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Local Band Mate Remembers Frank Sinatra Jr.

STROUDSBURG — Music fans around the world are remembering Frank Sinatra Jr., the son of the legendary crooner. Sinatra traveled the world carrying on his ...

STROUDSBURG -- Music fans around the world are remembering Frank Sinatra Jr., the son of the legendary crooner.

Sinatra traveled the world carrying on his father's legacy while also making his own music.

Just last May, Frank Sinatra Jr.'s voice filled the theater inside the Kirby Center in Wilkes-Barre as part of a 100th birthday celebration for his father.

But while many people inside were focused on their favorite Sinatra songs, they may not have noticed the Pittston native bass player who has been a part of Sinatra Jr.'s band for about four decades.

Paul Rostock of Stroudsburg has been touring with Frank Sinatra Jr. since the late 1970s as his bass player.

"He considered himself one of the guys," Rostock recalled.

The Pittston native was playing at Mount Airy Lodge in the '70s with the house band when Sinatra's band leader found out Rostock was leaving the lodge. That meant he was a perfect fit to fill an opening in Sinatra's band.

"He really liked to have people around that he was comfortable with."

And as the saying goes, the rest was history.

"It's interesting because his career was always overshadowed by his father's career because of his father's magnitude. But what a lot of people didn't know is he was really, he had a career of his own," Rostock said.

Sinatra died on Wednesday after a heart attack. It happened while the band was on their "Sinatra Sings Sinatra" tour in Daytona Beach, Florida.

Rostock would have been there except that his own mother, Catherine, passed away on Tuesday. Photos show her with Frank Sinatra Jr. at the Kirby Center last year, a member of Rostock's family meeting part of his other family.

"Everybody in the band stayed for decades. It's like a second family."

Frank Sinatra Jr. was 72 years old.

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