Making Records: The Scenes Behind the Music (29 page)

I knew he was still on the ball when he listened to the playback and said, “That tempo’s not 106.” I told him that I was running the tempo at 105, 106, and 107 beats per minute. “Why are you doing that?” he asked. “I’m running it at all three tempos in case you change your mind about the tempo tomorrow,” I explained. I saw his energy return. “There ain’t gonna be no change of mind. Just let me hear it at 106.”

The tempo was reset.

Ray listened and said, “That’s it. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Then he snuck out.

It was sad to see him leave, and I was uncertain that we’d ever see him again. I knew that Ray wanted it to happen, but there was clearly a chance that he wouldn’t make the vocal date. When Ray started listening and getting fussy about the tempo, I thought we might still have a chance. I knew he wasn’t going to let this one go.

The vocal session started at ten.

We were told that it was better to record Ray before noon, because of his physical therapy schedule. If all went well and he was able to rest after noontime, he might be able to come back at three. We were gambling. Would the ten-to one o’clock session give us enough time, or should we schedule the session for three? If we made it three and it didn’t work, we might lose the song entirely. Both Elton and Ray then were in prime shape musically, but Ray wasn’t in prime shape healthwise.

When Ray arrived and they led him into the Record Plant, I
gave the signal to begin recording. As I glanced at the console, I noticed that one of the assistants was fiddling with the balance, and I said to engineer Joel Moss, “Let’s put the no-touch rule into effect. Hit the computer so it’s recording, and just let it run. We might find out later that what we’ve got is awful, but it might be perfect.” I wanted to catch everything that transpired between Elton and Ray; I didn’t need anyone missing those magic moments.

Elton had arrived at eight thirty, and when Ray came in they sat and had tea, chatting for a while. It was Elton’s way of preparing; he wanted Ray to walk into the room and feel the love and respect, and that’s exactly what happened.

It was time to record.

I arranged it so that Elton and Ray would be three or four feet away from each other, face-to-face, because I wanted Ray to hear Elton acoustically and not through his headphones. They began their first run-through, discussing who was going to sing which line. “You sing this line…” “No, no, no—I think you should sing it, and I’ll come back in here…”

Elton was being very careful. He looked at the lead sheets I had prepared and gingerly said, “Well, it says here…”

Ray pounced on that immediately. “Who said that?”

“I did, Ray,” I interjected.

“Well how do you know that’s what I want to do?” he asked, somewhat indignantly. I chuckled. “They’re only suggestions—we can do whatever you’d like. Instead of us fishing for ideas, this is what I do. I start by suggesting certain vocal solos on some lines, harmonies on others.”

Everyone in the room got the message right away: Getting the vocals laid down would be a one-shot deal. Ray said, “I’m ready to roll one.” “Okay Ray, here we go.” We rolled it, got a nearly flawless take, and then did one more for insurance. The final record is an
edit of those two takes, and the wistful, melancholy tone of the recording speaks for itself.

By the end of the second take, all of us were in tears, but we wouldn’t let Ray catch us crying. It was a bittersweet time in all of our lives—especially mine. After we were done, Ray waved to me, and I walked out to the studio and hugged him. He said, “I’m sorry—I’m really not feeling well today.” They wheeled him down the hall and out into the warmth of the sun.

I never saw Ray again, but he heard the finished mix of the album. We recorded “Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word” on March 3; Ray died three months later, on June 10, 2004.

Original track sheet for “Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word”
Phil Ramone Collection

Recording with Ray deeply affected Elton, who took a CD of the entire session home so he could savor the conversation they’d shared. “When people mention Ray Charles, I just smile,” Elton explained. “That grin, that voice, and his music are so joyous. It was amazing to sit in the studio and sing with him. It’s incredibly impressive to be with someone whose music had meant so much to me.
He had a prodigious effect on my career, so it was a very emotional experience.”

