Nat King Cole - This Is Nat King Cole '2020

Tracks list

Tracklist:

1. Dreams Can Tell Lie (Remastered)
 2. I Just Found Out About Love (Remastered)
 3. Too Young to Go Steady (Remastered)
 4. Forgive My Heart (Remastered)
 5. Annabelle (Remastered)
 6. Nothing Ever Changes My Love For You (Remastered)
 7. To The Ends Of The Earth (Remastered)
 8. Im Gonna Laugh You Right Out Of My Life (Remastered)
 9. Someone You Love Me (Remastered)
 10. Love Me As Though There Were No Tomorrow (Remastered)
 11. Thats All (Remastered)
 12. Never Let Me Go (Remastered)
 13. Small Towns Are Smile Towns (Remastered)
 14. Dont Hurt The Girl (Remastered)
 15. My Flaming Heart (Remastered)
 16. United (Remastered)

 For a mild-mannered man whose music was always easy on the ear, Nat King
Cole managed to be a figure of considerable controversy during his 30 years as a
professional musician. From the late 40s to the mid-60s, he was a massively
successful pop singer who ranked with such contemporaries as Frank Sinatra,
Perry Como, and Dean Martin. He shared with those peers a career that
encompassed hit records, international touring, radio and television shows, and
appearances in films. But unlike them, he had not emerged from a background as a
band singer in the swing era. Instead, he had spent a decade as a celebrated
jazz pianist, leading his own small group. Oddly, that was one source of
controversy. For some reason, there seem to be more jazz critics than fans of
traditional pop among music journalists, and Coles transition from jazz to pop
during a period when jazz itself was becoming less popular was seen by them as a
betrayal. At the same time, as a prominent African-American entertainer during
an era of tumultuous change in social relations among the races in the U.S., he
sometimes found himself out of favor with different warring sides. His efforts
at integration, which included suing hotels that refused to admit him and moving
into a previously all-white neighborhood in Los Angeles, earned the enmity of
racists; once, he was even physically attacked on-stage in Alabama. But civil
rights activists sometimes criticized him for not doing enough for the cause.

Such controversies do not obscure his real talent as a performer, however. The
dismay of jazz fans at his abandonment of jazz must be measured against his
accomplishments as a jazz musician. An heir of Earl Hines, whom he studied
closely as a child in Chicago, Cole was an influence on such followers as Oscar
Peterson. And his trio, emerging in the dying days of the swing era, helped lead
the way in small-band jazz. The rage felt by jazz fans as he moved primarily to
pop singing is not unlike the anger folk music fans felt when Bob Dylan turned
to rock in the mid-60s; in both cases, it was all the more acute because fans
felt one of their leaders, not just another musician, was going over to the
enemy. Less well remembered, however, are Coles accomplishments during and after
the transition. His rich, husky voice and careful enunciation, and the warmth,
intimacy, and good humor of his approach to singing, allowed him to succeed with
both ballads and novelties such that he scored over 100 pop chart singles and
more than two dozen chart albums over a period of 20 years, enough to rank him
behind only Sinatra as the most successful pop singer of his generation.

Nat King Cole was born Nathaniel Adams Coles on Montgomery, AL, on March 17,
1919. (In his early years of music-making, he dispensed with the s at the end of
his name.) As a black child born to a poor family in the American South at that
time, he did not have a birth certificate; his March 17 birthday was recalled
because it was also St. Patricks Day. He listed conflicting years of birth on
legal documents during his life; most sources give the year as 1917. (Biographer
Daniel Mark Epstein, for his 1999 book Nat King Cole, consulted the 1920 census
to determine that the Coles household had a male infant at that time and confirm
the birth year as 1919.) Coles father was a butcher who aspired to the Baptist
ministry, and when Cole was four the family moved to Chicago, where his father
eventually succeeded in becoming a preacher.

Like his older brother Eddie, who became a bass player, Cole showed an early
interest in music. He was taught piano by his mother as a child and later took
lessons. Also like his brother, he turned professional early; by his teens, he
was leading a band, called either the Royal Dukes or the Rogues of Rhythm, and
he dropped out of high school at 15 to go into music full-time. The following
year, Eddie, who had been touring with Noble Sissles band, returned to Chicago
and the brothers organized their own sextet. On July 28, 1936, as Eddie Coles
Swingsters, they recorded two singles for Decca Records, Nat King Coles
recording debut. That fall, they were hired to perform in a revival of the
all-black Broadway musical revue Shuffle Along. Unlike his brother, Cole
remained with the show when it went on tour, in part because his girlfriend,
dancer Nadine Robinson, stayed with it as well. The two married in Michigan on
January 27, 1937, even though Cole was only 17 years old. The tour made its way
around the country, finally closing in Los Angeles in May. Cole and his wife
remained there, living at first with her aunt, while Cole sought employment as a
musician. He briefly led a big band, then played solo piano in clubs.

