Lionel Frederick Cole was born on October 15, 1931, the youngest of Edward and
Paulina Nancy Cole's five children. His three elder brothers, Eddie, Ike and Nat
(twelve years Freddy's senior) were all musicians.
"I started playing piano at five or six," Freddy
remembers. "Music was all around me." In the Chicago home of his youth, visitors
included Duke Ellington, Count Basie, and Lionel Hampton. He also credits Billy Eckstine as a major influence. " He was a
fantastic entertainer," Freddy recalls. " I learned so much from just watching
and being around him." After a possible career with the NFL was shelved due to a
hand injury, he began playing and singing in Chicago clubs as a teenager.
Although he was ready to hit the road at 18, his mother intervened and he
continued his musical education at the Roosevelt Institute in Chicago.
Freddy moved to New York in 1951, where he studied at the
Juilliard School of Music and found himself profoundly influenced by John Lewis,
Oscar Peterson and Teddy Wilson. He got a Master's degree at the New England
Conservatory of Music and then spent several months on the road as a member of
an Earl Bostic band that also included Johnny Coles and Benny Golson.
It was back in New York that Freddy successfully laid the
groundwork for a career that continues to flourish to this day. He developed a
vast repertoire of songs in Manhattan bistros and concurrently began to
supplement his live performances with television and radio commercial jingle
work.
A resident of Atlanta since 1972, he currently leads a
trio made up of himself, guitarist Randy Napoleon, drummer Curtis Boyd and
bassist Elias Bailey that regularly tours the US, Europe, the Far East and South
America. Freddy has been a recording artist since 1952, when his first single,
"The Joke's on Me", was released on an obscure Chicago-based label.
Freddy recorded several albums for European and English
companies during the 1970s that helped him develop a loyal overseas following.
Cole believes that becoming an international favorite made him "widen my scope a
little bit." He developed a stand-up act, a better rapport with audiences, and
learned to sing in other languages. "It made me much more of a performer."
Cole doesn't apologize for sounding like his brother, Nat
"King" Cole. There are certain unmistakable similarities. He plays piano and
sings and performs live with guitar and upright bass, just like Nat. Yet his
voice is raspier, smokier, jazzier even. But he has emerged from the awesome
shadow cast by his elder brother. In truth, his phrasing is far closer to that
of Frank Sinatra or Billie Holiday than that of his brother and his timing
swings a little more. His vocals - suave, elegant, formidable, and articulate -
are among the most respected in jazz. Cole's career continues to ascend as he
has moved into the front ranks of America's homegrown art form with a style and
musical sophistication all his own.