Buddy Cole “Buddy Cole Plays Cole Porter”

Make no mistake—the subtitle of this album is: “At the Bösendorfer Piano”—but a little more on that later. “Buddy Cole Plays Cole Porter is a clever title—with that format, you could come up with an entire series of records (and maybe there is one, a series, that I don’t know about) like, say, “James Taylor Plays Taylor Swift”—is the first one that comes to mind. I’ll stop there and save further possibilities for a future “game night.” Pianist Buddy Cole, along with an orchestra conducted by Pete King, interpreting a dozen Cole Porter classics, in classic style. I’m not going to name the songs, except to say, I know nine of them in my sleep, mostly from Sinatra versions, and the other three I recognize, but wouldn’t be able to name in a trivia contest. Half of them have the world “love” in the title. I’m sure you know the songs—each of them will outlive these artists, the record, us, listening, and the technology. Well, you could say Cole Porter lives on—with these songs. Buddy Cole will live on with this record, as well—and there’s a great album cover. Two guys are sitting at a rickety table and chairs, playing chess, in the middle of a city street! Enormous 1950s cars whiz by on either side of them. It looks like they’re moments away from getting run over by a taxicab. For all I know, the two men could be Porter and Cole—in fact, this could have been the end. I looked up their bios, and sure enough, they died in the same year—1964, only about three weeks apart. This record, however, came out in 1958, so that would have meant they both spent six years in the hospital with ultimately fatal, photoshoot injuries. Not real likely.

Seemingly the impetus of this eminently listenable record is the Bösendorfer piano that Buddy Cole played on the recording—apparently quite a piano. I admit, I was not familiar with this particular instrument—but I am now! The extensive, uncredited, back-cover liner notes spend a couple, brief paragraphs discussing the two men, but the rest of the glowing coverage is for the piano! I mean, I am familiar with pianos—there was one in my home, growing up, and then one in the home of my piano teacher, Mrs. Patterson. It’s possible that hers was a Bösendorfer—I have no recollection of it—but it’s not likely. I guess they are fine pianos, made in “distant Vienna” (as opposed to Vienna, Illinois), and few are (or used to be) made, so they were somewhat rare on this side of the pond. Also, very expensive. But according to these Bösendorfer-heavy liner notes—they make all the difference. Perhaps if my parents had a Bösendorfer, instead of the nice piano we had, I might have become the next Buddy Cole. Probably not, but I’d have had no excuses, then, to be a piano-lesson-dropout. They’re not cheap—I looked online—the first one I see is $190,000 (with free shipping) (really? Free shipping?)—and here’s one on eBay for $395,000! The funny thing is, the liner notes just go on and on and on about this Bösendorfer, as if this was a Bösendorfer advertisement. Maybe it is. Does or did Warner Brothers own Bösendorfer? But also odd, on the back cover, there are a few “suggestions” for other records by other artists—none of them Buddy Cole—and a few of them are on other labels! What’s with that? Maybe… all those records also feature the Bösendorfer? I’ll have to look into that. This mystery lands firmly in the category of “still ongoing and open.”

3.21.25