Tony Bennett, who has died aged 96, made a high art out of being the very best kind of saloon-bar singer – not only in the good-humoured optimism of his big, expansive sound, or his passionate gratitude for life’s lucky breaks and glimpsed beauties, but also in an unquenchable appetite for sharing good songs, whether with 10 people or 10,000.
Frank Sinatra used to call Bennett “the best singer in the business”, an accolade that would frequently turn up in the younger man’s publicity, though a more forthright tribute from the same source (“that kid’s got four sets of balls”) generally did not. Bennett’s artistry and power to stir the heart were qualities a world away from the cliched perception of the Vegas crooner in a tuxedo. During the rock-dominated 1960s and 70s, Bennett was easy to caricature. You only had to pretend to loosen a tie, casually throw an imaginary microphone from hand to hand, and exhale “the loveliness of Paris” in tones somewhere between Sinatra’s and the club style of Vic Reeves.
