Nat King Cole
Jazz legend, Nat King Cole was born Nathaniel Adams Cole on the 17th March 1919 in Montgomery, Alabama before moving to Chicago at the age of four. It was at this age that he made his first public performance having been taught to play the organ by his mother.
He began to perform more regularly in the 1930s while still a teenager alongside his brother Eddie who played bass it was around this time that he got the nickname “King”. By the end of the decade he had formed the King Cole Swingers alongside guitarist Oscar Moore and double bass player, Wesley Prince. They eventually signed to Capitol Records in 1943. It is widely considered that his recordings funded the growth of the record label (later home to The Beatles).
His first major hit was Straighten Up and Fly Right which sold half a million copies and while not being a rock and roll song is often cited as an influence. As he moved toward “poppier” numbers the hits kept coming for Cole, most notably his 1951 track Unforgettable.
Amid cries that he was selling out the singer continued to release jazz records including the album, After Midnight. In 1956 Cole hosted his own musical variety series on NBC; The Nat King Cole Show lasted only one series and was unable to get a national sponsor. The genre was one that typically struggled with the likes of Frank Sinatra also lasting just one series.
Racism was a problem that dogged Nat King Cole’s career as well as personal life. One of the worst instances was when he was attacked by three men while performing in Birmingham, Alabama in 1957. In 1948 when moving into an all-white neighbourhood in L.A. his was targeted by the Ku Klux Klan.
The singer managed a number of hits throughout the fifties and proved popular with Cuban audiences when recording two albums completely in Spanish. Despite the influx of rock music he managed a few more hits in the 1960s as well as an attempt at following the trends of the day with song, Send for Me which reached number 6 in America.
Sadly he passed away due to lung cancer on the 15th February 1965.
