Billie Holiday Research Paper

he seen that she had what it takes to be a singer. Her father went out and got

Not everyone is blessed with musical talent but when someone has an extraordinary ability, he or she should get the chance to please others with it. Sometimes a career can be made out of musical endowment, and that is what Billie Holiday did. Billie had a life that she may not have dreamed of since it started out rough with her mistreatment from adults and discouraging misfortunes, but she was ambitious and that showed through her singing career. Billie could usually adapt to her life’s problems except for her drug addiction and alcohol abuse, which unfortunately led to her demise. She was a talented woman who sang and helped create hit songs that aided her to rise to fame. Billie Holiday bravely stood up to racism, showed the world her talent, and inspired many of her beloved fans, all while continuing to be herself and not allowing the issues in her life hold her back.

“Other kids could play cowboys and Indians and imagine that they’d grow up to be cowboys,” he wrote in his Living Proof autobiography. “I couldn’t do that. I knew that I would never grow up to be a cowboy or a fireman or the president of the United States. I knew I’d grow up to be a singer. That’s all there ever was, the only option, from the beginning.” http://www.hankjr.com/career-biography/

Butch Cassidy and his members of the Wild Bunch left a remarkable chapter in the history of old American West. Interestingly, Butch was no mean robber, but someone full of charm. The story of the group was made more interesting with the addition of Butch’s constant partner-in-crime, Sundance Kid.

The 1930’s was a decade of extremely hard times, following the stock market crash and an extreme depression. In spite of the tremendous hardships in America during this decade, it also became a time of great music that is still remembered today. Jazz music was highly popular in this time, and Billie Holiday was a famous jazz performer. She stood out from many other musicians because of her intense and passionate performances. Jazz arose from “unacceptable” segments of society, but quickly grew like wildfire. We often think of the 1930’s as the decade that jazz became civilized, and famous throughout popular culture through the work of pioneering artists like Billie Holiday. People did not own televisions or cable, so radio was their main source of entertainment, and music during this decade was both up beat and a source of relaxation. “Strange Fruit” defied musical category because it was considered too artsy to be folk, and too explicitly political to fit into jazz. This is why “Strange Fruit” became such a powerful phenomenon. Many other artists later took on this song, changing the genre but still portraying the same message. Nina Simone dramatized “Strange Fruit” in the context of the Civil Rights Movement. More important artists like Jeff Buckley, Rene Marie, Labor Camp Orchestra, and many others made their own rendition on the song, still leaving all of their audiences moved by the powerful imagery of the lyrics.

The Harlem Renaissance was an African American cultural movement specifically in creative arts such as music and literature. Jazz represented the flavor and zest of African American culture in the 1920s-1940s. Billie Holiday had a great impact on the Harlem Renaissance because she was one of the most influential jazz singers of all time. She performed with other great jazz musicians such as Louis Armstrong, Teddy Wilson, Jo Jones, and Henry Allen. Her career as a jazz singer was an incredible and thriving one, however, it was shortened because of her battle of substance abuse. Despite the drug use and the loss of her mother, the only thing she could turn to was her music. Billie Holiday's legacy will always live on when the discussion of the Harlem Renaissance is present.

In the summer of 1969, a music festival known as “Woodstock” took place for three straight days in Upstate, New York with thirty-two musical acts playing, and over 400,000 people from around the world coming to join this musical and peaceful movement. Woodstock started out being a small concert, created to promote peace in the world. Now, Woodstock is still being celebrated over 40 years later. This three day music festival represented the perfect concert for the “baby boomers” during a messy political time. Woodstock significantly impacted the counterculture era of the 1960’s in a number of ways; how it began, the ideas of the concert, the sense of union and love it represented and it

Carole King was originally named Carole Klein when she was born in New York City on February 9, 1942 [1]. An accomplished pianist by age 10, Carole began songwriting in her early teens [1]. Shortly after, she helped form a quartet called the Co-Sines and created her stage name, Carole King [1]. While attending Queens College, King met Gerry Goffin, her first husband [1]. Shortly after King and Goffin’s marriage, they

While on tour with Gillespie's band in 1946, Fitzgerald met and fell in love with the bassist Ray Brown, whom she married in 1947. (She had been previously married to Benjamin Kornegay, a shipyard worker, but their two-year marriage was annulled in 1943.) Fitzgerald and Brown were divorced in 1952, but they continued to perform together in Brown's own jazz combo.

Every memory of the summer of 1969 is connected to, in one way or another, the historical event, Woodstock. The festival could not have left more of an impact on the “hippie” generation anymore than it did those three days of music and peace. The generation of the time wanted nothing more than what they got out of Woodstock. Today, people still look back on the festival and think of how well it made history without the expectance of doing so. Woodstock, one of the most important cultural events of the 20th century, combined iconic musical acts with interesting social behavior.

     During 1936, Holiday toured with groups led by Jimmie Lunceford and Fletcher Henderson, then went back to New York for several more recording sessions. In later January of 1937, she recorded several songs with a small group from one of Hammond's newest discoveries, Count Basie's Orchestra. Tenor Lester Young, who'd known Billie from previous engagements, and trumpeter Buck Clayton were

Sedaris’ desire to sing like Billie Holiday can also be linked to his father’s passion for jazz music. His father loved jazz music almost to the point of obsessive-compulsiveness, where he’d sit down and analyze each note and the timing of the jazz songs playing on his record player, and although Sedaris claims to also love jazz, it wasn’t enough to convince his father. “Because it was the music we’d grown up with, I liked to think that my sisters and I had a genuine appreciation of jazz. We preferred it over the music our friends were listening to, yet nothing we did or said could convince my father of our devotion,” (p. 17) writes Sedaris. Singing like Billie Holiday might have been a way for Sedaris to be closer to his father, or at least allow the two of them to bond in a way based on a common interest. Because of the controversy about homosexuals, Sedaris probably wasn’t open about his sexuality with his father, thus not feeling close to him. In singing in the style of Billie Holiday, one could assume that it could be appreciated by any lover of jazz, such as

On the KCSM radio I heard Billie Holiday song It Had to Be You. The tune seems to be very soothing with a saxophone playing in the background. I find the music not that bad at all I am a music person I never thought Jazz was my thing, but it is okay since my mom always play this at her restaurant when I was a kid. I am use to the soothing tune of Jazz.

She received this name because she was different. She didn't want to create music that everyone was singing. She used a method called scat. One of the first songs that she used this new method was called “Flying home”. When singers are trying to use the method scat, the singer makes their voices sound like different instruments in bands and orchestra. Many people have said that “scat” is the most influential jazz record of all time. By creating these new ways sounds to us in her music is made people more interested in her music making her become more and more

In 1942 he decided to go solo and found the fame as the king of the bobbysoxers, which were the young women and girls who were his fans. He became America’s first teen idol. He was the only singer that sang the most smooth, straightforward ballads. And he credited jazz singer Billie Holliday as a major influence on his vocal style.