Billie Holiday Bio
Billie Holiday (April 7, 1915 – July 17, 1959), born Eleanora Fagan and later nicknamed Lady Day , was an American jazz singer, a seminal influence on jazz and pop singers, and generally regarded as one of the greatest female jazz vocalists.
Billie Holiday had a difficult childhood, which greatly affected her life and career. Much of her childhood is clouded by conjecture and legend, some of it propagated by her autobiography, Lady Sings the Blues, published in 1956. This account is known to contain many inaccuracies.
Her professional pseudonym was taken from Billie Dove, an actress she admired, and Clarence Holiday, her probable father. At the outset of her career, she spelled her last name "Halliday," presumably to distance herself from her neglectful father, but eventually changed it back to "Holiday."¹
¹ wikipedia.
Billie Holiday Quotes
"Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what's more than enough."
"I never had a chance to play with dolls like other kids. I started working when I was six years old."
"Sometimes it's worse to win a fight than to lose."
"If you think dope is for kicks and for thrills, you're out of your mind. There are more kicks to be had in a good case of paralytic polio or by living in an iron lung. If you think you need stuff to play music or sing, you're crazy. It can fix you so you can't play nothing or sing nothing."
"I'm always making a comeback but nobody ever tells me where I've been."
