Janet Jackson, Young MC win Grammys 1990

Janet Jackson's multiple award-winning album Rhythm Nation 1814 continued to garner more honors at the 32nd annual Grammy ceremony held February 21, 1990.  She took home the Grammy for Best Music Video, Long Form, with Aris McGarry (video producer), Johnathan Dayton and Valerie Faris (video producers and directors), and Dominic Sena (video director)

Young MC won Best Rap Performance for his Bust a Move. From this point on, the category was split into Best Rap Solo Performance and Best Rap Performance by a Duo or Group.  These two were combined again in 2012 and reinstated as the Award for Best Rap Performance.  

Peter Schickele won Best Comedy Recording for his P.D.Q. Bach: 1712 Overture and Other Musical Assaults.  

Nat King Cole and Paul McCartney were each awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.

Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire was nominated for Record of the Year, but lost to Bette Midler's Wind Beneath My Wings.

Singer Natalie Cole born 1950

Natalie Cole, born February 6, 1950 in Los Angeles, California, was the daughter of the amazing Nat King Cole and won 9 Grammy Awards.

She was the first African-American artist to win Best New Artist in 1976 along with her performance of This Will Be.  In 1991, she released Unforgettable in which she sings a duet with her famous father.  It garnered her 3 more Grammys. She won numerous other awards such as American Music Awards, and NAACP Image Awards for her music and acting.

She passed away December 31, 2015 in Los Angeles.  

I've always loved her song Dangerous.  Listen to it here:

Celebrating Black History Month: Natalie Cole, first African-American to win Grammy for Best New Artist

Super-talented Natalie Cole, daughter of the great Nat King Cole, is the first African-American performer to win a Grammy for Best New Artist, which she won in 1976, beating out KC and the Sunshine Band!

Her debut album Inseparable generated two hit singles, This Will Be and Inseparable.  Both songs went to #1 on the Billboard R&B charts.  She won a Grammy for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance.

On Father's Day 1991, she released Unforgettable...With Love, an album with covers of her father's hits.  Through the magic of technology, she recorded Unforgettable as a duet with Nat King Cole.  The single won four Grammys: Record of the Year, Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance, Song of the Year, and Best Arrangement, Instrumentals and Vocals.  The album won Grammys for Album of the Year and Best Engineered - Non-classical.

She left us too early as she passed away in December 2015 due to health problems.

"Unforgettable" by Nat King Cole and Natalie Cole reaches #1 1991

Natalie Cole released her Grammy-winning album Unforgettable...With Love in June 1991, a cover of her father's songs.  July 27, 1991, Unforgettable, the duet engineered with her and Nat King Cole, reached #1 on the Billboard 200. 

The single won four Grammys: Record of the Year, Traditional Pop Vocal Performance, Song of the Year and Arrangement Accompanying Vocals.

The album won Album of the Year and Best Engineered - Non-Classical.  It has been certified 7x platinum in the U.S. as of 2009.

Nat King Cole born 1919

Nat King Cole, born March 17, 1919 in Montgomery, Alabama as Nathaniel Adams Coles, had one of the most recognizable and velvety voices ever.  He dropped out of high school to pursue a career in music.  As a member of the King Cole Trio, he recorded Sweet Lorraine in 1940 which became his first hit.

November 5, 1956, the Nat King Cole show debuted on NBC, which was the first variety program to be hosted by an African-American.  It failed due to the lack of a national sponsor, despite the efforts of friends such as Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee, Eartha Kitt to keep it on air.  A year later, the last show aired December 17, but it was Cole, not NBC who ended the program.

He recorded Unforgettable in 1951, which was edited and remixed in 1991 to create a duet with his daughter Natalie.  Her version reached won three Grammys in 1992, Song of the Year, Record of the Year, and Best Traditional Pop Vocal Performance.

Nat King Cole's original recording was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000. 

His last album L-O-V-E was recorded in December 1964 before he entered the hospital for cancer treatment and released just before he died February 1965. 

He was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 1990.