Billie Holiday's voice is constantly and deservedly praised as one of the finest musical instruments ever to be immortalized on records. Her phrasing, inflections, tone, all of it are, to steal an oft-repeated catchphrase, often imitated but never duplicated. To this day, the multiple record companies that Billie recorded for have released compilations, box sets, best-ofs, etc. and many of them are absolutely worth a good listen.
Proper Records in the UK has seen fit to take 99 of Billie's recordings from 1935-1949 on Columbia, Brunswick, Vocalion, Okeh, Commodore, and Decca and release them in a 4-CD box set for about the same price as many of the official 1-CD compilations of material from these years. So what's the catch? None, really. Sound quality isn't flawless, and that's actually not a bad thing - removing analog flaws can often create digital ones if remaster engineers are a little too heavy-handed with their digital scrubbing. The songs on this collection, thankfully, have all of the character and soul that was recorded into them. The packaging, while not of the same design caliber that the major labels could create, is still attractive - a hard cardboard box that snugly (but not too snugly - at least in my case) houses four mini-LP sleeves, each containing a CD (The biggest flaw in this set is that each CD is labeled with "The Lady Sings: This Year's Kisses," the title of the first disc. A very minor quibble.), a catalog of other releases from Proper - many of which have since become part of my wishlist thanks to my satisfaction with this set - and a booklet featuring several B&W photos and an informative essay, plus recording session info on every song in the set.
Honestly, I can think of hundreds of reasons to recommend this set, but I can't think of a single reason *not* to. 99 songs with great sound quality packaged nicely for a budget price? If you need an introduction to Billie Holiday's pre-Verve years (which, along with her penultimate album "Lady In Satin," also provide plenty of superb material, even with the deterioration of her voice) you could do a lot worse. And I will be adding more Proper Records sets to my library in the future.
Customer reviews
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Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2011
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United States on February 28, 2008
Verified Purchase
Reviewed in the United States on March 29, 2004
Top international reviews
Arcticblue
Highly recommended!
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 7, 2016Verified Purchase
Ms. D. M. Neale
Billie Holiday - The Lady Sings
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 1, 2009Verified Purchase