When Elton heard the first mix of the song, he noticed that one of the Pro Tools editors had eliminated a breath—a little gasp—and he said, “No, no, no. You don’t take those things out. You may want it cleaner for some technical reason, but that’s not what Ray and I want.” When he heard the next mix, you could tell he was moved. Halfway through the song, I saw tears well up in his eyes. He turned to John Burk and me and quietly said, “This is one of the most meaningful moments of my recording career.” For all of us, “Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word” became the ultimate metaphor, even though Bernie Taupin didn’t write the lyric to reflect the end of someone’s life. No one predicted that it would be the last thing that Ray would ever sing.

Genius Loves Company
may have started out as a duets project, but it turned into something with far more intrinsic value. “All of these artists are friends of mine,” Ray said. “It’s been great, man, really great to be able to take these classic songs and get behind them in different ways. It’s taken me back to my roots.”

I’m not sure who first called Ray Charles a genius. It may have been Tom Dowd, or a marketing person at Atlantic Records. It could be argued that whoever chose the title
The
Genius
of Ray Charles
for the album of that name in 1958 was a tad overenthusiastic, and that Ray hadn’t quite earned that status yet—at least with the public.

We insiders knew he was a genius the moment we saw him work. We knew he was a “musician’s musician,” and that his eclectic musical taste and fastidious approach were something quite special.

Being immersed in his musicality gave one a chance to learn; in this regard, he set the pace for us all. As I reflect on everything that accompanied
Genius Loves Company
, I think of something that Ray
said once: “I’ve been makin’ music since I was three. You hear about people saying they’re gonna retire, but retire to what? I don’t wanna do nothing but what I’m doing.”

To be continued…

With Charles L. Granata, NYC, 1999
Charles L. Granata Collection

I met Phil Ramone in 1998, when we appeared together on a speaking panel to discuss the music of Frank Sinatra.

Although
he
didn’t know it, I felt like I’d known Phil for years.

At the time, I was writing and lecturing on the way Sinatra recorded his music; Phil was my subject’s greatest living exponent. After one such discussion, I asked Phil if he would consider writing the foreword for a book I was writing on Sinatra’s recording methodology. “Absolutely,” he said. “Here’s my number—call me, and we’ll talk.”

I called, we talked, and Phil’s warm recollections helped get my Sinatra story off to a very good start. It was the beginning of a pleasant friendship.

Our collaboration on the Sinatra piece in September 1999 brought me to the Shire, the ten-acre farm in Bedford, New York, that was (until recently) the Ramone family’s home. The visit offered my first glimpse of Phil’s superb taste, and the tasteful way in which he lives his life.

Despite being a relative stranger, I was treated with warmth and graciousness.

It was pouring outside, and there was a fire burning in the main parlor. As I set up my tape recorder, a friendly woman with a thick Irish accent came in and asked if she could make me some lunch. Soon, a sandwich and a Coke appeared. So did Andre Previn’s son, who was a houseguest—and, like me, hungry.

The Shire, I learned, was a spacious, cozy place where family, friends, and business associates were always welcome.

Phil and I sat in a corner near the fireplace and chatted for the better part of two hours. He spoke fondly of his love for Sinatra and his music.

He recalled the first time he’d watched Sinatra record in May of 1961, when Bill Putnam snuck him into a recording session at United-Western Studios in Hollywood. Frank was recording “Granada” and a few other songs with Billy May’s big band; as a fellow engineer and Phil’s mentor, Putnam knew that “the kid” revered Frank, and thought he’d get a kick out of running the tape recorder.

Then, Phil talked about the Sinatra sessions he’d engineered at A&R in 1967. They were Frank’s first New York sessions in more than a decade; for the occasion Phil literally rolled out a red carpet. The sessions wrought the Sinatra favorite, “(Over and Over) The World We Knew.”

But it was Phil’s recent projects with Frank Sinatra—
L.A. Is My Lady
in 1984, and
Duets
and
Duets II
in 1993–94—that we dwelled on. The former was Sinatra’s last all-star jazz record; the latter two were million-selling, Grammy Award–winning efforts that became the biggest-selling records of the singer’s career.

