Natalie Cole dies on New Year's Eve
Natalie Cole, daughter of legendary jazz singer Nat King Cole, has died at the age of 65. According to a statement issued by her family she died Thursday evening, December 31st at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles due to complications from ongoing health issues. "Natalie fought a fierce, courageous battle, dying how she lived ... with dignity, strength and honor. Our beloved Mother and sister will be greatly missed and remain UNFORGETTABLE in our hearts forever", read the statement from her son Robert Yancy and sisters Timolin and Casey Cole.
Other artists also honoured Cole on social media. Aretha Franklin said, "I had to hold back the tears. I know how hard she fought. She fought for so long. She was one of the greatest singers of our time." Patti LaBelle posted on Twitter, "She will be truly missed but her light will shine forever!"
While Natalie was a Grammy winner in her own right having carved out her own successful career with R&B hits like "Our Love" and "This Will Be", she had her greatest success in 1991 when she re-recorded her father's classic hits - with him on the track utilizing modern studio wizardry - for the album Unforgettable ... With Love. It became a multiplatinum smash hit and garnered her multiple Grammy Awards, including Album of the year.
Natalie Cole was inspired by her dad at an early age and auditioned to sing with him when she was just 11 years old. She was just 15 when he died of lung cancer in 1965. She started singing seriously in college, performing in small clubs. While she began her career as an R&B singer, she later gravitated toward smooth pop and jazz standards following the steps of her father. She also worked as an actress, with appearances on TV's Touched by an Angel and Grey's Anatomy.
In her 2000 autobiography Angel on My Shoulder, Cole discussed how she had battled heroin, crack cocaine and alcohol addiction for many years. She spent six months in rehab in 1983.
When she announced in 2008 that she had been diagnosed with hepatitis C, a liver disease spread through contact with infected blood, she blamed her past intravenous drug use. Cole received chemotherapy to treat the hepatitis and "within four months, I had kidney failure", she told CNN reporter Larry King in 2009. She needed dialysis three times a week until she received a donor kidney on May 18, 2009. The organ procurement agency 'One Legacy' facilitated the donation from a family that had requested that their donor's organ go to Cole if it was a match. Cole toured through much of her illness, often receiving dialysis at hospitals around the globe. "I think that I am a walking testimony to (that) you can have scars," she told People magazine. "You can go through turbulent times and still have victory in your life."
A great voice of our times has left us.