(b Montgomery, AL, 17 March 1917; d Santa Monica, CA, 15 Feb 1965). American popular singer and jazz pianist. His family moved to Chicago when he was four, and by the age of 12 he was playing the organ and singing in the church where his father was pastor. Cole left Chicago in 1936 to lead a band in a revival of Eubie Blake’s revue Shuffle Along. The following year he formed a trio in Los Angeles with Oscar Moore (guitar) and Wesley Prince (double bass). The group’s instrumentation proved influential: Art Tatum adopted a similar trio format in 1943, as did Oscar Peterson and Ahmad Jamal during the early 1950s. Cole retained his trio (with some changes of personnel) until 1951.
Among Cole’s jazz recordings were four masterpieces in 1942 with Lester Young; Indiana, Body and Soul, I can’t get started and Tea for Two (all 1942, Philo) document Cole’s impeccable jazz credentials. The King Cole Trio sometimes sang in unison on their early recordings, but in 1943 Cole had a national hit with his solo song Straighten up and fly right (Cap.). His immaculate diction and liquid vocal style made his recordings accessible to white audiences and launched his career as a popular singer. From this point he gradually appeared less often with his trio, though from 1944 to 1946 he gave concerts and recorded with Jazz at the Philharmonic. He was one of the first black jazz artists to have his own weekly radio show (1948–9).
His hit recording The Christmas Song (1946, Cap.) was the first of his solo vocal recordings to be accompanied by a studio orchestra, and marked the start of his rise as an internationally acclaimed popular singer, with a smooth and mellifluous style that was both emotive and sophisticated. Further successes included his versions of Nature Boy, which became a no.1 hit in the USA, and Mona Lisa, which featured an arrangement by Nelson Riddle; he later recorded with arrangements by Gordon Jenkins and Billy May. In 1956–7 he had a weekly show as a soloist on American television and until 1965 toured widely, performing in supper clubs, theatres and concert halls. He also appeared in several films including From Here to Eternity (1953), and St Louis Blues (1958), in which he portrayed W.C. Handy.
His daughter Natalie Cole (b Los Angeles, 6 Feb 1950) is a leading pop singer. From her first release, This will be (1975), she has achieved several US no.1 hits, in both pop and soul styles. Her album Everlasting (Manhattan, 1987) yielded the hit singles ‘Pink Cadillac’, ‘I Live for your Love’ and ‘Jump Start’, while for the album Unforgettable … With Love (Elek., 1991) she reworked one of her father’s most famous recordings, ‘Unforgettable’, as a duet between them both, subsequently winning Grammy awards for Best Album and Best Song.
CBY 1956
M. Cole and L. Robinson: Nat King Cole: an Intimate Biography (New York, 1971)
H. Pleasants: The Great American Popular Singers (New York, 1974)
L. Feather: ‘Pianist Giants of Jazz: Nat King Cole’, Contemporary Keyboard, iv/4 (1978), 57
J. Haskins and K. Benson: Nat King Cole (New York, 1984; rev. 2/1990 as Nat King Cole: a Personal and Professional Biography)
L. Gourse: Unforgettable: the Life and Mystique of Nat King Cole (New York, 1991)
K. Teubig: Straighten up and Fly Right: a Chronology and Discography of Nat ‘King’ Cole (Westport, CT, 1994)
BILL DOBBINS, RICHARD WANG/R