In her recording career, Billie recorded for four labels, and with every label we saw and heard a different Commodore recordings, Billie became a singer of torch songs and dramatic ballads. At this point,
Commodore)Verve recordings. Billie's voice was deeper, rougher, harder, her style had turned into a bag of affectations, her stylings were totally predictable and by all rights her recordings should have been unimportant. Not so. She had become a world-weary, wise actress in song, and virtually everything she recorded for Norman Granz was compelling.
When I first listened to song after song in this collection I realized, having never heard the music in order in its entirety, I had missed a point. I think Billie was simply incapable of being uninteresting. There isn't a record here that isn't just fascinating. By the time we get to the final album, on M-G-M, when she was literally on her last legs, the wonder is the album is so hypnotic (and at the time of its release was a big deal).
Billie's life did not turn out the way it should have, it should have ended healthy and wealthy. But at the very least, she ended up celebrated and loved. The records can't show her beauty, elegance, terrific taste in fashion, beautiful grooming and hypnotic presence as a performer, but this is music you can listen to over and over, year after year and still discover something new.
'The Complete Billie Holiday On Verve, 1945-1959' is one of my favorite boxed sets. It has wonderful sonics, and one of the best booklets I have ever seen, it's a 220-page book featuring recording information, interviews and rare photographs (it's included in the freeload in .pdf format)
Alto saxophones: Willie Smith, Benny Carter
Tenor saxophones: Illinois Jacquet, Wardell Gray, Charlie Ventura, Coleman Hawkins, Lester Young, Flip Phillips
Trumpets: Howard McGee, Buck Clayton, Charlie Shavers, Harry "Sweets" Edison, Roy Eldridge
Trombone: Trummy Young
Vibraphone: Red Norvo
Pianos: Milt Raskin, Ken Kersey, Oscar Peterson, Sonny Clark, Billy Taylor, Jimmy Rowles, Wynton Kelly, Tony Scott, Mal Waldron
Acoustic guitar: Freddie Green
Electric guitars: Tiny Grimes, Barney Kessel, Herb Ellis
Basses: Charles Mingus, Curly Russell, Al McKibbon, Ray Brown, Red Mitchell, Milt Hinton, Joe Benjamin
Drums: David Coleman, J.C. Heard, Alvin Stoller, Ed Shaughnessy, Cozy Cole, Jo Jones
As a retiree, any day that ends in a "Y"... on another topic, Lady in Autumn's recorded work may be my favourite (some exceptions may apply!)
ReplyDeleteIn the UK there aren't many celebratory holidays to start with not least because there are certain deranged factions in the British political establishment who resile from and resist any sort of patriotic gesture. As such there are no celebrations of our national identity or national heritage unlike say the USA.
ReplyDeleteSo we are left with a series of non descript 'Bank Holidays' which with the increasing 24x7 nature of modern life have become so diluted they are only holidays for bankers, central and local government employees and office workers pretty much and the only wider religious holidays are Easter, and Christmas along with New Year.
With me New Year lost all its sheen through working in technology, as I did, thanks to the mythological 'millennium bug', as I spent the most significant New Year celebration of my life time, not with friends and family, but in the office fixing server problems totally unrelated to the most overhyped computer problem of all time. IIRC my celebration of the Millennium was a can of beer at my desk and a peak out the window at some distant fireworks before picking up the phone and shouting at my hardware suppliers for not getting an engineer out to provide support (they were all out celebrating the Millennium).
Which leaves us with Easter and Christmas which really is no contest. I do love Christmas and do still make a big deal of it but do so in part because the rest are really just a day off and as I retired early anyway the rest are just like any other day. In fact many of them I don't even notice anymore. So without question Christmas is my favourite.
It's a shame because there are plenty of things that could be celebrated (VE or VJ day, Signing Of The Treaty Of Union, Universal Suffrage, Signing Of The Magna Carta. Celebration of Home Nation Saints Days etc) but our venal worthless self serving political class simply are so spineless they can't even organise that fearing any innate sense of national pride or togetherness would further undermine their personal pan continental and international ambitions.
I thought it was funny that most people celebrated the new (3rd) Millennium in the wrong year.
DeleteI have trouble remembering the month. Now we gotta remember the year too?
DeleteDon't comment here often but am always reading & enjoying (both the words & music), but I just had to chime in. The celebration of the new Millenium on the wg year is one of my pet peeves. I guess everyone thought the reckoning began on some year 0? Thanks for stating (what to so few was) the obvious. & thanks for Billie, the ultimate.
DeleteAlso, part of the problem was the artist formerly known as "Prince" while a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he was hardly a member of the Intelligentsia.
Delete"Who is more foolish? The fool or the fool who follows him?" -- Obi-Wan Kenobi
May the farce be with you...
New Years Day 2000, great day. hanging about in case there was a Y2000 crisis (spoiler - there wasn't) 2 thousand quid.
