What is the message of the song The Way?

Frank Sinatra onstage in the 1970s. Though the star was ambivalent at best about the song's message, "My Way" became emblematic of this era of his career.

This story is part of American Anthem, a yearlong series on songs that rouse, unite, celebrate and call to action. Find more at NPR.org/Anthem.

It's hard to imagine two occasions more different than the inaugural ball for President Trump and the funeral for murdered rapper Nipsey Hussle, but they have at least one thing in common: The same song played at both. It's a song that has come to represent a particular idea of American individualism, and in some ways feels even more relevant today than when it was recorded in 1968 by Frank Sinatra.

Released the following year, "My Way" was an unusual song for Sinatra. It's not a love song about a girl, a boy or even a city — it's about me, me, me. Among his fans, it is a subject of controversy: Will Friedwald, author of the book Sinatra! The Song Is You: A Singer's Art, told me it "would certainly be not on the Top 10 list of anybody who I'd consider a real major Sinatra fan." So how and why did Frank Sinatra come to sing this song? It turns out that when is even more important.

Like others in his generation, by the late 1960s, Sinatra was feeling the culture slip past him. His ring-a-ding-ding Rat Pack years had wound down, as rock and roll became America's dominant music. He was sometimes in the news for the wrong reasons — like when his partnership with the Sands Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas reportedly ended in a physical altercation. His output during that era does include some of his greatest vocal achievements, such as the masterpiece album Strangers in the Night — but hits were unpredictable, and the future of his career seemed far from certain. Enter Paul Anka.

Anka was a one-time teen idol, a peer of Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons, who had grown up in the shadow of singers like Sinatra. On a visit to France, Anka came across a torch song called "Comme d'habitude," performed and co-written by the French pop singer Claude François, that caught his ear. He decided to buy the rights to the song and keep its music, but rewrite the lyrics with his hero in mind. Conductor Don Costa completed the equation, arranging "My Way" for a full orchestra with a big, lush sound.

Jason King, a professor at NYU's Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music, says that in writing "My Way," Anka used Sinatra as a totem for a certain kind of American bravado.

"You could read 'My Way' as a kind of metaphor for the World War II generation that Frank Sinatra represented," he says, "looking back at 20th century history in this kind of cosmic defiance." King says that essentially, Anka wrote a song not for Francis Albert Sinatra the man, but Frank Sinatra the character, who could stand as a kind of cultural figurehead. "Saying, 'Look, I did it the way I wanted to do it, and I did it right. I'm looking back at all this history, and I'm OK with it.' "

Sinatra's youngest daughter, Tina, remembers very clearly the first time she heard her father perform "My Way": "You could feel the energy, electricity, in the room. That song became his that first night," she told NPR at her Beverly Hills home. "I think it was a song waiting for him to happen."

At the time "My Way" was made, Tina was returning from school in Europe for the holidays, and had begun to get involved in politics and the women's movement. She and her dad were moving in different directions personally and politically — and while she loves his performance of the song, she's always been so-so on the lyrics, which she says offer an extremely male perspective on the world.

"Women are going to ask for respect. I don't know that they're going to want to talk about regrets, they've had a few — do you know what I mean? Maybe because men make more mistakes, and they have more to regret," she jokes, adding that if you're looking for a woman's anthem, try "These Boots Are Made for Walkin' " by her big sister Nancy. But she doesn't dispute the song's anthemic status.

"An anthem is something that everybody, I think, responds to," she says. "And the only difference with dad and 'My Way' is you don't have to stand up."

Tina Sinatra wasn't the only one who liked the sound of "My Way" but was turned off by its chest-thumping: One of the song's biggest critics was Frank Sinatra himself. Introducing it in 1984 at a concert at Carnegie Hall, he told the audience, "We have a song we haven't done in a long time, and we're gonna drop it in here now. I think we did it for about 10 years, and it got to be a real pain you-know-where."

"It is this song that really inflates him, and inflates his persona, to stadium-sized proportions," Will Friedwald explains. "Whereas Sinatra's trademark, his patented approach, the thing that people liked most about Sinatra before 'My Way,' was the intimacy: the idea that this is a guy who has experienced life and love the same way that we have." He points out that as a musician, Sinatra tended to be humble, always sharing credit with his writers and orchestrators.

