2017 · Album
Nat “King” Cole & Me
Blue Note Records and Decca Records · Released: October 27, 2017 · Arranged by: Vince Mendoza · Recorded at: AIR Studios, London, England · Orchestra: 70 piece orchestra
The Fifth Album, the First Orchestra
Porter graduates to the full orchestra sound in five albums—Cole took twice as long.
By his fifth album, Gregory Porter had already established himself as a singer with serious range and a gift for standards. But Nat King Cole & Me marks a genuine shift in ambition. This is the moment he stops accompanying himself and steps into the kind of lush, orchestral sound that defined Cole's later career. Arranged by Vince Mendoza for a 70-piece orchestra and recorded at AIR Studios in London, it's Porter's first time working at that scale, and you hear the deliberateness in every choice.
The album isn't a tribute band exercise. Porter sings songs Cole recorded or inspired, but the point isn't imitation—it's inhabiting a lineage. Cole moved from trios to strings late in his career; Porter does it here, five albums in, which tells you something about his confidence and his sense of where he belongs in jazz history. Some of Mendoza's arrangements stay very close to the originals, which can feel jarring when Porter's voice enters the space. But that friction is honest. He's not trying to disappear into Cole's shadow.
Critically, the album found admirers. The Times gave it three stars, with the critic praising the scope of Porter's ambition. Rolling Stone Australia awarded four stars, noting how Porter captures the cinematic romance of midcentury American song. This isn't a record that shocked anyone or changed the conversation about jazz. It's a confident artist working in a tradition he loves, backed by serious orchestral muscle, and doing it well.
Who's playing
Terence Blanchardguest, trumpet
Where next?
More by Gregory Porter
Liquid Spirit 2013
All Rise 2020
Take Me to the Alley 2016
One Night Only: Live At The Royal Albert Hall 2018
The musicians on this record
Their own records, close in time