DeleteGreat post Babs
ReplyDeleteI grew up in a secluded little suburb. We were from a Methodist family, across the street we had a Jewish family and next door to them were Irish Catholics. We enjoyed each others holidays. The kids were all our age. The Jewish kids came over for Christmas, we went to their house for Hanukah. We learned each others religions over the years and still believed what we were taught, but allowed others to have their beliefs, and didn't question it much. We were just kids after all. Probably a good way to grow up. We would all get together on the street for 4th of July. Not to be patriotic but to light off "Safe and Sane" fireworks. The other holiday we liked was Thanksgiving. No religion, just food. And back then you could eat and not get fat. I had one friend that usually got three Thanksgiving dinners by timing his visits correctly. Hell, he was still going to my parents house long after me and my brother had moved out.
ReplyDeleteSo as a favorite holiday I might pick Thanksgiving. No pressure, just eat.
I raised the kids through many holidays but they have moved on. It was fun decorating for Christmas.. My mom and aunts would exchange new recipes at Thanksgiving. But they are all gone. Shit, it just turned sad. I'll vote for Thanksgiving. That was the longest lasting holiday for "get togethers", but you British don't have that. Do you have anything similar?
You grew up in a secluded little suburb, I grew up in Brooklyn, and yet we had very similar experiences.
DeleteGood to hear Babs. We had no prejudice, weren't raised on it. I had a friend in high school. A long haired Japanese guy that was impressed when he entered our house, that my dad stood up and shook his hand. My only experience with discrimination was from the cops that didn't like long haired white boys. Blamed us for all the burglaries in the rich neighborhoods.
DeleteBy the way, how are you feeling a week later Babs?
BTW, The long haired Japanese guy was riding a Triumph motorcycle.
DeleteI live in the California desert. I have two neighbors left. But when my neighbors mom was still alive I would hang Christmas lights facing her house because she once told me that was something she missed before moving out here.
ReplyDeleteThanksgiving - all the feasting, no shopping or wrapping. Automatic four-day weekend. Perfect holiday.
ReplyDeleteI worked for 27 years at a retail food store, and that took some of the shine off Thanksgiving for me. One, I could no longer travel far for Thanksgiving dinners, because The Day Before Thanksgiving was our biggest turnover day of the year, and it required attention and attendance. Two, because ...it wasn't quite as carefree anymore. But, before that professional engagement, Thanksgiving was it.
ReplyDeleteI also love Christmas, which is funny since all the atheists at my house were, officially, agnostic (meaning, if I'd wanted to argue for religion, I was encouraged to do so). It was a celebration of family - different in different decades of family life, of course. Between decorating - which included hanging ornaments on our tree that had belonged to my father's father's grandparent (I forget which one) - imaginative present-wrapping, and lots of singing Victorian carols, we really enjoyed each other's company. Good memories.
Memorial Day, on the other hand, marked the real kick-off of the foggy, gloomy morning season in Southern California. That's because the land was hot, the ocean was cold, and the area we lived in was close enough to the coast to have low clouds that wouldn't burn off until afternoon.
D in California
" and God Created Atheist's too"
DeleteIf Jesus is not real, why is Dracula afraid of crosses?
DeleteWhich puts me in mind of an old Borscht Belt gag: A young woman is being pursued by a vampire and ducks into a church. Seizing a crucifix from the alter she brandishes it before her as the bloodthirsty demon approaches. [In a marked Yiddish accent] the vampire pulls up and with a devilish grin spreading across his face says, "Oy, lady, heff you ever got the wrong vampire!"
DeleteThe old ones are the best!
DeleteWhen I lived in the US, it was Thanksgiving, because it was a great day to celebrate food, and without the stress of presents being bought. Now, its the winter solstice, for pretty much the same reason (Thanksgiving is not a holiday in Spain) and we have continued to host parties on that day, like we did in NO.
ReplyDeleteIn Thailand the Thai new year, Songkran, is still my favorite. For a few days in April lots of people go bonkers trying to soak each other! In between you may soak yourself internally with beer... Even after 35 years still good fun 😄
ReplyDeleteMy favorite is the 4th of July. The weather is almost always beautiful, with barbecues and fireworks. Every year, I have a 4th of July party up on my roof, a.k.a. "Tar Beach".
ReplyDelete"Tar Beach" conforms to my romantic notions of Manhattan life. Of course, it also reminds me of the tenements.
DeleteWe like 4th of July pretty well, as fireworks are pretty. But the explosion noises disturb one dog profoundly, and the weather is sometimes quite hot (above 105°F). So, a good day, but not the best of all.
D in California
Yes D in C. Too hot in California in July for fireworks. But I did, as a kid, enjoy all the families coming out front to light off fireworks. Enjoyed the sights and sounds and smells. The Family across from us always had the "Big Box" of fireworks. We could always keep watching theirs after ours ran out. We all kept a bucket of water at the ready.
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All Hallows' Eve and Arbor Day. Of the events which actually qualify as National Holidays, I suppose MLK Day is the most worth celebrating.
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