While performing at the Café Century during the summer of 1937, Cole was
approached by the manager of the Swanee Inn, who invited him to put together a
small band to play in the club. With guitarist Oscar Moore and bassist Wesley
Prince, the act debuted that fall, drawing upon the childrens nursery rhyme (Old
King Cole was a merry old soul...) for the name the King Cole Swingsters, later
simply the King Cole Trio. The group gradually built up a following, with Cole
emerging as a singer as well as a pianist. By September 1938, they had begun
making radio transcriptions, originally not intended for commercial release,
though they have since been issued. In 1939 and 1940, they made occasional
recordings for small labels while expanding their live performing to include
appearances across the country and radio work. In late 1940 they were contracted
by Decca. Their 1941 recording of Coles composition That Aint Right hit number
one on Billboard magazines Harlem Hit Parade (i.e., R&B) chart on January 30,
1943, Coles first successful record. By that time, Prince had left the group to
work for the war effort, replaced by Johnny Miller.

The King Cole Trios contract with Decca expired before That Aint Right became a
hit. Their next single, All for You, was recorded for the tiny Excelsior label
in October 1942. After its initial release, it was purchased by Capitol Records
and reissued. On November 20, 1943, it became the groups second number one hit
on the Harlem Hit Parade. It also crossed over to the pop chart. With that,
Capitol signed Cole directly. The trios first Capitol session produced both the
Cole composition Straighten Up and Fly Right, which topped the black chart for
the first of ten weeks on April 29, 1944, spent six weeks at the top of the folk
(i.e., country) chart, and reached the Top Ten of the pop chart, and Gee Baby,
Aint I Good to You, which topped the black chart on October 21 and also crossed
over to the pop chart.

The trio placed another four titles in the black chart during 1944, and Capitol
released its debut album, The King Cole Trio (catalog number BD-8) that fall.
The collection of four 78 rpm discs contained eight tracks, only three of them
featuring Cole vocals. When Billboard instituted its first album chart on March
24, 1945, The King Cole Trio was ranked at number one, a position it held for 12
weeks. At the same time, big-band swing music was declining in popularity, and
many jazz fans were beginning to turn to the emerging style of bebop, a
development that, whatever its artistic significance, spelled the end of jazz as
a broadly popular style of music.

The King Cole Trio -- and particularly the singer/pianist then known as King
Cole -- on the other hand, was going in exactly the opposite direction, as its
success on records and at clubs and theaters around the country led to
appearances in films and on radio. After numerous guest-star stints on Bing
Crosbys Kraft Music Hall radio series, the trio, along with pianist Eddy Duchin,
was hired to host the shows summer replacement program for 13 weeks beginning
May 16, 1946. During that run, on August 17, The King Cole Trio, Vol. 2 (Capitol
BD-29), another set of four 78s, hit number one. Over the next five days, the
trio recorded two songs that would add to their pop success. Mel Tormé and
Robert Wells The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You) (better known by its
opening line, Chestnuts roasting on an open fire), recorded August 19, was Coles
first disc to feature strings. (I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons, though it
only featured the trio, demonstrated that Cole was more than capable of handling
a straight romantic ballad, not just the uptempo novelties with which he and the
group had succeeded up until this point.

(I Love You) For Sentimental Reasons became Coles first number one pop single on
December 28, 1946; The Christmas Song (Merry Christmas to You) peaked at number
three, going on to become a holiday perennial and million seller. While these
hits were developing, the trio went from its summer replacement berth to its own
network radio series, King Cole Trio Time, a 15-minute Saturday afternoon
program that debuted on October 19, 1946, and ran until April 1948. The groups
recording schedule during the first half of 1947 was relatively light, but the
pace picked up considerably starting in August, in anticipation of the musicians
strike called for January 1, 1948. On August 22, 1947, with an orchestral
backing, Cole recorded Nature Boy, an unusual philosophical ballad. Released
March 29, 1948, and credited to King Cole, it hit number one for the first of
eight weeks on May 8, becoming a gold record.

Oscar Moore, the trios original guitarist, left the group in October 1947 after
ten years and was replaced by Irving Ashby. In March 1948, Cole divorced his
wife and married singer Marie Ellington. Among the couples children was Natalie
Cole, who became a singer. Bass player Johnny Miller quit the trio in August
1948 and was replaced by Joe Comfort. In February 1949, Cole added percussionist
Jack Costanzo to the group, which thereafter was billed as Nat King Cole & the
Trio. As of the spring of 1950, Coles recordings were being credited simply to
Nat King Cole. On July 8 of that year, his recording of the wistful movie theme
Mona Lisa, featuring a string chart arranged by Nelson Riddle, became Coles
third number one pop hit and gold record.

