The big brassy strut begins - everyone knows this means the end. I wore out three copies of the single (bigger sound, brighter mastering) of Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York," putting the final exclamation point on literally thousands of parties in '80s and '90s. When Frank came in, the crowd knew it was really, really, no kidding, the last song and the party was over.

And what a great song: Sinatra's last culture-spanning hit, capturing both the challenge of grabbing the attention of the Big Apple and the satisfaction of achieving it; a bold, bigger-than-life tribute from one legend to another, meeting as equals on the plane of song.

Anytime you hear a song that many times you come to feel a certain level of proprietorship and over time I felt free to rewrite that famous opening line, which I also felt free to sing over the microphone in my best Sinatra baritone: "Start spreading .. your legs." The stunned expressions yielding to giggles were a source of deep satisfaction.

But I digress, the author of the REAL lyrics to "New York, New York" ("Start spreading the news ...") and the lyrics to smash musicals Chicago, Cabaret, Kiss of the Spider Woman, Zorba, and Woman of the Year, Fred Ebb, has died at (more or less) 76:

Ebb died Saturday at his home, said David McKeown, an assistant to composer John Kander, Ebb's longtime collaborator. The lyricist was believed to be 76, although Ebb always was "sweetly vague" about his age, said director Scott Ellis, who worked with him on several shows.

With Kander, Ebb wrote the scores for 11 Broadway musicals, many of them for such leading ladies as Gwen Verdon, Chita Rivera, Liza Minnelli and Lauren Bacall. Minnelli was a particular favorite of the songwriting team, and over the years, the duo created special material for the performer's solo appearances on Broadway and on television specials.

...."New York, New York" was written for the 1977 Martin Scorcese film of the same name, which starred Minnelli and Robert De Niro. The song became a standard, particularly after it was recorded by Frank Sinatra.

Together, the songwriting team won Tony Awards for their scores of "Cabaret," "Woman of the Year" and "Kiss of the Spider Woman." In addition, the 2002 film version of "Chicago," directed by Rob Marshall, won the Academy Award for best picture.

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