Natalie Maria Cole (February 6, 1950 – December 31, 2015) was an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Cole was the daughter of American singer and jazz pianist Nat King Cole. She rose to success in the mid-1970s as an R&B singer with the hits "This Will Be", "Inseparable" (1975), and "Our Love" (1977). She returned as a pop singer on the 1987 album Everlasting and her cover of Bruce Springsteen's "Pink Cadillac". In the 1990s, she sang traditional pop by her father, resulting in her biggest success, Unforgettable... with Love, which sold over seven million copies and won her seven Grammy Awards. She sold over 30 million records worldwide.
Natalie Cole was born at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in Los Angeles, to American singer and jazz pianist Nat King Cole and former Duke Ellington Orchestra singer Maria Hawkins Ellington, and raised in the affluent Hancock Park district of Los Angeles.[2] Regarding her childhood, Cole referred to her family as "the black Kennedys" and was exposed to many great singers of jazz, soul and blues. At the age of 6, Natalie sang on her father's Christmas album The Magic of Christmas and later started performing at age 11.With the assistance of Chuck Jackson and Marvin Yancy, a songwriting and producing duo, she recorded some songs in a studio in Chicago that was owned by Curtis Mayfield. Her demo tapes led to a contract with Capitol,[7] resulting in the release of Cole's debut album, Inseparable, which included songs that reminded listeners of Aretha Franklin. Franklin later contended that songs such as "This Will Be", "I Can't Say No", and others were offered to her while she was recording the album You but she had turned them down. Released in 1975, the album became an instant success thanks to "This Will Be", which became a top ten hit and won her a Grammy Award for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.In 1993, she was among the guests of honor attending Wrestlemania IX at Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas. At the 65th Academy Awards she performed a medley of two Oscar-nominated songs: "Run to You" and "I Have Nothing", both performed by Whitney Houston in the film The Bodyguard. Cole made a number of dramatic appearances on television, including I'll Fly Away, Touched by an Angel, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, and Grey's AnatomyCole's funeral was held on January 11, 2016, at the West Angeles Church of God in Christ in Los Angeles. David Foster, Stevie Wonder, Smokey Robinson, Lionel Richie, Chaka Khan, Eddie Levert, Mary Wilson, Gladys Knight, Ledisi, Jesse Jackson, Angela Bassett, Denise Nicholas, Marla Gibbs, Jackée Harry and Freda Payne were among the mourners at the funeral. After the funeral, she was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.
