watching the greats like tony or ella fitzgerald, i learned so much.or example, wh use offstage was the exact same person -- use offstage was the exact same person on stage. what you are seeing on stage is that person. he was gracious, humble. he usd to -- he used to stand in the lobby and shake people's hands as they were coming into the room. one it's good business and two he just generally like people. imagine if you're going to see the show, how special that night is, you will always remember that. kristen: how long was his career? he was popular pre-rock 'n' roll, right? >> very much so. much before -- long before you were born. believe me. he started with all the great big band singers in the 1940's. part of why they were so humble, back in the 1930's and 1940's, the real stars with the bandleader's,, james or benny goodman. in the singers -- and the singers, they would sit in a chair off to the side and the band would go, come on, sing a tune, so there was humility, the musicians were the star and the greats like tony, it is all about the music

in terms of his legacy, what he and frank sinatra and ella fitzgerald, they defined notjust and ella efined not just a and ella fitzgerald, they defined notjust a musical genre, but those songs and how they were meant to be heard. people like gershwin said until artist like tony bennett recorded their songs, they were never aware or appreciated themselves how good those songs were. tony bennett always said he didn't want to have a hit record, he wanted a hit catalogue. the legacy he has created and left us, we will never see it again. the albums represent a golden period of music which will never be surpassed. in terms of his musical legacy, because he had come up at a when there he had come up at a time when there was sinatra, nat king cole, to come up was sinatra, nat king cole, to come up when all those people were at the top of their game and establish his own voice is quite astonishing. he was influence at the start by the early singers like ella johnson, and sinatra, but he took the rhythmic approach of the piano player and it with the sweet saxophone combined it with the sweet

he done with stuff with ella fitzgerald. >> come on. frank loves ella, frank sinatra , sinatra and ella, frank sinatra, sinatra and frank sinatra . even though he's frank sinatra. even though he's one of the greats, he said that tony bennett was the best singer in the business. so this is the kind of voice that we are now going to miss. and the stats are just incredible. 50 million records sold, 70 albums released, 23 grammys, 1—1 after the age of 60. and he just stopped performing at the age of 95. so he still was passionate about it. it's been undisclosed what he died from, but he was diagnosed with alzheimer's in 2016, which he didn't make publicly known until 2021. but he was still singing. it's just fascinating saying that he had alzheimer's , but he still alzheimer's, but he still remembered his songs and he still sang with much life . as still sang with much life. as you can imagine. the tributes have been pouring in, president joe biden said. for more than 70 years, tony bennett didn't just sing the classics him himself was an am