Between Frank Sinatra and “My Way”, it wasn’t love right away
The story of “My way” part from afar has indeed European origins. It was Paolo Anka who during a trip to France discovered this very melodic song performed in 1967 from Claudio Francesco. The title was originally “For me”, author a French singer-songwriter named Jacques Revaux who composed this somewhat syrupy song, with unsatisfactory lyrics in a rather peculiar English. A demo was made of it which was then sent to Petula Clark, Dalida and at the same Claude François , to no avail. Always in that period Hervé Vilard, singer in vogue in France in the 60s, together with François, reworked the piece and the text, publishing it under the title of “Comme d’abitudine” (As usual).
Disc that saw the light in November 1967 which ended up conquering the summit of French rankings in the following year 1968, to stay there for a whole week. Paul Anka listened to the French original while on vacation in the south of France and wasted no time. He took the plane to Paris, decided to negotiate the rights of the song. The thing went through, made its rights to adaptation, registration and publication. All for the nominal but formal consideration of one dollar, but on the condition that the composers of the melody keep their original share of the royalty rights with respect to any version of Anka or its designees created or produced. The lyrics of the song were not what we later learned to like, that was work of Paul Anka. In fact, he had the intuition to completely change the verse of the song that initially spoke of good of a love, in the end, but of a life. That of a man who, having reached the end of his days, does not deny anything of what has been done, adding that everything happened “in his own way”... My way. Anka rewrites the text starting from a thought: “If Frank was writing what would this say? ”
And starting metaphorically, he threw it down like that “And now the end is near” … Paul had read many periodicals and noticed that everything was “my this” and “my that”. He and Sinatra himself belonged to the “me generation” and Frank was the type to “dare” to say so. I used words I would never have used: Anka continues: “I ate it and spat it out.” But that was how he spoke. I was hanging out in the Turkish baths with the Rat Pack boys: they liked to talk like the boys of the mafia, even if they were afraid of their own shadow. Sometime later, Anka had dinner in Florida with Frank Sinatra and “a couple of mafia guys” during which Sinatra said, “I’m leaving the business. I’m sick of this; out.” Sinatra “The voice” that “In my way” was “Self-indulgent and self-reproachful, in short, he did not like it and the daughter Tina Sinatra in a recent interview with the BBC said the father hated “Comme d’abitudine”, calling it by its French name. Paul Anka convinced him and the December 30, 1968 Frank sinatra entered the recording studio … the rest is history!
“My Way” was sung by several big names in the song such as Elvis Presley, by Nina Simone, by Robbie Williams and even Sid Vicius of the Sex guns.