Customer Reviews

Lady Day: The Best of Billie Holiday

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

In 2001, Billie Holiday's landmark recordings from the first decade of her recording career have finally been remastered for best-ever sound quality on the 10-CD boxed set. The historical value of that collection is enormous, but not all admirers of Lady Day are going to have the half-day needed to absorb everything on there. Furthermore, there are a lot of similar-sounding alternate takes on the last few discs of the box. It's a paradise for collectors, but what about those who want a smaller dose of these jazz classics?

This 2-CD anthology is the answer, providing a generous helping of memorable cuts, with an preference for high-quality songs (frankly, quite a few of the tunes on the boxed set aren't worthy of Britney Spears, let alone a peerless vocalist like Billie, albeit Lady Day is renowned for turning trite songs into art). There are other one-disc collections culled from these sessions, but I highly recommend this collection above all others--the sound quality is as good as possible, and with two discs there's enough of a sampling to give the listener a good idea of what Billie and her accompiament were up to during this era...and what they were up to revolutionized popular music!

Unless you plan to invest in the "Complete Lady Day on Columbia," this is the Billie Holiday collection either to start with or to own (if you plan to stick to one). There is much of value on Billie's later, Verve recordings, but they can't match the timeless beauty to be found on her Columbia sessions. The singular "emotion" with which Billie is identified wears best and longest when we feel it as a property of the song as much as of the singer. On the Columbia outings, it's the combination of Billie's musical talents and the strength of her "persona" that results in very possibly the most believable and influential interpretations of the "American Songbook" ever recorded. It's from these recordings that Sinatra learned his most valuable singing lessons: first, trust the material; second, establish a persona that, in the listener's mind, would be capable of experiencing the story and emotions of the song; third, make it "natural"--American popular song and singing are all about the art of artlessness.

Since I own the box set of LP's already, I settled for this "Best Of" CD version. It's a judicious selection of material, the audio quality affords slightly more "presence" to Billie's voice than on the originals, the liner notes by Gary Giddins are informative and provocative, and the photos are revealing (contrasting the early buxom, spontaneous Billie with the later posed, slimmed-down star).

Columbia-Sony has obviously invested much thought and care in the production of this package. Unlike many of my CD acquisitions, this one is not going to be played once and set aside.

If there were some way to award music 200 stars, I am sure all of us would have done so for this set!

Like others here, I have it all, but I think her work from the 30s and early 1940s from Columbia and its ancestors is not just her greatest works, but among the great works of world musical culture. Everyone with a set of ears should be more or less required to have this music and enjoy it.

Strange Fruit was not recorded for Columbia but for the Indy label Commodore. Thus, you will not find it on this or any of the Columbia collections like this that capture her work in the period BEFORE Strange Fruit. It was recorded in the 1940s, whereas this collection contains work from Billie in the 1930s and perhaps 1940 and 1941. No doubt Sony wishes it had the rights to that side and everything else Commodore recorded, but they don't.

The truth is, Strange Fruit is not one of Billie's Greatest works. There are about 15 tunes on this CD that have better singing, better musicians backing her, and were more important pieces of Billie's work. Strange Fruit is well known to the people who know about Billie as a person, but don't know much about Billie as a Jazz musician. Her recording, while powerful, was not very nuanced, not very jazzy, and not as good as much of the work here. Indeed, the weakness of her mid-1940s Commodore work as opposed to these recordings is that Billie was persuaded to move away from Jazz and swing to attempt to become a cabarat chanteuse of "serious" songs, a move that some also relate to the inception of heroin and the decline of her voice, a move that brought about a decline in her art.

If you want to hear a better version of "Strange Fruit," listen to Josh White's recording which is so much more powerful, if not as well known. I am not downing the song or its politics, far from it, but Billie's Strange Fruit is more important as a political statement than as a work of Jazz art.

One of the greatest things about these records are the many master musicians of swing and jazz that join her on these recordings. Very shortly after she started recording, the greatest names in Jazz would flock to her sessions and play on her recordings for litte because of the innovation and creativity Billie showed as a jazz creator in her own right. These recordings were a chance for them to jam together in loose arrangements and be more innovative and creative than they were with the orchestras they played with.


These masters of Jazz viewed Billie as a serious artist of Jazz. They delighted in her knowledge of the musical aspects of swing jazz which was unique for such a young singer (she was in her twenties when these records were made) and delighted in her ability to sense what they were doing in their accompaniments and solos and to respond to them in her vocals.

Despite the exaggerated picture of her life as a prostitute that was part of the marketing of the 1950's work of ghost-written fiction called "Lady Sings the Blues," that a drug addled Billie claimed was her autobiography, Billie Holiday grew up around Jazz with her father being a big band guitar player who complained Billie hired every NY guitarist but him for these sessions. Billie's mother specialized in boarding Jazz musicians and catering parties for musicians and singers, parties where the young Billie would often help serve the food. So when she met Lester young in 1937 for these sessions, she had already known the man she named 'Prez in 1934 when he boarded with her mother while he was in the Fletcher Henderson band.

