Cole was exposed to the greats of jazz, soul and blues at an early age and began performing at the age of 11. Her debut album in 1975, Inseparable, won her immediate praise, with the smash single This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) (#1 R&B, #6 Pop) winning her a Grammy for Best R&B Vocal Performance, Female, a category that had been monopolized by Aretha Franklin, since its inception in 1967. She also was named the Grammys' Best New Artist of 1975. She attended the Northfield Mount Hermon School in Northfield, MA.
More hits followed through 1980, including her biggest Pop hit, 1977's I've Got Love On My Mind, as well as Sophisticated Lady (She's A Different Lady) (1976), Our Love (1978), and Someone That I Used To Love (1980). "I've Got Love On My Mind" and "Our Love" both earned certifications as Gold singles. But then her career hit a snag in the early 1980s due to a severe drug problem. By 1985, Natalie was clean, sober, and in fine voice, and ready to begin her comeback in earnest with the album Dangerous, released on the Modern label.
In 1987, she released Everlasting (on EMI Manhattan) which sold over 2 million copies in the U.S., and won Cole a Soul Train Award for Female Single of the Year for the #1 R&B ballad I Live for Your Love. This album was the one that put Natalie Cole firmly back in the spotlight, yielding three major hit singles: Jump Start, "I Live For Your Love" (#2 AC and #13 Pop as well as #1 R&B), and a successful remake of Bruce Springsteen's Pink Cadillac (#5 Pop, #16 AC, and #1 Dance). The album also included a taste of things to come in her career with a remake of one of her father's signature hits, "When I Fall In Love," which did moderately well on the AC chart. In 1989, the aptly-titled Good To Be Back gave her another across-the-board smash with "Miss You Like Crazy" (#1 both R&B and AC, and #7 Pop).
However, it was her 1991 album, Unforgettable... with Love, featuring her own arrangements of her father's greatest hits, that gave her the most success. Ironically, when Natalie began her career, she was determined not to capitalize on her father's name and wanted to forge her own identity by going after the soul market in earnest. For many years, she also found the prospect of recording her late father's songs too painful on a personal level. But Unforgettable... With Love certainly paid off. The set sold over 5 million copies in the United States alone, and won Cole several Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance. The album featured a duet, the title track, with her father, created by splicing a recording of his vocals into the track. As a single, it reached #14 on Billboard Magazine's Hot 100 chart, and went gold. The one sour spot in the album's success was that it strained Natalie's already-tumultuous relationship with her mother, Maria, who said in interviews at the time that she couldn't listen to the album or attend any of her daughter's concerts because she felt that the music really belonged to her late husband.
Natalie has released several more albums of pop standards in the years since; as a result of appealing to the "adult standards" audience, she has made only occasional forays onto the pop singles charts in that time (for example, "A Smile Like Yours," #8 AC and #84 Pop in 1997), although her albums still sell well. Her 1999 album Snowfall On The Sahara marked a return to the easy adult-contemporary soul that categorized her late-1980s hits, but for 2002's critically-praised Ask A Woman Who Knows, she turned more to the jazz side of the spectrum, covering songs made famous by Dinah Washington, Nina Simone, and Sarah Vaughan.
Battle With Drugs
In 2000, Cole released an autobiography, Angel on my Shoulder, which described her battle with drugs during much of her life. In the book, Cole admitted to using LSD, heroin and crack cocaine. Cole said she began experimenting with drugs while attending the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and was arrested in Toronto, Canada for possession of heroin in 1975. Cole continued to spiral out of control - including an incident in which her young son Robert nearly drowned in the family swimming pool while she and her first husband, the late Reverend Marvin Yancy were on a drug binge - until she entered rehab in 1983.
In concert with the release of the book, her autobiography was turned into a made-for-TV movie, The Natalie Cole Story, which aired December 10, 2000 on NBC.
Natalie has been married three times and has a son Robert Yancy (by Marvin Yancy), born in 1977. She later married former Rufus drummer Andre Fischer, who co-produced the Grammy Award-winning Unforgettable... With Love, Natalie's love offering featuring songs made famous by her father, including a faux-duet between her and her father.
The marriage to Fischer ended in divorce a few years later, amidst rumors of domestic verbal and physical abuse.
It has also been reported that Natalie has recovered from a life-threatening hepatitis illness (most likely the cause of her years of drug abuse) by having a liver transplant.
Miss Cole went on to release more albums after Unforgettable...With Love, with most of them featuring jazz-oriented standard songs or pop-song remakes. None of the albums were nearly as successful as Unforgettable...With Love.
As of 2013, Natalie Cole spent most of her professional time covering the concert circuit entertaining audiences around the world with her hits.
On December 31, 2015, Natalie Cole died from congestive heart failure at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles. She was aged 65.
The First Noel
Natalie Cole Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Was to certain poor shepherds in fields as they lay.
In fields where they lay keeping their sheep,
On a cold winter's night that was so deep.
They looked up and saw a star, shining in the east beyond them far.
And to the earth it gave great light,
And so it continued both day and night.
The star drew nigh to the north west,
On Bethlehem it took its' rest.
And there it did both stop
And stay right over the place where Jesus lay.
The song "The First Noel" by Natalie Cole narrates the story of the first Noel, the first Christmas celebration that announced the birth of Jesus. The angel's declaration of this momentous event was made to certain poor shepherds who lay in the fields watching over their flocks. The phrase "certain poor shepherds" communicates that the birth of the Saviour was not to celebrities or people of high status, but rather to lowly shepherds whose hearts were receptive to the Good News.
When the shepherds were out in the fields at night, a star appeared in the east that shone brighter than any other, giving them enormous light. It was a cold winter's night, and the star drew the shepherds to travel towards it, and nigh the star shone brighter and brighter until it rested in Bethlehem. The star stopped and remained over the place where Jesus lay; this was the birthplace of Jesus. The bright light of the star symbolizes how the coming of the Saviour brought hope and enlightenment to the world that was lost in darkness and sin.
The song conveys a message of love, peace, and hope, true essence of the Christmas season. Its melody and lyrics evoke the feelings of joy and gratitude for the incredible gift of salvation that humanity received through the birth of Jesus Christ.
Line by Line Meaning
The first noel, the angels did say,
According to the angels, the very first noel occurred
Was to certain poor shepherds in fields as they lay.
It was announced to some shepherds who were lying down in a field.
In fields where they lay keeping their sheep,
The shepherds were in a field keeping watch over their sheep.
On a cold winter's night that was so deep.
The noel occurred on a very cold and dark winter night.
They looked up and saw a star, shining in the east beyond them far.
The shepherds looked up and saw a bright star shining in the far east.
And to the earth it gave great light,
The star shone very brightly and illuminated the earth.
And so it continued both day and night.
The star remained visible both day and night.
The star drew nigh to the north west,
The star moved closer to the northwest direction.
On Bethlehem it took its' rest.
The star rested over Bethlehem.
And there it did both stop
The star stopped moving.
And stay right over the place where Jesus lay.
The star remained fixed over the spot where Jesus was laid.
Lyrics © Peermusic Publishing
Written by: Traditional
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind