WILLIAM SHATNER, RENAISSANCE MAN

William Shatner cannot be killed. He has nine lives. Not only is he an actor (Star Trek, Twilight Zone, T.J. Hooker, Boston Legal), a director (Star Trek the Movie), a writer (Star Trek books, with Judith and Garfield Reese-Stevens), and a pitchman and shill (countless commercials), he can also sing like a nightingale.

Well, not really. You could say The Shat is a "song stylist." His interpretations are so bad they're good--and then bad again. When he met Mr. Tambourine Man he didn't just ask for a song, he pistol-whipped the perp like T. J. Hooker on cranky pills.

Here Shatner performs the Pulp song "Common People" with the help of Joe Jackson and Ben Folds.

Of course, we can't resist re-posting his surreal "interpretation" of the Elton John classic "Rocket Man." This is cool. In fact, it's cold as hell.

Who said there are no second acts in American lives? That's right. Too bad Fitzgerald never met William Shatner.

OPERA SINGER GIUSEPPE DI STEFANO DIES

Celebrated tenor, Giuseppe di Stefano, longtime singing partner with Maria Callas, died in his home Monday. Born on July 24, 1921, in Motta Sant’Anastasia, a village near Catania, Sicily, Di Stefano made his operatic debut in 1946. He performed in the northern Italian town of Reggio Emilia, as Des Grieux in Massenet’s “Manon.” He performed the same role the following year when he made his debut at La Scala.

You could say di Stefano's life was an opera. He rose to fame and riches from humble beginnings, sang all over the world, and then came to a tragic violent end. He death was caused by injuries suffered several years ago from unknown assailants, which ailed him for the rest of his life. In winter 2004, there was an attack on his family’s villa in Kenya; unidentified aggressors struck both the tenor and his wife. He awakened from a coma after several surgeries, but never fully recovered. He was 86.

It's unusual to have opera on the blog -- as you know, we mostly lean toward rock, soul, and rhythm and blues -- but we're actually opera fans, too. This past Saturday we saw a fantastic production of "Tosca" at the Seattle Opera. There is nothing like the spectacle -- the costumes, the sets, the music, the voices -- of a good opera. Why leave such a grand tradition to the snobs? Sure, the tickets can be expensive, but cheaper ones are available for dress rehearsals. If you've never been, then consider it a splurge, something on your bucket list before you die.

Here, Giuseppe di Stefano performs "Core 'ngrato" by Cardillo, a song you may remember from The Sopranos, when Uncle Junior (Domenic Chianese) sang it at the wedding. The words mean "Ungrateful Heart...you have stolen my life!"

LA VIE EN ROSE

American Idol? Puh-lease. Mariah Carey has greater range, and Jessica Simpson is MTV-cute and sells more records, but Edith Piaf has soul. Here she performs La Vie En Rose in 1954. It's her most famous song, describing the happiness she had with her lover, the boxer Marcel Cerdon. Cerdon died in a plane crash in 1949 while flying from New York to meet her in Paris. Piaf's life was tragic from the start, and she found solace in music and narcotics. She was discovered by a nightclub owner in the Pigalle area of Paris, in 1935, while busking in the streets.

THE NAT KING COLE TRIO

In this pen and ink drawing, I tried to capture The Nat King Cole Trio. The trio consisted of Cole on piano, Oscar Moore on guitar, and Wesley Prince on bass. They played around the Los Angeles area from the late 1930s. (During the war, Prince was replaced by Johnny Miller). At first, Cole didn't sing, just played the piano and led the band. Then someone at an L.A. nightclub requested he sing "Sweet Lorraine." Cole resisted at first, then relented when the patron complained to the club manager. The rest, as they say, is history.

Nat King Cole (born Nathanial Adams Coles, 1919, Montgomery, Alabama) was a phenomenally talented jazz singer, songwriter, and pianist. In 1956, The Nat King Cole Show debuted on NBC-TV, breaking down the color barrier on television. Sponsors shied away from the show, and it was canceled a year later. "Madison Avenue is afraid of the dark," Cole quipped. In spite of the loss, Cole continued to be a popular entertainer with a long string of hits, beloved by music fans until he died in 1965.

In this clip from 1946, the Nat King Cole Trio can been seen performing "It's Better To Be By Yourself."