Regardless of how Sinatra felt about it personally, the song became a phenomenon culturally. Though never a Top 10 hit, it stayed on the charts for years, was covered by artists as disparate as Elvis Presley and the Sex Pistols' Sid Vicious, and was named the most-played song at funerals in a poll of funeral directors. The more it shook off its mid-century moorings, the more it came to resonate with people its creators could never have imagined.

"I think Jay-Z would be the classic example, because he has a song called 'I Did It My Way,' which samples the Paul Anka version," offers Jason King. "And in the lyric, Jay-Z actually likens himself to Frank Sinatra."

King says that in a hip-hop context, it's possible to read "My Way" as more of a blueprint for fine living, a mantra for how "to do it your way and don't let anybody else tell you how to live. And that's a metaphor in some ways for hip-hop's own kind of defiance, its own singularity, its own uniqueness."

Ayana Contreras, a Chicago cultural historian and radio producer, agrees that the influence of the song now reaches far beyond its original context. You know that guy who picks up a microphone in a karaoke bar and belts out "My Way" completely irony-free? Whether he's a stockbroker or a construction worker, Contreras says that he's projecting an image of his idealized self.

"I think it really goes back to the aspirational nature of what Frank Sinatra represented for people. ... It was like this fabulosity on a level that we can only hope to achieve: 'I did it the way I wanted to do it. I made it. And here I am,' " she says. "Which is, at its very root, not just aspirational, but a self-determination anthem."

Self-determination — or, in other words, "I did what I had to do / And saw it through, without exemption." What sentiment could be more American than that?

This story was produced for broadcast by Walter Ray Watson. Daoud Tyler-Ameen adapted it for the Web.

anonymous Apr 2nd 2006 report

Like the one above, that is true. I was watching this thing on VH1 one time, where they were going behind all these songs in which were always rumored to be about something, (Such as "Mr. Jones," by Counting Crowes.) The lead singer was fascinated with this story, so he dedicated a song to the families. On the show, the elderly couple was apparently going to a family reunion because they had their bags packed, but they never showed up. When the police found them, they were in their car dead. The police believed the elderly man died first. They were saying that the woman had been cuddled up to the man before she died, because she thought he was still alive.

A pretty sad song when you think about it. :(

19 years ago, Austin-based band Fastball topped the charts with their hit song "The Way." But the true story behind the song's inspiration - and how the hit came to be - is even more incredible.

{"html":"\n&#lt;iframe width=\" 459\" height=\"344\" src=\"https://www.youtube.com/embed/X5jlTlUTWfQ?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"&#gt;&#lt;/iframe&#gt;\n","thumbnail_url":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/X5jlTlUTWfQ/hqdefault.jpg","title":"Fastball The Way (Official Video) www.fastballtheband.com","width":459,"author_url":"https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC3EMWd1XsvVhf3hn2f4LguQ","url":"https://youtu.be/X5jlTlUTWfQ","version":"1.0","type":"video","height":344,"author_name":"fastball","thumbnail_height":360,"provider_url":"https://www.youtube.com/","provider_name":"YouTube","thumbnail_width":480}

Chapter 1

An exit to eternal summer slacking, but where were they going without ever knowing the way?

It's a summer tradition, one that takes greater meaning in cities like Salado and Belton.

For Lela and Raymond Howard, that tradition was Pioneer Day in Temple.

"I knew they were going to be going because they went every year," said Hal Ray Copeland, Lela Howard's son.

The Howard's were both on their second marriage, united through a love of the church, and that late-in-life lust to live.

"I think they just enjoyed going and doing things together. Nanny always used to – that's the main word she stood by is 'go'," said Rhonda Alford Coleman, Lela Howard's granddaughter.

And on Saturday, June 29, 1997, "go" was on their mind.

On the mind of their loved ones - concerns over their memories.

Raymond, 88, had recently had brain surgery, and Lela, 83, was showing symptoms of memory loss.

"You know on Saturdays, when I said when I would come out here, I started noticing a few things. She'd leave something on the stove, and we'd be fixing her hair – and I'd say I got to go check on whatever she had. She'd go 'I don't know what you're talking about," said Coleman.

Their concerns rose to a point where they tried to prevent them from driving.

"We kind of hid the keys for a little while," Coleman said.

