Like Bobby Troup and Bobby Scott, Bobby Cole was a songwriter, arranger and lounge pianist-singer. But unlike the other two Bobbys, Bobby Cole is virtually unknown today. That's largely due to the year Cole came up, in 1960, and his decision to skip recording opportunities with major labels.That decision was largely because of the junk they wanted him to sing and their refusal to let him record songs he wrote. [Photo above of Bobby Cole]
Want proof? Cheryl Pawelski at Omnivore Recordings recently released Bobby Cole: A Point of View, recorded in 1967 and issued on the Concentric label. Listening to the album, I'm rather astonished that he wasn't able to gain traction, even in the rising pop-rock and pop-soul era. He seemed to have everything going for him. Perhaps he wasn't as magic in front of a camera as he needed to be or he wasn't different enough or there were no longer budgets at record labels for pop artists who weren't going to sell a ton of records without heavy marketing dollars.
Let's start at the beginning. Cole was born in 1932 in New York and grew up in Astoria, Queens. In the 1950s, after a stint in the Army, he put together a local band but soon shifted to a trio, playing piano and singing. The group premiered at the Living Room in Manhattan in 1960, which soon led to him becoming the house pianist at Jilly's, the Manhattan watering hole co-owned by Frank Sinatra. Cole had been offered a record deal by Capitol, but he turned it down. Capitol wanted him to record commercial songs of the day, which wasn't Cole's bag back then.
In 1961, Cole had a change of heart and recorded an album for Columbia. But whatever he was promised in terms of recording a few of his own songs evaporated, and the album of lightweight standards, New, New, New, was largely a bore. In 1964, Cole was introduced to Judy Garland at Jilly's. They hit it off, and weeks later Cole was hired by the Judy Garland Show as musical arranger after Mel Torme left. But later that year, the show was cancelled and Cole was back to playing gigs with his trio.
In 1967, Garland hired him to conduct the orchestra for her concerts at the Palace Theatre on Broadway in Times Square. Cole had already come to the attention of Jack Lonshein, album cover designer and artist at Mainstream Records. Lonshein tried to persuade Bob Shad, Mainstream's founder, to record an album of Cole playing and singing his originals, but Shad passed. [Photo above of Judy Garland and Bobby Cole at an ASCAP event in 1967]
Lonshein promptly quit and, in 1966, he started his own label—Concentric Records—and recorded Cole and his originals. The album, A Point of View, was released in 1967 and did well in New York, with Ralf Rost on bass, Arnold Wise on drums (around the same time as he was on Bill Evans at Town Hall) and Kathy Kelly on vocals. But as funds continued to stream out of jazz labels and into rock ventures, Cole never again gained the momentum he needed to become a name recording artist. He died in 1996 on his way to his regular gig at Campagnola, a trattoria that's still on Manhattan's Upper East Side.
Hugs to Cheryl for re-issuing this beauty with all of the previously unreleased material.
JazzWax tracks: You'll find Bobby Cole: A Point of View (Omnivore) here.
JazzWax clips: Here's Bobby Cole in 1964 on the Judy Garland Show. Move the space bar to 1:39. As you watch the first two numbers, try to remember that Cole, the singer, is also playing piano. Then watch as perhaps the finest Garland small-group recording on tape and the strongest chemistry between Garland and a musician unfolds on Poor Butterfly. Absolutely amazing. Why these two didn't go straight into a New York studio to record a duet album is beyond me. A missed opportunity...
Here's Cole singing and playing his song, But It's Spring...
And here's The Name of the Game Is Trouble...
Bonus: Here's Nancy Sinatra singing Bobby Cole's Flowers...
And here's Cole in 1975 in Atlantic City singing and playing The End of a Love Affair...
