Billy Holliday

By Billie Holiday
"I can't stand to sing the same song the same way two nights in succession, let alone two years or ten years. If you can, then it ain't music, it's close-order drill or exercise or yodeling or something, not music."
"Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what's more than enough."
"Don't threaten me with love, baby. Let's just go walking in the rain"
"Love is like a faucet, it turns off and on."
"If I'm going to sing like someone else, then I don't need to sing at all."
"A kiss that is never tasted, is forever wasted."
"I hate straight singing. I have to change a tune to my own way of doing it. That's all I know."
"If I don't have friends, then I ain't nothing."
"If you copy, it means you're working without any real feeling."
"No two people on earth are alike, and it's got to be that way in music or it isn't music."

I wanted to introduce this fabulous songstress with some of her quotes.I chose to do my paper on Billie Holiday if you haven't noticed.Here are a few reasons as to why I chose her.I loved her stage presence, her voluminous voice, and her striking beauty.Billie Holiday was a true artist of her day and rose as a social phenomenon in the 1950s. Her soulful, unique singing voice and her ability to boldly turn any material that she confronted into her own music made her a superstar of her time.Billie Holiday (Eleanora Fagan) was born Wednesday April, seventh in the year 1915 in the city of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Later, as a child she grew up in the city of Baltimore, which was full of jazz enriched-talent in the 1920s. When Holiday's mother, Sadie Fagan, moved to New York in search of a better job, Billie eventually went with her. In New York is where Holiday made her true singing debut in obscure Harlem nightclubs and borrowed her professional name - Billie - from screen star Billie Dove and the last name- Holiday- from her thought to be estranged father. Although she never underwent any professional hands on training, and never even so much as learned how to read music, Holiday quickly became an active participant in what was then one of the most vibrant jazz scenes in the country.

She would move from one club to another, working for tips and at other times would work as part of a group of performers.At the age of 18 and after gaining more experience than most adult musicians can claim, Holiday was spotted by a man named John Hammond, and cut her first record as part of a studio group led by Benny Goodman, who was then just on the verge of public prominence or recognition.Holiday began working with a man by the name of Lester Young in 1936, who gave her rightly so, now-famous nickname "Lady Day." When Holiday joined Count Basie in 1937 and then Artie Shaw in 1938, she became one of the very first black women to work with a white orchestra, which at that time was an impressive accomplishment.

In the 1930s, when Holiday was working with Columbia Records,it was then she was first introduced to the poem "Strange Fruit," which was truly an emotional piece about the lynching of a black man. Though Columbia would not allow her to record the piece due to subject matter, Holiday went on to record the song with an alternate label by the name Commodore, and the song eventually became one of Holiday's classics. "Strange Fruit" which was one of the first anti Racism songs ever, this song eventually prompted Lady Day to continue more of her signature, moving ballads; such as Lover Man, Summertime, Ain't Nobodies Business If I Do, and many more.

Holiday recorded about 100 new recordings on another label, Verve, from 1952 to 1959. Her voice became more rugged and vulnerable on these tracks than earlier in her career. During this period, she toured Europe, and made her final studio recordings for the MGM label in March of 1959.

One specific thing that I liked about Holiday was that she whore White Gardenias in her hair ,which by the way was her trademark, and that her talent was unique and inimitable. Lady Day was in fact the number one leading songstress of her day.

Lastly,Billie Holiday, who is clearly a musical legend still popular today, died an untimely death from life along with drugs at the age of 44 on Friday July, seventeenth in the year 1959.

(Billy Holiday: The Official Site of Lady Day at GOOGLE .COM)