If you love Frank Sinatra, you have likely heard his popular song "My Way." But even if you know all the words, you might want to know the history of this beloved track.
Before Sinatra famously sang the song, it was written by the French songwriter Jacques Revaux in 1967.
The ballad was initially titled "For Me" and Revaux; while the lyrics were written in English about a couple falling out of love, it found very little success in the industry.
But he collaborated with Claude François to rework the song, calling it "Comme d'habitude," which then made it to the top of the French charts for a week in 1967.
Later that year, famous American singer and songwriter Paul Anka was vacationing in the south of France and heard the track on the radio. He immediately loved it and began the process of getting the rights to the melody.
After negotiations in Paris, he received the rights to use the song, with the condition that Revaux continued to earn royalties from anything Anka produced.
A short time later, Anka had dinner with Sinatra and some of the Mob guys; after speaking with the singer, Paul Anka decided that Frank was indeed the only man for the song.
He went home and wrote the lyrics all in one night. Anka stated in an interview that he tried to write the song as if Sinatra had written it himself.
On December 30, 1968, the two recorded the track. And in 1969, they released the song as a single on the LP named simply "My Way."
The song experienced almost immediate success on the radio. It reached #27 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart and #2 on the Easy Listening chart in the US. However, its significant reception was among UK audiences.
On the UK charts, "My Way" stayed in the Top 40 for a whopping 75 weeks! And to this day, it is the third longest-running UK chart-topper.
When Paul Anka's record company heard the song, they were highly disappointed that Paul did not release it himself. And while he stood by his decision that Frank was the man for the job, he did record his own version the following year.
Anka has released several versions of the song over the years, and popular artists such as Elvis Presley and Sid Vicious have also produced a rendition of the track.
However, while they all were successful in their own way, there is no doubt that Anka was right: The song was made for Frank Sinatra.
His version was undoubtedly the most popular at the time, and it still is today. If you haven't listened to Frank Sinatra's "My Way" in a while, you might want to give it a listen right now!
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