The stories of Phil’s days and nights in the studio with Mr. S. delighted me, and I was sorry when our interview drew to a close. As I packed up my microphones, I casually asked Phil what had turned him on to Frank Sinatra.

“I grew up with his music,” he explained. “And I loved his album covers—especially the ones that show him standing in the studio, with the orchestra crowded around him in a semicircle. I
studied those pictures to see what kind of microphones they used, and what instruments they were used on…”

In that moment, I realized that Phil and I were kindred spirits.

As a youngster I was obsessed with records. Anything having to do with sound recording, actually: LPs, seventy-eights, reel-to-reel tapes and tape recorders, turntables, amplifiers, and microphones all made their way into my bedroom—and my life. The best place for a kid to find records in those days was the old-fashioned, neighborhood yard sale.

It was at such a sale, circa 1973 or ’74, that I bought my first copy of
Getz/Gilberto
. I had no idea who Getz or Gilberto were, nor did I care. The album cost me a dime, and I fell in love with the cover and the cool Verve label. It was the first time I saw the name Phil Ramone on a record jacket.

Not long after, another Saturday afternoon record-hunting expedition yielded a stack of Frank Sinatra’s Capitol and Reprise records—including
Sinatra’s Swingin’ Session!!!
and
The Concert Sinatra
—two albums with covers depicting the singer standing in the studio, with the orchestra crowded around him in a semicircle.

I, like Phil, studied those covers.

Kindred spirits.

I was fourteen years old when Billy Joel’s
The Stranger
was released in 1977, and I spent hours blasting the album through a pair of old Sony headphones. The record packed a mean wallop.

As an amateur drummer, I was drawn to Liberty DeVitto’s solid beat, and the unrelenting drive of Doug Stegmeyer’s bass. The sound was crystal clear; the bass tones throbbed with a focus that I’d rarely heard before. To my ears, the punchy, resonant quality of the drums was the way drums should
always
sound on a record. Best of all, every song on
The Stranger
was great.

The Stranger
solidified my love for Billy Joel, and his producer—Phil Ramone.

Thereafter, I relished each new Billy Joel release—
52nd Street,
Glass Houses, Songs in the Attic, An Innocent Man, The Nylon Curtain,
and
The Bridge
—not as a Johnny-come-lately, but as a young musician and audiophile who bought them the minute they came out. I can mark each moment of my adolescence through those individual Billy Joel albums, and the landmark songs that sprang from them.

It seemed that everywhere I turned in those days, Phil Ramone was there, an omnipotent and omnipresent figure on the record scene, simultaneously producing soundtracks, jazz records, and pop albums by the likes of Paul Simon, Billy Joel, Phoebe Snow, and a plethora of other great artists.

I was thrilled to learn that it was Phil who engineered Ben E. King’s “Spanish Harlem,” “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” from
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,
Simon and Garfunkel’s “My Little Town”—even the Starland Vocal Band’s “Afternoon Delight.” All were Top 40 pop songs that were in heavy rotation on WABC-AM radio in New York, and they piqued my pre-teen interest. I simply wanted to hear them over and over; even then I recognized the sophistication of their production.

But Sinatra was our nexus.

When Frank recorded at A&R with Quincy Jones in 1984, it was Phil behind the board. They filmed the recording sessions and made a documentary showing Sinatra at work in the studio. I watched the tape with rapt attention, and there, to my delight, was Phil Ramone. It was the first time I put a face to the name.

I was in a meeting at Sony Music’s New York headquarters in early 1993 when I first heard of Frank Sinatra’s
Duets
project.

My colleagues and I were planning a massive reissue of the nearly three hundred sides that Frank Sinatra had made while at Columbia Records in the 1940s, and Frank’s business manager, Nathan “Sonny” Golden, was conferring with our team. During a break, I asked Sonny about The Man:

I was not surprised.

