Top 55 Natalie Cole Quotes

I think that it’s going to be interesting to see where Beyonce’s career goes.

When I did ‘Unforgettable,’ it wasn’t appropriate for us to take liberties with that music. There had to be kind of a fine line between what had made it so great and the fact that a woman was singing it. We changed some of the arrangements, but not too much.

Life is such a gift, I just say thank you all day.

I think we need to be sexy and kind of mysterious and still pretty and beautiful. I like to hear that when a man sings. I don’t really want to hear about taking my clothes off.

I never got to make that transition from little girl to young woman… and that really screws you up.

The medication I had to take was a form of chemotherapy. You feel like death every day. No appetite. No energy. But the treatment worked. It cured my liver 80 per cent but compromised my kidneys.

As kids, we had no clue about the racial stuff that seemed to preoccupy adults. We just enjoyed our life as kids.

I like Kelly Rowland, I think that she’s great. It’s hard to come out of the group of Destiny’s Child and still kick some butt.

If you don’t have dialysis, absolutely, you will die. Dialysis is actually keeping me alive.

When I was old enough to walk home alone from school, I loved seeing our house from a distance. It sat on the corner of South Muirfield Road and West 4th Street and had this proud, majestic look. But I rarely went through the front door. The back was more dramatic.

Nothing had been attempted like that, to lift Dad’s voice, literally, off of that track and put it on a brand-new one, and then line it up, match it up, get the phrasing right. I remember listening – everyone listening at the end, and we were just enthralled. It was really wonderful.

It’s the subtleties of a ballad that truly make it beautiful – and it’s all in the way you present it to the listener.

I’ll never totally get away from being who I am, which first, to many, is the daughter of Nat King Cole, which became even more intensified with the ‘Unforgettable’ album.

My idols are Janis Joplin and Annie Lennox, who are neither of them from the typical pop culture.

I’ve always been interested in the office. I was a secretary a long time ago, and I’ve always been into paperwork. My first secretarial job was 1965 or 1966.

When you reach 50, what you care about is being honest, being accurate, and being an example.

By the time I approached my forties, I had the self-assurance to approach all the genres I love so deeply: R & B, rock, jazz, and pop.

I’m an ordinary person under extraordinary circumstances.

God surrounded me with people of faith, people of strong faith, people of power, spiritual power, and I saw little miracles happen in their lives. By it happening in their lives, I started believing it could happen to me.

I think people hear the warmth in my voice and the friendliness, and they think: ‘Oh, she must be a very nice person’.

I couldn’t breathe. I – I went into – literally, my kidneys stopped functioning. They stopped, you know, processing the fluid that was starting to build up in my body.

I thank my dad for leaving me such a wonderful, wonderful heritage.

I think that I am a walking testimony to you can have scars. You can go through turbulent times and still have victory in your life.

I think that talented people really do have insecurities, and that is one of the things that kind of motivates them, because that’s one thing they know they’re good at. And when they’re up on that stage, you can do no wrong. The audience is yours; they’re there to see you.

I was madly in love with Elvis Presley. Dad wasn’t into it at all, at least not for himself as a performer. He used to say, ‘Mr. Cole does not rock n’ roll.’

It’s important to wallow and grieve when you have a health issue. I don’t think you really get the best stuff out of life until you’ve had the worst stuff.

I have been to hell and back. I have seen the edge. I have seen the dark side of life.

I feel enough distance from the person I used to be. I’m not ashamed about my life anymore, because I’ve learnt from it.

We used to have to arrange things around the dialysis. I would have to plan where to play so I could be back in time, and couldn’t go too far.

I loved when my dad was home. He liked to sit in the living room and watch boxing and baseball on TV. Or he’d be tinkering around or listening to records by his musician buddies – George Shearing, Oscar Peterson and the Jackie Gleason Orchestra.

I’m a born-again Christian. I was raised Episcopalian – I’ve always been of a Christian faith, but I became much more active in it when I married my first husband, Marvin. I changed from Episcopalian to Baptist.

I have been on dialysis in Istanbul, Milan, Indonesia, Manila, London. It’s – it’s amazing.

I was going to college to be a doctor.

My friend was on dialysis for six years before he got a new kidney. I was on dialysis for eight months. I’m almost not even the typical person who has kidney failure.

Like my father, I don’t want to see anyone mistreated, anything like that. I’m very racial-conscious because my father had a lot of, you know, challenges in the area of race. I’m very sensitive to that kind of issue.

I would hate to look back on my life and go, ‘You know, I wanted to do a rock n’ roll album. I should have, and I never did.’

You shouldn’t have regrets. I’d say instead that I’ve learned a lot of lessons. Yes, I could have handled some things better. But they’ve also made me who I am today.

It’s remarkable what a new kidney does to your life. I have no complaints… I’m pretty amazed. I have been working on my stamina.

Aretha Franklin does not like me.

It’s the same girl-who-has-everything story. You know, the one where she’s insecure and scared and unhappy and has marriage problems and doesn’t know how to handle stardom and screws up right and left and gets in with the wrong people and goes down the drain.

I think people just want to be popular. So they’re going to write lyrics that are going to get your attention. You know, sometimes, they’re a little graphic, and I don’t think that’s so necessary.

I think that I sound a lot better than Diana Ross.

Losing people is dark, but some things you just have to accept.

I like Babyface, but he keeps the good stuff for himself. If he’s willing to give his good stuff to me, we’ll talk. But it can’t be any of his B-grade stuff.

One thing that stays the same is my passion for music. Other than that, I’ve become more dedicated. I think that I really work much harder than I ever did when I first started at my craft; I’m more dedicated, and I have become a perfectionist.

I think foreign countries really do like it when American artists sing in their language. And when you go over there and say, ‘Hi, how are you?’ in their language, they love it. It makes them feel like you’re doing it just for them. We in America take so much for granted.

I’ve always adored my father’s music, but ever since I’d started singing, whether it was while I was still a student at the University of Massachusetts or professionally, I avoided Dad’s material.

I had to make peace with my past because I can’t change it.

People say I look younger than the music I’m doing just because the songs are older. Hopefully I can keep my youthful look!

We are born with two kidneys and only need one to survive. Maybe God gave us the other one so that we could give it away.

As miserable as I was, once I started singing, I felt better.

I’ve always loved Spanish. I love my father’s Spanish records.

Even when I had no money, I spent everything I had on clothes.

We have to stop rewarding bad behavior.

Being my dad’s daughter has allowed me to do a lot of things that maybe another artist might not be able to do or wouldn’t be necessarily embraced doing.