By June 1997, Lela Howard was doing the majority of the driving for the couple.

"She called me and crying and said she couldn't find her keys, and I couldn't stand (her crying)," Copeland explained, adding he eventually relented and gave her the keys back. "I could feel how she hurt."

Even with the memory loss issues, the family said Lela drove often, and did so well.

But when it came time for the Pioneer Day Festival, the family offered to assist.

"I said 'do you want me to go with you, and drive the car?' She said, 'oh no, we'll be fine'," said Copeland.

Chapter 2

Anyone can see the road that they walk on is paved in gold. It's always summer they'll never get cold. They'll never get hungry, they'll never get old and gray.

The trip from their Belton home to Temple was 10 miles - fifteen minutes tops.

"They'd stay until about 3 usually. When it got 5, and they weren't home, and then it was 8 and they weren't home, I went out to the TV stations, and they put it on TV that night, " Coleman recalled, adding they immediately knew something was amiss.

"We called the officers, and they came right on out. (We) had no clue whatsoever, we had no idea," said Copeland.

The family drove to the local Wal-Mart, where the Howards would stop in daily for a coffee and donut, but found no sign of them there.

Their disappearance gained widespread media attention, including in the Austin-American Statesman. At the time, the manager for Austin-based band Fastball encouraged their lead singer Tony Scalzo to look to the newspaper for inspiration.

"Our first album was called 'Make Your Mama Proud.' As hard as we worked to make it and promote it, we were still basically running a college-market. We didn't really have an established sound. Where that record sound indicated where we were going, wasn't really where we wanted to go," said Scalzo.

Along with Scalzo, the band features guitarist and singer Miles Zuniga, and drummer Joey Shuffield.

Trying to come up with new material for their second album, Scalzo took their manager's advice and turned to the newspaper.

"I looked in, right away this story sort of struck me. It was sort of an ongoing story. Still no developments in the case of the missing couple," Scalzo said.

As he read more and more, the wheels started moving in his mind.

"I just started getting these ideas, well maybe they don't want to be found, maybe they're just like - they're sick of being responsible and they just want to go out and have fun," Scalzo explained.

Within a few hours, Scalzo had developed the bulk of the song, all as authorities were still searching high and low for the Howards.

CHAPTER 3

They just drove off and left it all behind them. Where were they going, without ever knowing the way?

"The police got a lot of calls about seeing them, seeing them different places. Finding an older couple in a certain type of car, and we kind of got our hopes up that first week," said Coleman.

"They got pulled over one time by a cop – he questioned them, but he let them go," Lela Howard's grandson, Randy Alford, explained.

An officer in Arkansas – hundreds of miles from Salado – had stopped the Howards for driving without their lights on.

The cop flicked the headlights on for the couple – then let them go.

"We can't figure out how they got through Dallas. Haven't figured it out yet," said Coleman, her mind still flummoxed by the trip.

Lela Howard had family in Arkansas and was familiar with the area.

"In her right mind, [Lela] would have called and found Nadine (her relative)," Coleman said.

"They were about a mile from my cousin's house when [the officer] stopped them," Copeland said.

At the time – the officer didn't know they were missing.

The stop did, however, narrow the search area.

Still, with no answers, the saga continued.

"Biggest nightmare of my life," Coleman said.

"[We] didn't know anything," Copeland said. During that time, he made three separate trips from Salado to Arkansas, searching the area they were last seen - hopeful to find them.

Each time, he left empty-handed. Finally, on Day 13, a break in the search.

"Two boys, walking home from a video store. Their father left them at the video store and they were going to walk home. As they walked home, they walked by this little creek area. And it had a strong smell, a strong odor, so when they got home, they told their parents, and that's when all of it started," said Coleman.

When cops checked the area, they found the maroon Oldsmobile the Howards were driving - at the bottom of a 25-foot cliff near Hot Springs, Arkansas.

"It was a relief. Because a lot of families don't have that closure. And that must be very hard," said Alford.

CHAPTER 4

You can see their shadows wandering off somewhere, They won't make it home but they really don't care, they wanted the highway, they're happier there today, today

On a conference call - Fastball and its managers were discussing what song would be the single on their new album.

"Our manager just blurts out - what about that song 'The Way?' Why don't you just go ahead and try that?" Scalzo explained.

