(USA TODAY) -- Natalie Cole, who died Thursday at 65, could have easily spent her career looming in or trying to shake off another singer's shadow. She was, after all, the daughter of Nat King Cole, whose velvety baritone was one of the most distinctive voices of the 20th century.
Instead, the younger Cole both embraced her heritage and was a radiant and enduring presence in her own right. Over a career spanning nearly four decades, she lent credibility and beauty to material ranging from contemporary pop and R&B ballads to dance music to the standards that had been her father's turf.
From her dad, she inherited warmth and elegance, the kind of aptitude and class that cannot be learned. She established her own seamless style, distinguished by an easy buoyancy that infused even darker songs with a sense of light. Jazz and soul were in her blood, but she was a natural pop singer, drawing the listener in with both smoothness and heat.
Cole's 1975 debut album, Inseparable, established her capacity for joy with two chart-topping R&B hits: the moonstruck title track and the buoyant This Will Be (An Everlasting Love), which was also a Top Ten pop single. She sustained her pop presence in the late '70s with tunes that were sexy (I've Got Love On My Mind) and forthright (Our Love), and enjoyed a resurgence in the late '80s with a playful cover of Bruce Springsteen's Pink Cadillac, which also became a dance hit via a remix.
But it was in honoring her father, and the American songbook, that Cole reached her pop peak. On 1991'sUnforgettable...With Love, she revisited traditional pop tunes, including the title track, which she performed (with an assist from modern technology) as a duet with her late father. The album was a phenomenon, its appeal crossing audiences and generations; it collected a bevy of Grammy Awards, including Album, Record and Song of the Year (though the songUnforgettable was at that point four decades old).
Cole followed up with 1993's Take A Look, which also featured pop and jazz classics set in orchestrations as robust as they were refined. (Cole's then-husband, musician/producer/arranger André Fischer, was a key collaborator on both recordings.) Another collection showcasing standards, Stardust, arrived in 1996, featuring another posthumous duet with the elder Cole, When I Fall In Love.
Cole's musical curiosity and range, and her affection for her dad, would continue to inform her projects. Two years ago, at 63, she released her first Spanish-language album, Natalie Cole en Espanol -- inspired by 1958's Cole Espanol, his Spanish-language debut, and featuring both Coles' voices on Acercate Mas. Once again, the loving daughter held her own.
