Short Biography
International Pop, R&B and Jazz legend Natalie Cole, joins the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra for An Unforgettable Evening with Natalie Cole at The Plenary, Melbourne Convention Exhibition Centre on Tuesday 31 January 2012.
Throughout her highly successful career, the sultry and sophisticated songstress has received accolades in abundance - nine Grammy Awards, Songwriters Hall of Fame Hitmaker, George and Ira Gershwin Lifetime Musical Achievement Award, three American Music Awards across the Adult Contemporary, Soul & Rhythm & Blues genres and three NAACP Image Awards - 2000 Outstanding Actress in a Television, Mini-Series or Dramatic Special (Livin' For Love: The Natalie Cole Story) and Best Jazz Artist in 2002 & 2009.
Natalie is the daughter of the late Jazz icon Nat King Cole and first recorded with her father at the age of six on his Christmas album. A tomboy who delighted in mischief and music, she often walked onstage during performances or sneaked into the jam sessions with Louis Armstrong and other celebrated artists.
Natalie released her debut album Inseparable in 1975 and became a star in her own right with the #1 single This Will Be (An Everlasting Love), earning her first two Grammy Awards in 1976.
Her 1987 album Everlasting was a cohesive merge of eighties dance floor funk and tasteful adult contemporary tributes, producing the hits - Pink Cadillac, Jump Start, Everlasting, I Live For Your Love, When I Fall In Love and I've Got Love on My Mind.
The seminal 1991 jazz collection, Unforgettable...With Love, was Natalie's tribute to her father. It included the posthumous duet Unforgettable, sold more than fourteen million copies worldwide and received six Grammy Awards.
Recent albums have brought the hits Miss You Like Crazy, Sophisticated Lady, Inseparable, Our Love and Over You amongst others.
As an author, Natalie documented her journey through privilege and poverty, success and serious illness in her deeply personal autobiography Angel On My Shoulder, which was produced for television as the biopic Livin' For Love: The Natalie Cole Story.
Diagnosed with chronic Hepatitis C whilst recording her 2008 album Still Unforgettable, Natalie acknowledges that the infection likely resulted from addiction decades ago. Her second memoir in 2009, Love Brought Me Back, chronicles the bitter-sweet story linked to her kidney transplant and recovery. Natalie is now the spokesperson for the Los Angeles University Kidney Research Organisation which supports the prevention, treatment and eradication of kidney disease.
Film and television credits include the lead role in Lily In Winter, De-Lovely the Cole Porter biopic, Always Outnumbered and as herself in Livin' For Love: The Natalie Cole Story. She has appeared in over 300 television programs including Law and Order, Grey's Anatomy, American Idol, The Real Housewives of Miami and New York, concerts with Andrea Bocelli, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, Nelson Mandela's 70th Birthday Tribute, the Super Bowl XXVIII and more.
If You've Got Love On Your Mind....don't miss An Unforgettable Evening with Natalie Cole and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra on Tuesday 31 January 2012 at The Plenary, Melbourne Convention Exhibition Centre.
This Will Be the only Melbourne performance and Grace Knight Quartet are special guests.
In-depth Biography
The daughter of jazz and pop legend Nat King Cole, Natalie Cole has forged a successful career in two phases, doing R&B/urban contemporary and then jazz-based pop. She made her stage debut at age 11 and sang in college. Cole met the writing and producing team of Chuck Jackson and Marvin Yancey in 1973. The next year they collaborated on some sessions that were recorded at Curtis Mayfield's Curtom studios in Chicago. These helped her land a deal with Capitol, and she teamed with Jackson/Yancey for a string of hit albums and singles from 1975 until 1983. Such LPs as Inseparable, Natalie, Thankful, Unpredictable, and I Love You So yielded five number one R&B hits between 1975 and 1977. These included "This Will Be, "Inseparable," "Our Love," and "I've Got Love on My Mind." She stayed with Capitol until 1983, then switched to Epic for her final album with the Jackson/Yancey tandem. Cole made duets with Peabo Bryson in 1979 and 1980 and Ray Parker, Jr., in 1987. She scored more hits with "Jump Start," "I Live for Your Love," and "Over You" in 1987, and "Pink Cadillac," a cover of a Bruce Springsteen tune, in 1988, and then made her stylistic shift. Cole eased into the transition with "When I Fall in Love," a number her father recorded in 1957. It was included on her 1987 LP Everlasting. She fully embraced the move with the 1991 LP Unforgettable: With Love, earning Grammy Awards and landing a number one pop album that eventually sold over five million copies. The title track featured her doing a duet with her father via electronic elaboration. She continued the jazzy trend with Take a Look in 1993, and she toured and did television specials working with a large orchestra conducted by Nelson Riddle. Holly & Ivy (1994) and Stardust (1996) both continued Cole's exploration of American pop standards. Snowfall on the Sahara was released in 1999, as was The Magic of Christmas, recorded with the London Symphony Orchestra. Ask a Woman Who Knows (2002) and Leavin' (2006) followed for Verve. Cole switched to Rhino for 2008’s Still Unforgettable, an acclaimed collection of pop standards that won the Grammy for Best Traditional Pop Vocal album. Two years later, she released another Christmas album, The Most Wonderful Time of the Year, which found Cole teaming with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. ~ Ron Wynn, Rovi
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