Hopefully I never get hit with that stigma of being a novelty act. Since [my father] death in 1998 I've been doing a program called Sinatra Sings Sinatra.

So what's happening with the audio/visuality, for the first time we are doing the music - the people who would come to the concert love the music - they loved him and loved his music - for the first time in concert it's not only the music. Now it's time to know the man. We know the music, but what was the man like?

I was able to put something back. I was able to be of help to [Frank Sinatra] when he needed my help - and he did need somebody's help.

Frank Sinatra was very devoted to what it was he did. At the end of his life, what he had left - there have been accolades, mementos, festivals, superlatives, all that stuff. He's done movies, TV, done this, done that - what he had left was a love of his audience, and that kept him alive.

It's the way of all flesh, you know. Aging takes its toll. Like I said, it's the way of all flesh. When the time came and he finally had to step down, the thing that kept him going disappeared.

There was a time in medieval England when they had wandering minstrels ... A wandering minstrel would have been Frank Sinatra's counterpart had he lived during the time of Henry II in 1190 or 1180.

I have said my philosophy - I'm a backyard philosopher, I guess - is that the dirtiest word in the English language is retirement.

A man once said when the legend gets bigger than the man, you've lost the man and you have an unrealistic picture.