Why billie holiday famous

As a young singer Hoiday became part of the vibrant Harlem Renaissance scene, performing in nightclubs and jazz clubs. At only eighteen, she recorded her first record as part of a studio group led by Benny Goodman. Her career quickly grew as she recorded songs with Teddy Wilson and began a long partnership with Lester Young, who gave her the nickname "Lady Day. Holiday became the first African American woman to work with an all-white band.

Many scholars now consider it one of the first protest songs of the Civil Rights Movement. Young named her "Lady Day" or simply "Lady" , and that title became her jazz world name from the mids on.

She in turn labeled him "Pres" the "President of Tenor Saxophonists". Many successful tunes were recorded, interweaving Young's tenor saxophone with Holiday's voice.

After the late s they rarely recorded together, but to the end they remained soul mates. Holiday's career reached its peak in the late s. In she worked a long engagement at Cafe Society. The following year she joined Benny Goodman on a radio broadcast. Two songs of the period are noteworthy. The first, "Strange Fruit," is a detailed description of a lynching an unjust killing because of race. Columbia record company considered it too inflammatory exciting to the senses and refused to issue it.

A small record company, Commodore, finally released it in It became a big money-maker because of the tune on the record's other side, "Fine and Mellow," a blues song written by Holiday. Another tune always associated with her is "Gloomy Sunday," which spoke of such deep despair misery that it was kept off the airwaves for a time. Billie Holiday. By the mids Holiday had been arrested many times for illegal drug use.

After one arrest, at her own request, she was placed in a federal rehabilitation having to do with recovery from drug or alcohol abuse center at Alderson, West Virginia, for a year and a day. Neither Holiday's first husband, Joe Guy, a jazz guitarist who she divorced, or Louis McKay, who survived her, seemed able to save Holiday from herself.

By the s alcohol and marijuana had strained her voice, so that it was unnaturally deep and grainy and occasionally cracked during performances. Nevertheless, her singing was sustained by her highly individual style, the familiarity she projected, and her special way with the words of a song. She died in Metropolitan Hospital in New York City on July 17, , of "congestion of the lungs complicated by heart failure. Holiday's early small-group recordings have been rereleased in several boxed sets under the general title Billie Holiday: The Golden Years.

Her best later work is to be found in The First Verve Sessions, recorded in and I try to improvise What comes out is what I feel. Not only did she mesmerize us with her voice, but Holiday also lived a fascinating life filled with tremendous ups and downs.

She managed to survive a difficult childhood — often left in the care of cold-hearted relatives and even spent time in a Catholic reform school before joining her mother in New York City. Before she found fame as a singer, Holiday did whatever it took to survive, including working a prostitute for a while.

She became one of jazz's great stars, performing with the likes of Count Basie and Artie Shaw. Holiday even appeared in a film with Duke Ellington. Her great talent, however, was later diminished by bad relationships and alcohol and drug abuse. Holiday was born Eleanora Fagan, though some sources say the name on her birth certificate was "Elinore Harris. That strained relationship didn't stop her from borrowing his last name when she became a performer. During her childhood, she also used her stepfather's last name, Gough, after her mother married longshoreman Phil Gough for a time.

The name "Billie" came from silent movie star Billie Dove, whom Holiday adored. I was crazy for her. As a child, she even took a job doing chores and running errands for a local madam in exchange for a chance to play records on the madam's Victrola.

Holiday later got a chance to work with Louis Armstrong with the two of them starring in the musical New Orleans. It climbed to the No. Holiday returned the favor, choosing to rename him "Pres" or "Prez" depending on the source.

The nickname was short for president of the saxophone, according to Donald Clarke's Billie Holiday: Wishing on the Moon. The pair became friends in the mids and later toured together with Count Basie.