Tribute/Appreciation

We remember poet and author Denise Levertov who died on Saturday at the age of 74. Her publisher says the cause was complications from lymphoma. (Rebroadcast of 12/4/1987)

Composer Saul Chaplin passed away Saturday at the age of 85. We pay tribute to Chaplin by playing a recording of a 1972 interview with Sammy Cahn at New York's 92nd St. Y. Cahn collaborated with Chaplin on many of his most known works.

Nigerian singer Fela was considered one of the most popular and innovative musicians in Africa. He died last Saturday of complications from AIDS at the age of 58. Fela was a songwriter and bandleader who played the sax and keyboards. Music critic Milo Miles remembers the life and work of a performer who made every album and every show a celebration of ordinary people and an attack on authority

Critic Milo Miles remembers singer/songwriter Laura Nyro, who died this week.

Book critic Maureen Corrigan pays tribute to the late American poet.

She was the mother of director Martin Scorsese, who cast her in several of his movies. Catherine died this past Monday at the age of 84.

Author, jazz writer and musician, Stuart Nicholson. He is an expert on and biographer of late jazz great Ella Fitzgerald. Through interviews with those closest to her,. "Ella Fitzgerald: A Biography of the First Lady of Jazz" (1994, Charlse Scribner's Sons) shows the public and private side of the media-shy legend. In her career of over 60 years, she gained the admiration of her contemporaries in the business. At the age of 79 and after years of suffering from diabetes, Fitzgerald died Saturday (June 15) at her home in California.

Poet Donald Hall. A year ago, his wife, poet Jane Kenyon died of leukemia. There's a new collection of her work, "Otherwise: New & Selected Poems" (Graywolf Press). Hall will read from the book, including the last poems she wrote, and discuss their life together. Hall also has a forthcoming book of poetry, "The Old Life," (Houghton Mifflin) to be published in June.

Charles Granata is a Cop who has an extensive archive of Sinatra recordings. Many of the them have been used for Sinatra reissues. He was Project Director for the box set: "Frank Sinatra: The Best of the Columbia Years 1943-1952).

Today is Frank Sinatra's 80th birthday. So we've brought a number of people on the show to comment on Sinatra's life and work: Nancy Sinatra, Sinatra's daughter. She's recorded a few hits of her own including "These Boots are Made for Walking," and "Something Stupid," the duet she recorded with her father. Nancy Sinatra has written a book about her father, Frank Sinatra: An American Legend (General Publishing Group). Nancy Sinatra has a new album too, (her first in 20 years) "One More Time." (Cougar records).