LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Frank Sinatra: Sands Hotel
built 127 days ago
On January 27, 1961, Sinatra played a benefit show at Carnegie Hall for Martin Luther King, Jr. and would go on to play a major role in the desegregation of Nevada hotels and casinos in the 1960s. Sinatra led his fellow members of the Rat Pack and label-mates on Reprise in refusing to patronize hotels and casinos that wouldn't allow black singers to play live or wouldn't allow black patrons. Sinatra would often speak from the stage on desegregation. Sinatra would play more benefits for Martin Luther King, Jr. who, according to Frank Sinatra, Jr., at one point during a show in 1963 sat weeping as Frank sang Ol' Man River.
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In 1954 Sinatra obtained a Nevada gaming license and bought a 2 percent interest in the Sands Hotel. Later Vicente ''Jimmy Blue Eyes'' Alo gave him a gift of an additional 7 percent of the hotel. Sinatra remained associated with the Sands until 1967, although he gave up his ownership in 1963 in the Cal-Neva/Warner Bros. deal, eventually rising to vice president of the corporation and earning $100,000 per night when he performed. Among the perks he received at the hotel was free no-limit gambling in the casino.
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Shortly before seven p.m., Jack Entratter, a big grey-haired man who operates The Sands, walked into the gambling room to tell some men around the blackjack table that Sinatra was getting dressed. He ... said that he'd been unable to get front-row seats for everybody, and so some of the men -- including Leo Durocher, who had a date, and Joey Bishop, who was accompanied by his wife -- would not be able to fit in Frank Sinatra's row but would have to take seats in the third row. When Entratter walked over to tell this to Joey Bishop, Bishop's face fell. He did not seem angry; he merely looked at Entratter with an empty silence, seeming somewhat stunned.
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Disc One was recorded at The Sands hotel (which Sinatra partially owned) in November of 1961. Such Sinatra standards as “The Lady Is A Tramp,” “Young At Heart,” and “Witchcraft” are greeted with rapturous response from the hometown crowd. An insightful bonus audio interview with Sinatra sheds light on the segregation in Nevada hotels that he was battling at the time of this performance.
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Sinatra told IRS investigators in 1959 that he met Giancana at the Fontainbleu Hotel in March 1958. Sinatra always maintained that he and Giancana were friendly, but not close, and that they had no business relationship. The FBI surveillance shows this to be a lie.
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Disc Two presents Sinatra back at the Sands in early 1966, performing with Count Basie & His Orchestra (which featured a young Quincy Jones conducting). Some of Sinatra’s performances from that engagement were excerpted for Sinatra At The Sands (which would become one of the singer’s most popular LPs), but all the recordings included here are previously unavailable. Organized as a complete show with the songs in the order they were performed, this is the ultimate swingin’ collaboration meeting between Sinatra and Basie.
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