Mountain Songs

Frankie Lane

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Somehow, we're not sure how, Fankie Lane sung and recorded the tune Rose, Rose I Love You, and seems to have owned the copywrite as writer. But it seems this tune was composed in Shanghai by Chen Gexin in the late 1930's. The original lyrics are about a China experience, whereas Frankie's lyrics are about a Malaysian love affair.

Frankie was born to Siscilan immigrant parents in the heart of Chicago's Little Italy on March 30, 1913. Laine first sang in public as part of the choir at the Church of the Immaculate Conception. His love of music led him to Chicago's Merry Garden Ballroom, where friends frequently urged him up onto the bandstand to perform a number or two.

At the age of 17, Laine left home to try his luck as a marathon dancer. This fad of the depression years was a tough way of keeping body and soul together, but Laine stuck with it and eventually he and a partner, Ruth Smith, met the all-time marathon dance record in Atlantic City, New Jersey. They danced for a total of 3,501 hours over 145 consecutive days, and split a grand prize of $1,000 for their efforts.

When Frankie decided to make his living with his voice instead of his feet, the road to success proved long and hard. It led him up and down the Eastern Seaboard, back to Chicago, to Cleveland and then eventually to Billy Berg's jazz club on Vine Street in Hollywood, where in 1946, Hoagy Carmichael heard the young unknown performing a favorite Carmichael composition, "Rocking Chair." This chance encounter led to a steady job at Billy Berg's, which in turn resulted in a recording contract with Mercury Records. On his first session he recorded a forgotten 1931 ballad entitled, "That's My Desire," and from that point on, there was just no stopping Frankie Laine.

Laine, along with Nat Cole, who preceded him by a year, marked the ascendance of the popular singer over the Big Bands, and his phenomenal success set the pattern for Johnny Ray, Tony Bennett, Elvis Presley, Tom Jones and the other musical idols who have followed. His style was thrillingly new to the audiences of the late 1940's, based as it was on his deep love of jazz and the blues.

The hit records were followed by starring roles in several motion pictures, guest appearances on numerous major radio and television shows, and his own television variety program on CBS in the mid-1950's. With a 1953 Warner Brother's production, "Blowing Wild," Laine started something different: he became the first and most successful of the singers to be identified with title songs. To date he has performed the title songs for seven motion pictures, most recently in 1974, Mel Brooks Western farce, "Blazing Saddles." On television, Laine's featured recording of "Rawhide" has become one of the most popular theme songs of all time.