That September, he traveled to Europe for his first international tour,
beginning a pattern that would find him giving concerts almost continually in a
combination of top nightclubs in major cities and concert halls around the U.S.,
with occasional trips to Europe, the Far East, and Latin America and extended
stays at Las Vegas casinos. In these appearances, he stood for most of the show,
only occasional sitting down to play a number or two at the piano. Ashby and
Comfort left in 1951, and an announcement was made that the trio was officially
dissolved, but that simply meant that Cole henceforth would be billed as a solo
act. In practice, he continued to carry a guitarist, John Collins, and a
bassist, Charles Harris, along with Costanzo (until he left in 1953 and was
replaced by drummer Lee Young), while often augmenting them with an orchestra.

Sings for Two in LoveCole scored his fourth number one pop hit and gold record
with Too Young, which topped the charts on June 23, 1951. His recording of
Unforgettable peaked at only number 12 on February 2, 1952, but it went on to
become one of his better remembered recordings; in 1991, a version of the song
by Natalie Cole with the Nat King Cole recording dubbed onto it became a gold
record and won the Grammy Award for Record of the Year. With his 1952 LP
Penthouse Serenade, Cole showed that he was not yet ready to dispense with his
jazz chops entirely. The disc was an instrumental collection that spent one week
at number ten in the album chart in October. Meanwhile, he was also looking for
new challenges, taking on small acting roles in the films The Blue Gardenia and
Small Town Girl and the television drama Song for a Banjo in 1953. His 1953
album Nat King Cole Sings for Two in Love, arranged and conducted by Nelson
Riddle, was a Top Ten hit in early 1954 that predated similar concept albums by
Frank Sinatra.

After MidnightAlthough Cole did not score a number one hit in 1953 (Pretend
peaked at number two), his seven chart entries were enough to rank him among the
ten most successful singles artists of the year. His five chart singles in 1954,
among them the gold-selling Top Ten hit Answer Me, My Love, allowed him to
repeat this ranking the following year, and he did the same thing in 1955 with
another eight chart entries, including the Top Ten hits Darling Je Vous Aime
Beaucoup, A Blossom Fell, and If I May. Nine more chart entries allowed him to
stay among the most successful singles artists in 1956, even though none of them
reached the Top Ten, and he maintained his rank for the fifth straight year in
1957, reaching the Top Ten (and the top of the R&B chart) with Send for Me.
Though he managed one more Top Ten hit, Looking Back, in 1958, the rise of rock
& roll diminished his success on the singles chart. Meanwhile, he returned to a
jazz approach on his 1957 LP After Midnight, which paired his backup group with
jazz musicians Harry Sweets Edison, Stuff Smith, Willie Smith, and Juan Tizol.
It was a modest commercial success, quickly followed by the ballad album Love Is
the Thing, arranged and conducted by Gordon Jenkins, which hit number one for
the first of eight weeks on May 27, 1957, and eventually was certified platinum.

Wild Is LoveMeanwhile, in the fall of 1956, Cole became the first
African-American host of a network television series when The Nat King Cole Show
debuted as a 15-minute weekly program on November 5. The show was expanded to a
half-hour in July 1957 and ran until December of that year, though it never
attracted a national sponsor that might have made it an ongoing success. Cole
attributed advertisers reticence to racism. He returned to his acting career
during 1957, appearing in Istanbul and China Gate, and got his most substantial
role in 1958 playing blues musician W.C. Handy in a film biography, St. Louis
Blues. His last acting role came in Night of the Quarter Moon in 1959. In 1960,
he turned his attention to the theater, putting together a musical revue
intended for Broadway. The songs were by Dotty Wayne and Ray Rasch, and the
album Cole made of them, Wild Is Love, became his first Top Ten LP in three
years. The corresponding stage show, Im With You, was not as successful, opening
what was intended to be a pre-Broadway tour in Denver on October 17, 1960, but
closing in Detroit on November 26. Cole, however, salvaged the concept of the
show for a stage production he called Sights and Sounds: The Merry World of Nat
King Cole, featuring a group of dancers and singers, with which he toured
regularly from 1961 to 1964.

Cole returned to the Top Ten of the singles chart for the first time in four
years with the country-tinged Ramblin Rose in 1962; his album of the same name
also reached the Top Ten and eventually was certified platinum. Those
Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer became his last Top Ten hit in the summer of
1963. In December 1964, he was diagnosed with lung cancer. Two months later, he
died of it at the age of 45.

After his death, Cole continued to appeal to the two almost mutually exclusive
audiences that had appreciated him during his life. Jazz fans continued to
treasure his recordings of the 1930s and 1940s and to dismiss the non-jazz
recordings he had made later. (In 1994, German discographer Klaus Teubig
compiled Straighten Up and Fly Right: A Chronology and Discography of Nat King
Cole, which pointedly cut off in the early 50s.) Pop fans clamored for reissues
of Coles 1950s and 60s music, awarding gold record status to compilations that
Capitol continued to assemble, without much worrying about the singers talent as
a piano player. (And, as his recordings fell into the public domain in Europe,
where there is a 50-year copyright limit, a spate of low-quality reissues
assumed flood levels.) But the ongoing debate was only testament to Coles
ongoing attraction for music lovers, which, in the decades following his
untimely end, showed no signs of abating. ~ William Ruhlmann

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