Lady Sings the Blues
Billie Holiday's autobiography tells the life story of a Negro jazz singer who went from poverty to riches by the time she was 25, but whose celebrity life was plagued by drugs and the law. Besides being in prison numerous times on drug charges, Billie was also put in jail at the age of 10 after being raped, and again at the age of 15 after becoming a call girl.
Billie's mom, Sadie, was only 13 years old when Billie was born, and she had never been to school. She paid to have her child delivered in a hospital by scrubbing floors there. Scrubbing floors and working as a maid were Sadie's only ways of supporting Billie and herself. Clarence, Billie's father left home when he was drafted during WW I and later traveled around as a musician. He rarely returned to his wife and daughter, but Billie remembered his death. He was sick with pneumonia in Dallas, Texas, but died "going from hospital to hospital trying to get help. None of them...would take his temperature or take him in."
When Billie began traveling as a singer with the Artie Shaw band and others, she faced the same prejudice her father had faced. Being rejected at hotels and restaurants, she'd have to sleep and eat in the band's bus.
But drugs created a bigger problem for her. After her first "cure" in a sanitarium, the law kept its eyes on her. She recalled "...all the cops have to do is find a celebrity, and it's page one stuff." Later after spending 10 months in jail, she was not allowed to sing in any New York nightclub after her release. But although she felt that England and most of Europe were way ahead of this country for legalizing drugs, she still blamed herself. She mourned that "...my getting hooked on dope killed my own mother."
Billy was married several times and had a number of lovers in the music business. She also became quite close to her managers and agents, who were responsible for her singing engagements as well as her money. However, between 1933 and 1944 she cut 200 records but never received a cent in royalties.
Billie Holiday's memoirs are written fairly well, but readers who have not heard her sing, on records or CDs, will never truly understand or appreciate her seductive voice and unique style. The fact that she reached only the fifth grade in school and didn't learn to read music indeed complements her achievement as a great American jazz vocalist.
Some of the big names in music with whom Billie recorded were Benny Goodman, Count Basie, Lester Young, Artie Shaw, Ella Fitzgerald, Paul Whiteman, Duke Ellington, and Louis Armstrong. Billie Holiday (1915-1959) wrote her autobiography in 1956 and made her last recording in 1959.