While a bit controversial in its day,
Duets
represented cutting-edge technology and reflected the progressive thinking of its producer.

Before I left the Shire on that wet September day in 1999, I told Phil that he should write a book. “I’d love to work with you on it,” I said naively. He was a world-famous record producer, and I was a first-time author.

Phil and I crossed paths a few times after that.

Joe D’Ambrosio, his assistant at the time, kept in touch and helped arrange for me to interview Phil again for my second book, on Brian Wilson’s
Pet Sounds.
I bumped into him at the Grammy Awards in Los Angeles in 2002—the year that Carlos Santana’s album
Supernatural
won big.

Through the years, the idea of writing a book with Phil was always in the back of my mind.

And so, I was flattered to receive a call to meet with Phil and his (now our) literary agent, Lisa Queen, in April 2003. They outlined an idea they had for Phil’s book, and I jumped at the chance to help write it. After all, Phil is a kindred spirit.

It has been my privilege to collaborate with Phil, and to help turn his recollections into this volume. It’s been three years in the making; during that time I’ve spent hundreds of hours with Phil, talking about music, recording, life, art, politics, and just about every other topic imaginable.

I was again welcomed to the Shire—this time as a frequent
guest, many times overnight. The warmth I had experienced on my first visit several years before had only offered a taste of the lively spirit of the household.

During the course of our work, I’ve spoken at length with dozens of Phil’s friends, artists and colleagues—including Quincy Jones, Billy Joel, and Tony Bennett. To a person, the admiration and respect that artists, arrangers, engineers, record company executives, and friends have for Phil Ramone is evident in their words, their hugs, and most of all, in the music they create under his watchful eye.

More than anything, I’m fortunate to have had the rare chance to watch Phil as he recorded (on separate occasions) Carole King and Elton John, and as he mixed albums for Olivia Newton-John (with engineer Joel Moss) and Elton John and Ray Charles (with engineer Frank Filippetti).

To illustrate the surety of Phil’s direction, I’ll reconstruct (from my hastily scribbled notes) a bit of the magic I saw in the studio as Phil recorded Carole King at Right Track Studios on West Forty-Eighth Street in June 2004:

Phil greets Carole at the door, and kindly introduces me. Once her coat is off, he walks Carole into the control room so she can meet the crew. Then, it’s into the studio where a music stand and boom-mounted microphone await her.

There’s a short break. The song has some difficult changes, and Phil asks if Carole is comfortable with the tempo. She returns to the studio, and does another take—her fifth.

At the mike, Carole thinks like a producer. She knows exactly which words from which take work best, and she mentions them as she goes along. Phil, following the lyric sheet, makes small notes in the margin.

When she comes back into the control room, Phil suggests a tea break.

Carole and I sit in the green room, talking about politics and current events. The Iraq War is foremost on everyone’s mind, and Carole isn’t shy about expressing her views. She breaks me up when she grabs a yellow Post-it note and “sketches” her impression of the current administration. The drawing—a musical lyre—is as metaphoric and pointed as one of her songs.

Those songs—“Up on the Roof,” “You’ve Got A Friend,” “I Feel the Earth Move,” “So Far Away,” and “(You Make Me Feel Like A) Natural Woman” have been part of my life since childhood.
They moved me then, and they move me now—in the somewhat inexplicable way that great songs should.

As we chat, Phil is in the studio, cutting together a rough edit of Carole’s best vocal takes. He dashes in and out of the green room, asking if there’s anything he can get for her. When he’s finished editing, he calls her in.

Before playing the rough edit of “Ton Nom,” Phil mentions that Peter Cincotti, a young artist he’s been working with, has just recorded “Up on the Roof.”

“Would you like to hear it?” he asks.

“Of course,” she answers.

Cincotti’s rendition of Carole’s “Up on the Roof” is exceptional. Its tenderness of spirit embodies all of the sentiment that Carole surely thought of when writing the song.