Natalie Cole, Grammy winning singer, has died

Natalie Cole, the daughter of jazz legend Nat King Cole, who carved out her own considerable success with R&B hits like "Our Love" and "This Will Be" before triumphantly intertwining their legacies to make his "Unforgettable" their signature hit through technological wizardry, has died. She was 65.
While Cole was a Grammy winner in her own right, she had her greatest success in 1991 when she re-recorded her father's classic hits — with him on the track — for the album "Unforgettable ... With Love." It became a multiplatinum smash and garnered her multiple Grammy Awards, including album of the year.

Cole died Thursday evening at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles due to complications from ongoing health issues, her family said in a statement. "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.

Natalie Cole had battled drug problems and hepatitis that forced her to undergo a kidney transplant in May 2009. Cole's older sister, Carol "Cookie" Cole, died the day she received the transplant. Their brother, Nat Kelly Cole, died in 1995.

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 15 when he died of lung cancer, in 1965. She began as an R&B singer but later gravitated toward the smooth pop and jazz standards that her father loved.

Cole's greatest success came with her 1991 album, "Unforgettable ... With Love," which paid tribute to her father with reworked versions of some of his best-known songs, including "That Sunday That Summer," ''Too Young" and "Mona Lisa."
Her voice was spliced with her dad's in the title cut, offering a delicate duet a quarter-century after his death. The album sold some 14 million copies and won six Grammys, including album of the year as well record and song of the year for the title track duet.
Cole received chemotherapy to treat the hepatitis and "within four months, I had kidney failure," she told CNN's 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 you can have scars," she told People magazine. "You can go through turbulent times and still have victory in your life."

RIP

Natalie Cole - Unforgettable: http://youtu.be/KZqZaOwxW2s/