Frank Sinatra, the talented and temperamental balladeer who dominated popular music longer than any entertainer before him, had clung to his legendary life as tenaciously as he had stuck with the audiences he loved.
Three years after he took his final concert bow, Sinatra died at 10:50 p.m. Thursday in Cedars-Sinai Medical Center's emergency room after a heart attack. His wife, Barbara, was at his side.
The self-styled "saloon singer," 82, had not been seen in public since suffering a heart attack in January 1997. Rumors of his imminent death proliferated throughout that period as he made frequent trips to the hospital only to return home.
Susan Reynolds, Sinatra's publicist who told the world of his death, said his funeral will be private.
