![]() ![]() 1 hits completely off his set list (and another couple No. John’s catalogue of smash hits and fan favorites is so vast that he can afford to leave as many as four of his nine Billboard Hot 100 No. Listen to the best of Nat King Cole on Apple Music and Spotify.“So let’s make it a good one, eh?” John suggested, to roaring crowd agreement.Ī good one was indeed made on Sunday, as John’s 23-song set satisfied exactly as a final engagement should, right from the opening piano pounds of “Bennie and the Jets” - repeatedly bringing the entire stadium crowd to their feet, despite the sweltering 90-plus degree July heat. It’s a timeless classic of post-war crooning that arguably represents the apotheosis of Nat King Cole’s recorded output. Over half a century later, Unforgettable has more than lived up to its title. But as good as those performances were, they didn’t eclipse the album’s title track, which, over the years, has been covered by singers as varied as Peggy Lee, Aretha Franklin, Engelbert Humperdinck and Merle Haggard – but none come close to Nat King Cole’s original rendering, which was revamped (thanks to modern technology) as a hit duet with his daughter, the late Natalie Cole, in 1991. In 1954, with the 12” LP having quickly superseded the 10” version, Unforgettable was expanded to accommodate four extra tracks, including ‘Nature Boy’ (which had been Cole’s first solo hit back in 1948) and ‘Pretend’, the latter proving to be one of the singer’s biggest UK chart smashes. The song’s success cemented Cole’s transformation from a cool jazz swinger into a romantic fireside balladeer and set him on the path to becoming a mainstream entertainer. It was Cole’s second chart-topping single as a solo artist and spent eight weeks at the top of the US pop charts in 1950. Given the extraordinary quality of Cole’s vocals – which are ravishing on the mournful ‘Lost April’ and Irving Berlin’s ‘What’ll I Do’ – it’s hard to believe that he kept his singing under wraps for a long time and was better known as a pianist during his early years.Īnother iconic Cole performance can be found on his definitive version of Jay Livingston and Ray Evans’ ‘Mona Lisa’, a homage to the mysterious woman in Leonardo Da Vinci’s painting of the same name. His ultra-smooth, subtly nuanced delivery is pitch-perfect and enhanced by subtle accompaniment from an orchestra elegantly arranged by Nelson Riddle (who would famously go on to work with Frank Sinatra). ![]() Unforgettable opens with its memorable title track, penned by Irving Gordon – who wrote ‘Me, Myself And I’ for Billie Holiday – and represents one of Cole’s career-defining performances. Though not conceived as a standalone musical statement, what gave Unforgettable its sense of cohesion was Cole’s ear-caressing, velvet-textured voice, which proved a unifying factor and the sonic glue that held the LP together as a coherent work of art. ![]() ![]() Given that situation, it’s no surprise that Unforgettable, like so many albums from that timeframe, was a compilation of disparate material that scooped up sundry singles and songs from different studio sessions (in this case, music that Cole had recorded between 19). With the advent of the 50s, singles remained the dominant musical currency in the record business, and the LP (which first emerged in 1948 and was still in its infancy) hadn’t yet proved itself as a viable or popular medium for recorded music. Before that, Cole’s trio (whose piano, guitar and bass format proved influential in jazz) was primarily a singles-oriented act who had dominated the American Rhythm And Blues chart, and had racked up a plethora of hits for Capitol in the 40s, including the chart-topping ‘Straighten Up And Fly Right’. Released in 1952, initially as a 10”, eight-track album, Unforgettable wasn’t the then 35-year-old Cole’s debut long-player for Capitol (it was preceded by four other LPs, two of which were instrumental, showcasing Cole’s piano skills), but it was arguably his first significant entry into the brave new world of 33 1/3rpm-playing discs. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |