Research Guides: Chasing the Scream: Billie Holiday

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The Life of Billie Holiday
Everything has been written about the private life of Billie Holiday: a youth shattered by violence, a marital journey with many lows and an addiction to hard drugs which ate away a good part of her life. Skilfully crafted, the documentary "Billie Holiday, The Life And Artistry Of Lady Day" takes the opposite view of this tragic destiny and above all recalls the main musical chapters of the lady with the gardenia. Short but precise, this film presents her trajectory in the clubs of the Big Apple and her musical collaborations with Teddy Wilson and Artie Shaw. Summarized here in a few shots, the meeting with the saxophonist Lester Young nevertheless testifies to a most inspired artistic collaboration. And the racist lynchings of the Deep South are openly denounced with a masterful interpretation of the terrible "Strange Fruit," based on a text by Abel Meeropol. Obviously the post-war period and the signatures with labels like Decca and Verve are rightly described as creative. The bewitching timbre of Billie Holiday’s voice loses its fluidity, however, and develops a dusky tone. A fact confirmed with the moving “Lady In Satin,” a disc of unfathomable sadness and a swan song of the woman who, in his time, Lester Young nicknamed Lady Day. Vincent Caffiaux

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