These sides contain most of the great collaboration between Lester Young and Billie. They were great musical friends and personal friends until Billie became a heroin addict, at which point Lester didn't much want to be around her.

However, as much as I am a Lester Young man to the death (his framed picture hangs in my home), too little is said of the other musicians who grace these recordings. Billie's collaboration with pianist Teddy Wilson who plays on and directed most of these recordings (many were recorded as Teddy Wilson Orchestra sides)needs to be explored. Likewise, her work with the great bassists and rhythm players on these records needs to be appreciated. My favorite sides are the ones in which she has the benefit of Basieites like her dear friend Freddy Green on guitar and the great Walter Page on bass. Likewise, Billie's musical closeness with the great Buck Clayton and his role on these sides is also underestimated.

Yet, it doesn't matter if Billie had recorded these sides with some high school band members from Winslow, Arizona. This is good music to listen to, good music to smile to, music to fall in love to, and music to dance too. Contrary to the tendency to get maudlin and milk her image as a tragedy that Holiday developed in the 1950s as her life and her musical skill declined , even the songs on these recordings with the sadest lyrics possess a great joy, swing, and spirit of the wonders of Jazz.

Billie Holiday is the quintessential jazz singer; despite a limited vocal range she set the standard by which all others are measured. It's all about the quality of her voice, the lush tone, and her marvelously idiosyncratic phrasing. Though her career was short and troubled, she recorded a lot, which means novice collectors must avoid innumerable bear traps. In general, her later work should be ignored, by then she was wearing her emotional problems like an ugly hat, despair manifested itself in performances so lackluster they're depressing at best, frequently downright tragic.

For the best of Billie you need to go back to the glory days, 1933-1944, precisely the time period covered by this reasonably priced and beautifully produced 2-CD set. (If you're a player with money to burn go for the 10-CD comprehensive retrospective, The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia, 1933-1944.) All the songs providing the foundation of her reputation are here, as well as many pleasant surprises. The booklet, though not lavish, provides photos, background, and a complete list of personnel for each track. This detail is significant because the players on these selections, in addition to being the finest who ever backed Ms. Holiday, were also the absolute elite of their generation, each worthy of individual exploration. (Names like Lester Young, Roy Eldridge, Ben Webster, Johnny Hodges, and Teddy Wilson enjoy legendary status.)

Perhaps most amazing is the sound quality, considering the recordings are WWII vintage they're clear and smooth. About Ms. Holiday's personal life, the less said the better. What is remarkable is that, despite her personal troubles, she managed to create a canon of work that is truly timeless, just as sweet and powerful today as it was then. Not only is this the best Billie Holiday anthology available, it makes a formidable addition any jazz collection. (Dig that cover photo, wow!)

Just because a recording is remastered, that doesn't mean it's been remastered well. Columbia's remastering of these Billie Holiday recording is a case in point. If you listen to Columbia's Quintessential Billie Holiday series that came out in 1989, you'll notice that those albums (with the same recordings that are on this CD) had infinitely better sound.

Simply put, these remastered versions sound awful. There's a constant, loud hissing in the background of every track that should NOT be there. It's amazing that such bad remastering work could come from Columbia (and on these legendary recordings, no less).

I'm surprised that none of the reviewers on this site seem to have noticed the shoddy sound quality on these remasters, but if you compare these recordings to the originals, the difference is glaringly obvious.

It's a real shame! Because if you want to hear the genius of these Billie Holiday recordings, you'll have to dig up the The Quintessential Billie Holiday series from '89 which is pristine, gorgeous, and mostly out of print now.

Anybody who likes Billie Holiday even part time needs this CD. Even great for those people who only know a few songs just by chance. Love the CD. Even got another as a gift for a friend.

The stature of this emblematic singer of the jazz is absolutely undeniable. Her powerful, sensitive and expressive voice made of her, one of the most tragic icons in the jazz. She sung as she lived. In this sense she reminds too much to the legendary Edith Piaff in the other side of the Atlantic.

What else might I add for cataloguing this cult artist that it has not been said just before? She is part of the history jazz and her memory will transcend and surmount the next years to come.

Well, I thought I was paying $15 plus shipping, for a 36 track Billie Holiday collection. Instead, I received a 10 track piece of garbage, with songs I can find in the $1.99 CD bin at your local truckstop. In my confusion, I come back to this page and I see that it is carefully constructed to make you think you are ordering something else. Watch your step, unless you like wasting money...

This is a very good collection of songs that Billie Holiday sang during the jazz era of America. It has an old fashioned sound as if it is being played on one of those antiquated phonographs-most of the very young population may not know what this is. I liked and enjoyed listening to this cd-Billie had a mysterious and beatiful voice that sang these songs with conviction.

I purchased this product for an assignment in my college Jazz class.
EXCELLENT quality displayed throughout both CD's.If you enjoy Billie Holiday, you'll enjoy this set.
I felt the tunes with the most "Body and Soul" were those where Billie sang and Lester played.
Lady Day and Prez (Lester Young) ...........AWESOME!!