After the decision was made, the song was sent to radio stations across the country.

"Little pockets, like Birmingham, Alabama, here and Salt Lake City. And little by little, people started paying attention. The radio started paying attention. The label starts paying attention, and not only that - a buzz is created in the industry and people from other labels start gravitating towards working for Hollywood (Fastball's label at the time)," Scalzo explained.

The Howards' family didn't initially know that 'The Way' was about Lela and Raymond, but the similarities to their story were apparent.

"That sounded like Momma and Mr. Howard - the way they died. You could tell by the way it sounded," Copeland recalled.

"I thought 'that's exactly what happened. That's what they did. They just drove away,'" said Coleman.

A few days later - Copeland's beliefs were confirmed. What had quickly become the #1 song in the country was a living tribute to his mother.

"I liked it, really. I liked the song (a lot)," said Copeland.

"I was just blown away, I just couldn't believe somebody would do something like that for my grandma," added Alford. "Powerful, very powerful."

"My cousin said (Lela) left a star. On TV all the time, a song about her. She would have loved that," Copeland said.

The album ended up going Platinum and made the band worldwide sensations. For seven weeks, it topped the charts, taking the band across the award show circuit.

{"author_name":"KVUE","author_url":"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/","provider_url":"https://www.facebook.com","provider_name":"Facebook","success":true,"height":281,"html":"&#lt;div id=\"fb-root\"&#gt;&#lt;/div&#gt;\n&#lt;script&#gt;(function(d, s, id) {\n var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\n if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\n js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\n js.src = \"//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.10\";\n fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\n}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));&#lt;/script&#gt;&#lt;div class=\"fb-video\" data-href=\"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/videos/10155740887821178/\"&#gt;&#lt;blockquote cite=\"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/videos/10155740887821178/\" class=\"fb-xfbml-parse-ignore\"&#gt;&#lt;a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/videos/10155740887821178/\"&#gt;&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;p&#gt;Tony Scalzo, lead singer of Austin-band Fastball, plays a few songs as part of a special story we're working on for next week&#lt;/p&#gt;Posted by &#lt;a href=\"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/\"&#gt;KVUE&#lt;/a&#gt; on Monday, July 17, 2017&#lt;/blockquote&#gt;&#lt;/div&#gt;","type":"video","version":"1.0","url":"https://www.facebook.com/KVUEinsider/videos/10155740887821178/","width":500}

"I believe that the song, in particular, it's a strong song. I think it's a strong song musically, it's a strong song in the way it was put together musically and lyrically, I think it's one of the best things I've done. At the same time, I think a lot of its power comes from the story behind it. And I somehow put together this musical piece that was enhanced by the story, and I also believe the story, for the family and the people involved, was enhanced by the song," said Scalzo.

And 19 years later - the song is still on the airwaves; its meaning far surpassing its platinum status.

"No one else has a story like that. There are other stories, but it's not this story," said Scalzo.

As for Fastball, they're currently on a cross-country tour, promoting their first new album, Shine Into Light, in eight years.

"Every single night (of this tour), 46 shows out on the road, with a big audience, every single [crowd] sang the whole song. They know all the words. They sang it. Amazing. They sing it loud," Scalzo said.

They're also working on a 20th-anniversary release of "All the Pain Money Can Buy," the album which featured "The Way."

The lyrics still hit home for a family still missing their loved ones.

"Amazing. And [Lela] deserved it. She was very special," said Coleman.

"I think the song is the closure part of it. It's the final deal to the whole story," said Alford.

July 2017 marked twenty years since the Howards' passing.

"It seems like yesterday to me," said Copeland.

While Lela was never diagnosed with Alzheimer's during her life, her family said she displayed some symptoms.

"I think at that point it opened up a whole new awareness for those with Alzheimer's (and memory loss/dementia), opened up the doors to a big problem we have in this country," Alford said.

"Early in the morning, (Lela's) mind would be pretty good. But as the day wore on, that's when it got worse," said Copeland.

To learn more about Alzheimer's Disease, click here.

As we concluded our interview with Lela Howard's family, Coleman read aloud the lyrics to the song. As she battled emotions, the words took on a far more personal meaning.

"They left before the sun came up that day. They just drove off and left it all behind them. Where were they going without ever knowing the way?"