Sinatra at the Maracanã
(January 26 1980)
By Mahnuel Muñoz
Even for those of us who do not decipher the magic of football, entering a large stadium is an overwhelming experience, not only because of the architectural display, but because of the intimidating presence of intense energy permeated in every corner of the temple.
The screams, the mix of emotions of all kinds, are printed on walls, seats, locker rooms and crossbars, and seem to be reproduced like psychophonies in the silence of the days when there is no game.
For those who shudder with the so-called King sport, the name of Maracanã evokes some of the most important moments in the history of the discipline, legendary feats on a battlefield that for years boasted of being the largest on the planet. Football fans can know or imagine, better than anyone, what kind of emanations are given off by a venue where, over seventy years, many relevant pages of football history have been written.
The Maracanã stadium, in Rio de Janeiro, displayed its grandeur to welcome Frank Sinatra on January 26, 1980 and tremble to the rhythm of different emotions, contained in his everlasting songbook. That is a date inscribed in multi-carat ink in the stadium’s guest book.
For The Voice, the 1980s were mapped by a busy international concert schedule. Frank had arrived in Rio on January 22 to give a series of four recitals at the luxurious Rio Palace hotel, and culminated with the show that motivates these lines, the most crowded recital of his life, with 170,000 people forgetting their daily problems and the offside rules in favor of a journey in time and space along the paths of the pentagram.
Backed by an orchestra under the baton of Vincent Falcone Jr. – his right hand on stage during that time -, Sinatra offers a show of solid emotional force, based on his essential classics and some of his most recent recordings, as well as winks to national folklore and some songs that were a must during live performances.
The feedback between the star and his audience generated a power comparable to that which combusts in any classic football match and, like the beam coming from a star millions of light years away, reaches whoever has the opportunity to enjoy the audio or video recording of the event. .(both circulate among collectors).
Surely whoever has the opportunity to step on the Maracanã grass behind closed doors, during the leather dream, among the ghosts of the great goals of Pelé, Zico and Ghiggia will be able to hear Old Blue Eyes sing one of his songs, perhaps that “Quiet Nights Of Quiets Stars“, English version of the hymn “Corcovado” by Antonio Carlos Jobim, whose last verses leave a message worthy of being chiseled into the stone of that day unrepeatable:
“This is where I want to be,
Here, with you, so close to me,
Until the last flicker of the embers of life.
I, who was lost and alone,
Believing that life was no more
What a bitter tragic joke,
I have found with you
the meaning of existence, oh my love.”
REPERTOIRE
The Coffee Song
I’ve Got The World On A String
At Long Last Love
Someone To Watch Over Me
Something
The Best Is Yet To Come
Bewitched
Where Or When
My Way
Strangers In The Night
Let Me Try Again
I’ve Got You Under My Skin
The Song Is You
Quiet Nights Of Quiet Stars (Corcovado)
My Kind Of Town
April In Paris
New York, New York
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