Billie Holiday, born Eleanora Fagan, on April 7, 1915, was one of the most influential jazz singers of the twentieth century. With her behind-the-beat phrasing and distinctive, melancholy voice, Holiday reinvented familiar songs.
As a child, she was influenced by the recordings of Louis Armstrong and blues singer Bessie Smith. In the early 1930s, Holiday performed in jazz clubs in New York, calling herself “Billie” after movie star Billie Dove. While singing at a Harlem nightclub, she was discovered at the age of eighteen by producer John Hammond. In the late 1930s, she performed with legendary bandleaders Count Basie, Artie Shaw, and Benny Goodman.
In 1939, she recorded Lewis Allan’s “Strange Fruit,” a haunting song about the lynching of African-Americans. Because of its subject matter, many radio stations refused to play it.
Some of her best-known songs include: “Lady Sings the Blues,” What a Little Moonlight Can Do” and “God Bless the Child.” Holiday died at the age of forty-four.
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