Billie Holiday

:For the Canadian broadcaster known professionally as Billie Holiday, see Billie Holiday (broadcaster).

Later life and death

Holiday was a dabbler in recreational drug use for most of her life, smoking marijuana, by some accounts, as early as twelve or thirteen years of age. However, it was heroin that would be her undoing. It is unclear who first introduced Holiday to the drug, but there is consensus from historians and contemporaneous sources that she began intravenous use sometime around 1940.

Related Topics:
Marijuana - Heroin - 1940

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Holiday's success was marred by this growing dependence on drugs, alcohol, and abusive relationships. This affected her voice as well, and in her later recordings her youthful spirit is replaced by overtones of regret, but her impact on other artists was undeniable. Even after her death she influenced such singers as Janis Joplin and Nina Simone. In 1972, Diana Ross played her in a movie version of Holiday's autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues. To everyone's surprise, the film was a commercial smash and earned a Best Actress nomination for Ross. In 1987 U2 released "Angel of Harlem", a tribute to her.

Related Topics:
Drugs - Alcohol - Janis Joplin - Nina Simone - Diana Ross - Movie - Autobiography - Lady Sings the Blues - 1987 - U2 - Angel of Harlem

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Her personal life was as turbulent as the songs she sang. She married trombonist Jimmy Monroe on August 25, 1941. While still married to Monroe, she took up with trumpeter Joe Guy as his common law wife. She finally divorced Monroe in 1957 as she split with Guy. That March 28, 1942, Billie married Louis McKay, a mafia "enforcer". McKay, like most of the men in her life, was abusive, but did try to get her off drugs. They were separated at the time of her death.

Related Topics:
August 25 - 1941 - Common law - 1957 - March 28 - 1942 - Mafia

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Her late recordings on Verve are as well remembered as her Commodore and Decca recordings of twenty years before. Several of her songs, including her signature song "God Bless the Child", George Gershwin's "I Love You Porgy" (covered exactly by Simone), and the rueful blues "Fine and Mellow" are jazz classics. Her performance of "Fine and Mellow" on CBS's The Sound of Jazz program is memorable for her interplay with dear friend Lester Young; both were less than two years from death.

Related Topics:
Verve - Commodore - Decca - George Gershwin - Covered - CBS - The Sound of Jazz - Program - Lester Young

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Her performance of Abel Meeropol's anti-lynching song on Commodore, "Strange Fruit", with the lyric "Southern trees bear strange fruit" gave her a place, not just in musical history, but in American history as well. http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/strangefruit/

Related Topics:
Abel Meeropol - Lynching - Strange Fruit

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She was arrested for heroin possession and she served eight months in prison. Her New York City Cabaret Card was revoked, which kept her from working in clubs there for the last twelve years of her life. She was swindled out of her earnings and died with only $0.70 in the bank and $750 on her person. At the end of May 1959, she was taken to hospital suffering from liver and heart problems. She was placed under house arrest on July 12 for possession; in 1959 narcotic addiction was a crime. Billie Holiday remained under police guard until she died from cirrhosis of the liver on July 17, 1959 at the age of 44.

Related Topics:
New York City Cabaret Card - July 12 - 1959 - July 17

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Billie Holiday is interred in Saint Raymond's Cemetery, Bronx, New York.

Related Topics:
Saint Raymond's Cemetery - Bronx, New York

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