips from the singers rarely-seen (and never reissued) 1950s TV series, concentrating on Sinatra's unique relationship with his most famous musical director, Nelson Riddle.

12 noon: A SPECIAL PANEL of professional and personal associates of Mr. Sinatra, including a special focus on his relationship with his original "rabbi" Manie Sachs, including private home movie footage of Sinatra's 1951 wedding to Ava Gardner at the Sachs home in Philadelphia.

1:30 PM: MARISSA MULDER & JON WEBER perform A MAN ALONE. A fresh interpretation of a classic Sinatra album from 1969, in which the singer, for the first time in his career, performed an entire album's worthy of songs written especially for him, by poet and songwriter Rod McKuen. This album, a relatively lesser-known work in the Sinatra canon, is nonetheless regarded as a masterpiece by Frankophiles.

3:00 PM: SINATRA AUTHORS & BIOGRAPHERS ROUNDTABLE, featuring James Kaplan (author of The Voice and The Chairman), Chuck Granata (author of Sessions With Sinatra) and Will Friedwald (author of Sinatra! The Song is You).

4:30 PM: AFTERNOON MUSICAL SET, featuring a dozen excellent singers from Jazz, cabaret, Broadway, and world music delving into the vast resources of the Sinatra songbook. Featuring Jon Weber (piano), Matt Munisteri (guitar, vocals), Ritt Henn (bass).

6:00 PM: Will Friedwald's CLIP JOINT presents: SINATRA : THE RARITIES – 60 minutes of some of the rarest Sinatra performances on film and video.

7:00 PM: KEYNOTE PRESENTATION: SINATRA – A SINGER'S ART, by WILL FRIEDWALD and CARY HOFFMAN, illustrated with rare recordings and video clips.

8:00 PM MY SINATRA, starring CARY HOFFMAN, from his long running hit Off-Broadway show and acclaimed public television special, performs live with his own big band, The hilarious and sometimes poignant story of how an obsession with a star can distort one's life.
"dead on." (The New York Times)
The world's best Sinatra singer." (Jackie Mason)

9:30 PM "COME SWING WITH ME" – Our headliner's set, featuring star singers performing with the big band, including original arrangements from the archives of Nelson Riddle and other actual Sinatra musical directors.

11:00 PM "THE BOB DYLAN – FRANK SINATRA SET"” – In tribute to Mr. Dylan's new album, Shadows in the Night, we present a late-night set of folk, rock, and country performers doing extremely new and unique interpretations of classic Sinatra songs.

Midnight: Sinatra-thon AFTER PARTY – The Fun Continues