HOBOKEN – Francis Wayne Sinatra, known professionally as Frank Sinatra Jr. (son of Hoboken’s Ol’ Blue Eyes) died on Wednesday, March 16 of cardiac arrest, the family website announced.
“The Sinatra family mourn the untimely passing of their son, brother, father, uncle, Frank Sinatra Jr. of cardiac arrest while on tour in Daytona, Florida,” a statement from the family posted online reads.
Details have not been disclosed by the family, media outlets report.
Sinatra Jr. was born in January 1944 to Sinatra and Nancy Barbato Sinatra (Sinatra Sr.’s first wife) in Jersey City. He followed his father’s footsteps into show business but never quite achieved his father’s level of fame.
Learned on the piano and violin from as young as five, Sinatra Jr. made his own way in the world without leaning on his father’s connections. For a time in the 1960s he hit the road with some of the surviving members of the Tommy Dorsey Band. He released his first record album of standards called Young Love for Sale in 1965, backed by The Sam Donahue Orchestra. He released several singles in 1967 that were admired critically, but largely overlooked by the general public. He toured ceaselessly, and by 1968 had performed in nearly every state and more than 40 countries.
Spurring headlines in 1963, at age 19 Sinatra Jr. was kidnapped in Lake Tahoe and held for ransom. Days later his family paid a $240,000 ransom and he was released near his mother’s Bel Air home.
Sinatra Sr. died of a heart attack in 1998 at age 82. Sinatra Jr. is survived by his son, Michael. – Steven Rodas
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