FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE   For more information or taped actuality, contact Norma Hammeke (620) 793-6759   FREDDY COLE QUARTET COMING TO GREAT BEND   The Golden Belt Community Concert Association will present the third concert of the 2008-2009 season, Thursday, February 5, 2009, at the Great Bend Municipal Auditorium, Lakin and Stone, at 7:30 p.m.  The house will open at 6:30 p.m., with the concert available to concert association members.  Any full-time student will be admitted to the concert for a $5 donation at the door.

Concert members may remember the Freddy Cole Quartet from Cole’s concert here several years ago.  He doesn’t apologize for sounding like his older brother, Nat “King” Cole, who was twelve years his senior.  He plays piano, sings, and performs live with guitar and upright bass, just like Nat, yet there is a definite difference.  His vocals, suave, elegant, formidable, and articulate, are among the most respected in jazz.

Freddy Cole started playing piano at five or six.  Music was all around him.  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.  Cole began playing and singing in Chicago clubs as a teenager and then continued his musical education at the Roosevelt Institute in Chicago.  He moved to New York in 1951, where he studied at the Julliard School of Music and found himself profoundly influenced by John Lewis, Oscar Peterson, and Teddy Wilson.  He received his 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.

The Freddy Cole Quartet regularly tours the U. S., Europe, the Far East, and South America.  Cole has been a recording artist since 1952, with his first single, “The Joke’s On Me.”  He recorded several albums for European and English companies during his early career and widened his scope and developed a stand-up act that created a great rapport with his audiences.  Cole’s career continues to ascend as he has moved into an art form with a style of musical sophistication all his own.

The next Golden Belt Community Concert Association attraction will be the Side Street Strutters on Friday, February, 27, 2009.