Sinatra 10 years Later: To Young Stars, Ol' Blue Eyes Is an 'All-Timer'

If Sinatra had been a fledgling artist in 2008, "he would have been influenced by whomever came along today, just as he was shaped by Bing Crosby and Al Jolson and Louis Armstrong and other influences he heard as a kid," Feinstein says. "And he would have taken these new influences and, as he did with the older ones, moved them to another place."

And were Sinatra alive and recording, he might still be learning the blues — and teaching them. "I was at Sinatra's house for dinner one night when Dean Martin was not well and had stopped singing. And Frank said, 'They're going to have to put me in a box to get me to stop singing.' "

His music lives on

Radio personality Jonathan Schwartz — the son of traditional pop composer Arthur Schwartz, whose material Sinatra covered — knew the Chairman of the Board even longer, and insists, "Sinatra hasn't gone anywhere. He's still profoundly alive." His music "proliferates" on Schwartz's programs, simulcast on New York's WNYC and XM Satellite Radio, "and I feel that music is more deeply perceived than ever."

Schwartz won't speculate on how Sinatra, given his professional savvy and penchant for trailblazing, might have embraced new opportunities offered to musicians by the Internet and other changes in the music industry. Still, he notes, "there are massive displays of his (work) in stores that sell CDs. You can go online and find discographies that list the dates of each and every song he recorded. If you go on YouTube, you'll find him singing everywhere.

"He is born again and again every day. Just go outside and listen — you'll hear him."