Black Americans credited with major contributions to blues, jazz savannahnow.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from savannahnow.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
The Double Life of Nat King Cole
After Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole is the best remembered of the singers who dominated American popular music between the end of the big-band era and the advent of rock ’n’ roll. Chiefly known today as a performer of romantic ballads, he had a dark, grainy baritone voice with which he sang in a style at once intimate and unmannered. While Cole’s reputation went into a temporary eclipse as a result of his early death a lifelong chain smoker, he died of lung cancer in 1965, three decades before Sinatra gave his last public performance he was restored to prominence in 1991 when his daughter Natalie, herself a talented pop singer, released a single of “Unforgettable” in which his original performance of the song, recorded 40 years earlier, was electronically superimposed on her own to create a “virtual duet.” The record put Cole back in the limelight, and he has been there ever since.
The Purnell Steen Quintet is comprised of some of the top musicians of this region. Purnell, a Denver native, started classical piano studies at age 4, and switched to Jazz Piano more than 40 years ago, due in large part to the urging of his legendary cousin, Charlie Burrell.
Bassist Ron Bland is a First Call internationally known bassist, as are guitarists Ed Stephen and Vohn Regensburger,along with drummer Bill Larson. This quintet is committed to preserving Hard-Swing jazz that made 5 Points famous. They have performed with 5- Time Grammy Award winner Dianne Reeves; Earth, Wind, and Fire, Bill Frizell, Ron Miles and countless other top notch artists. The swingin’ style of the immortal Oscar Peterson Quartet and King Cole Trio have greatly influenced this hot group.