Topeka-bound Freddy Cole is a king, too

By Bill Blankenship 

THE CAPITAL-JOURNAL

Nat "King" Cole wasn't the only one in his family to make music as the late singer's youngest brother, 79-year-old Freddy Cole, will demonstrate Sunday when he performs a Topeka Jazz Workshop Inc. Concert Series show.

The Freddy Cole Quartet — Cole on piano and vocals, Randy Napoleon on guitar, Curtis Boyd on drums and Elias Bailey on bass — will play from 3 to 5 p.m. in the Grand Ballroom of the Ramada Hotel and Convention Center, 420 S.E. 6th.

Admission is by season ticket, which is good for Sunday's show and nine more in the 2011-12 series. A series subscription can be purchased with cash or check at the door for $45 for s student 20 or younger or $100 for everyone else. To review the rest of the season lineup, go to www.topekajazz.comor contact TJW Inc. executive director Marcene Grimes at mgrimes14@cox.net or (785) 379-5169.

The Cole household in Chicago was a musical one. Cole's mother played the piano and directed the choir in her husband's Baptist Church. The eldest brother, bassist Eddie Cole, was leading a band by age 17, and it was under Eddie's name that Nat recorded some of his first songs. Ike Cole played drums, and his trio toured internationally. He also lent his keyboard-playing skills to niece's Natalie Cole's Grammy-winning "Unforgettable" album.

While music seemed to be the family business, it wasn't Freddy Cole's initial career choice. As a teenager, he had his sights set on becoming a running back in the NFL until at 16 he suffered a hand injury that resulted in a bone infection, a series of surgeries, extensive physical therapy and a return to music.

He enrolled in Chicago's Roosevelt Institute to further his musical education, then transferred to the Juilliard School in New York and went on to earn his master's degree at the New England Conservatory of Music.

Preceded in death by all three of his brothers, Freddy Cole later in his life emerged from his late brother Nat's shadow to establish himself as a jazz great in his own right.

His 2010 album, "Freddy Cole Sings Mr. B ," a tribute to Billy Eckstine, was nominated for the Grammy Award in the category Best Vocal Jazz Album.

A New York Times critic called him "among the surviving stalwarts of an oldfangled mode of jazz singing, one that now belongs mainly to the realm of cabaret. He's a melody man, allergic to undue embellishment, and his maturity manifests as understatement."

As far as comparisons to his more famous sibling, the reviewer wrote, "So for the record: he doesn't really sound like Nat, except when he does."

"Mr. Cole has his own voice, raspier and less solicitous than his brother's, and his own sort of charisma, with hints of bluesy gruffness behind the composure," the critic also wrote.

Rather than rest on such laurels, the Atlanta-based Cole, who turns 80 on Oct. 15, is touring in support of his latest CD, "Talk to Me," which HighNote released in August and about which some jazz critics have said could be destined for another Grammy nomination.

Bill Blankenship can be reached at (785) 295-1284 or bill.blankenship@cjonline.com.

http://cjonline.com/news/2011-09-16/topeka-bound-freddy-cole-king-too

Stalwart of an Old Style, but With His Own Identity

By NATE CHINEN
Published: July 31, 2009
The singer and pianist Freddy Cole exudes a gallant but unfussy brand of cool. Addressing a dinner-hour crowd at the Jazz Standard on Thursday, he described his own show as “an invitation to relaxation” — something to take the edge off after, say, a long day of shopping, or “whatever it is you ladies do.”
The smile he then flashed was debonair, knowing and a little mischievous. So was his reading of the following tune, a former Frank Sinatra vehicle called “Don’t Change Your Mind About Me.”
Mr. Cole is among the surviving stalwarts of an oldfangled mode of jazz singing, one that now belongs mainly to the realm of cabaret. He’s a melody man, allergic to undue embellishment, and his maturity manifests as understatement.

At 78 he has earned the right not to be defined in relation to his older brother Nat King Cole, who also sang at the piano, favored many of the same songs and employed similar instrumentation. So for the record: he really doesn’t sound like Nat, except when he does.
There was one such moment early in the set, involving his timbre and phrasing on the standard “I See Your Face Before Me.” But that was basically it for evocation. Mr. Cole has his own voice, raspier and less solicitous than his brother’s, and his own sort of charisma, with hints of bluesy gruffness behind the composure.
His set was typically full of love songs, avowals of attachment or yearning. But he didn’t convey the impression of someone given to extremes of feeling, whether that meant a swoon or a sob. Performing “If I Love Again,” a forlorn ballad, he sounded most engaged by the prospect of moving on. “I’ll find other charms,” he sang, and you believed him. (Was that the case when Barbra Streisand recorded the song? Tony Bennett?)

Mr. Cole has a new album, “The Dreamer in Me” (HighNote), that presents a fine approximation of one of his nightclub sets. (It was recorded last year, around Valentine’s Day, at Dizzy’s Club Coca-Cola.) The album features a tenor saxophonist to good effect, and this week’s engagement was billed to include one too.
Instead Mr. Cole had strict accompaniment from his crisp working band, with the guitarist Randy Napoleon, the bassist Elias Bailey and the drummer Curtis Boyd. It was enough, especially when he was busy at the piano, kneading out block chords or dancing around the melody of a song.
One of the more insouciant tunes from the new album is Cole Porter’s “You’re Sensational,” and Mr. Cole gave it just as much life here, especially during the bridge:

Making love
Is quite an art
What you require
Is the proper squire
To fire your heart

Singing in his husky baritone, with the faintest shiver of vibrato, Mr. Cole kept these lines from sounding cheeky. Or maybe he made them sound just cheeky enough.
Freddy Cole performs on Saturday at Jazz Standard, 116 East 27th Street, Manhattan, (212) 576-2232, and from Thursday through Aug. 9 at Blues Alley in Washington, bluesalley.com.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/01/arts/music/01cole.html?_r=1&partner=rss&emc=rss

Freddy Cole - Fly me to the moon