I watched Gregory Porter on The Graham Norton Show today - a recording of last night - and he sang Mona Lisa with another guest Jeff Goldblum on piano who actually played a fine just off-beat accompaniment showing an effective, distinctive style, an observation Porter himself made, calling it a 'special' style, I think, that the audience didn't quite grasp as compliment and seemed to think was a humorous remark.
I have subsequently ordered the double-vinyl copy of Porter's imminent release Nat King Cole & Me album. I would have anyway as a cd, but hadn't realised it was out as a vinyl lp. Porter is probably one of the only contemporary artists who can sing Cole with the quality and feel it deserves. When interviewed on the couch, Porter recalled how as a 6 year old he made a tape recording of himself singing and played it for his mother. She told him it sounded like Nat King Cole who he went on to follow and love, adding, convincingly and touchingly, how Cole was a role-model for Porter living in a fatherless home.
So at this very moment I am listening to the master himself, an album I have had since a teenager, and one I played and listened to with my mom whose favourite song was Ramblin' Rose, so that will always be mine as well. The song just on is Those Lazy Hazy Days of Summer and its lyrics of Just fill your basket full of sandwiches and weenies reminding of the innocent nonsense of some songs at that time, this the naff hit on the album, but who cares.
I have other Cole albums, again bought as a teenager, and I think I'll spin them on the turntable tomorrow as well. RR is about to play, so I'm going to stop typing and recall my own happy days with Cole and my mother, not at 6 and probably more about 14/15.
No comments:
Post a Comment