Tony Bennett: a personal appreciation

By TOM KANE

BETHEL, NY — Tony Bennett and I have little in common. We are both older singers, but the comparison ends there.

I’m close to him in age, sang for 10 years for the Delaware Valley Opera and am basically washed up. Bennett, who sang for 60 years at the top of the pop charts and is 81 years old, is in tip-top physical, emotional and vocal shape. He stood center stage for an hour and a half without faltering and belted out and finessed an impressive array of hits, some of them unique only to him. He did it all with a unique energy, which comes through mainly in his face. He shines. He radiates. He beams.

I have heard many older professional opera singers say that it wasn’t their voice that gave out on them, it was their legs. They couldn’t stand on stage for more than a few minutes without flagging. Not so Bennett.

It’s not only his legs that bolster him up. It’s also his voice and his command of breath.

As a singer myself, I listened to hear when he breathed and how he commanded his breath. Some of his long musical lines went far beyond anything that most singers can maintain, certainly including me.

And the crowd loved him, nearly 12,000 of them under the shed and on the lawn, cheering wildly at the end of each number. He stood there, unselfconsciously taking in the adulation and beaming his appreciation. At one point in a song, the words he sang were, “Nobody loves me.” Someone from the back of the shed yelled, “We love you, Tony” and everybody cracked up, including him. He nearly stumbled but he went on with a laugh.

Bennett said he was discovered by Bob Hope, who asked him what his name was. When he gave his full name—Anthony Bennedetto—Hope said, “That’s too long to fit on a marquee. I’ll shorten your name to Tony Bennett.” “Bob Hope gave me my name,” he told the cheering crowd.

As far as I am concerned, Bennett is the best professional pop singer in America today, hands down. There are some songs, like “I Left My Heart in San Francisco” that other professional singers will not dare to sing. Ever. There are probably a few others but that’s the main one.

Bennett doesn’t have a great voice by vocal standards. It’s a little raspy and shaky. But that’s what makes him great because he can use those quality quirks to give him uniqueness. Nobody else sings like that.

Bethel Woods goes after the best and that’s what makes it one of the leading performance sites in the Northeast. If they keep inviting people like Tony Bennett, their reputation will keep growing.