49 Fun Facts About Billie Holiday

What was Billie Holiday's birth name?

Eleanora Fagan was her birth name; she took the surname 'Holiday' from her father, the jazz guitarist Clarence Halliday, and her first name from a film star she admired.

In which city was Billie Holiday born in 1915?

Philadelphia: she was born at Philadelphia General Hospital on 7 April 1915 to a teenage mother who had been thrown out of the family home for becoming pregnant.

Which musician gave Holiday the nickname 'Lady Day'?

Lester Young, the tenor saxophonist she in turn called 'Prez', coined 'Lady Day' in the late 1930s; he had once been a boarder in her mother's house.

From which actress did the young singer borrow her stage first name?

Billie Dove, a silent-film star she admired as a girl, supplied the first name; the surname came from her father Clarence Halliday, a jazz banjo player and guitarist who abandoned the family.

Which producer first heard Holiday in a Harlem club in early 1933 and arranged her recording debut?

John Hammond heard her at Monette Moore's Harlem club in early 1933 and called her 'the first girl singer I'd come across who actually sang like an improvising jazz genius'.

With which bandleader did the 18-year-old Holiday make her recording debut in November 1933?

Benny Goodman's band backed her on 'Your Mother's Son-in-Law' on 27 November 1933, which sold 300 copies; 'Riffin' the Scotch' a few weeks later sold 5,000 and became her first hit.

Holiday's 1935 collaboration with which pianist produced the standard 'What a Little Moonlight Can Do'?

Teddy Wilson led the Brunswick studio groups from July 1935; the sessions were aimed at the jukebox trade and paid her a flat fee rather than royalties.

In which 1935 Duke Ellington short film did Holiday appear as a woman abused by her lover?

Symphony in Black: A Rhapsody of Negro Life (1935) gave Holiday her screen debut, singing 'Saddest Tale' as a woman knocked down by her lover.

Which of these was a 1936 hit for Holiday, taken from George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess?

'Summertime', recorded on 10 July 1936 with Bunny Berigan on trumpet, charted at number 12; 'Billie's Blues' came from the same session.

Which white bandleader did Billie Holiday join after Count Basie fired her in 1938?

Shaw was pressured to add a white singer, Nita Bradley, with whom Holiday had to share the bandstand.

'Strange Fruit' began as a poem written by which Bronx schoolteacher under the pen name Lewis Allan?

Abel Meeropol, a teacher at DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, wrote the poem in 1937; he later adopted the orphaned sons of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.

Lawrence Beitler's photograph of a 1930 lynching in which state inspired the poem 'Strange Fruit'?

Indiana: Beitler photographed the lynching of Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith in Marion on 7 August 1930; the poem first appeared as 'Bitter Fruit' in a teachers' union magazine in 1937.

At which integrated Greenwich Village nightclub did Billie Holiday first perform 'Strange Fruit'?

Owner Barney Josephson introduced her to the song; she said 'I opened Cafe Society as an unknown'.

Because Columbia found 'Strange Fruit' too sensitive, which label recorded it on 20 April 1939?

Commodore, Milt Gabler's small label, cut it on 20 April 1939; it got no airplay but sold a million copies, and Holiday called it her biggest seller.

What was on the flip side of the 'Strange Fruit' single, a jukebox hit credited with much of its sales?

'Fine and Mellow', a blues Holiday wrote herself, was the B-side and became a jukebox hit; she sang it with Prez in their famous 1957 television reunion.

What happened to Holiday's father, whose death she said 'Strange Fruit' recalled?

He was refused hospital treatment because he was Black: Clarence Holiday, a guitarist with Fletcher Henderson's band, died of pneumonia in Dallas in 1937, and she said 'Strange Fruit' always brought his death back.

'God Bless the Child' grew out of Holiday's argument with whom?

Her mother Sadie refused her money; she stormed out saying 'God bless the child that's got his own' and wrote the song with Arthur Herzog Jr. in 1941.

Which impresario signed Holiday in 1952 and produced her Clef and Verve records?

Norman Granz signed her in 1952; her small-group Clef and Verve sessions, many with pianist Oscar Peterson, make up most of her 1950s output.

Holiday's first Decca recording in 1944, and one of her biggest hits, was which song?

'Lover Man (Oh, Where Can You Be?)', recorded on 4 October 1944 with a string section, was her first Decca side and reached the pop top 20; it became one of her signature songs.

Holiday wrote 'Don't Explain' after catching her husband Jimmy Monroe with what?

Lipstick on his collar: Monroe came home with the smear and started to explain, and she cut him off with 'Don't explain'; she wrote the song with Arthur Herzog Jr. and recorded it for Decca in November 1944.

Holiday's only major film role was in New Orleans (1947), opposite which trumpeter?

Louis Armstrong co-starred, and Holiday played a singing maid; the studio trimmed both stars' parts so the story would not credit the birth of jazz to African American musicians.

After her 1947 narcotics conviction, Holiday served her sentence at which federal prison camp?

The Federal Reformatory for Women at Alderson in West Virginia held her from 1947 until her early release for good behaviour on 16 March 1948.

What did the drug conviction cost Holiday, barring her from clubs that served alcohol?

Her cabaret performer's card, issued by New York police, was revoked, and without it she could not sing in the city's nightclubs; thereafter she worked concert halls and theatres instead.

Eleven days after leaving prison, Holiday sold out which venue, with a record 2,700 advance tickets?

Carnegie Hall, 27 March 1948: the concert sold out with 2,700 advance tickets, a record for the hall, and she sang more than 30 songs over the evening.

What flower became Holiday's trademark, worn in her hair on stage?

Gardenias, usually white, pinned in her hair became her signature look from the late 1930s; at her 1956 concerts she stepped into the spotlight in a white gown with white gardenias in her black hair.

Which head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics is alleged to have targeted Holiday from 1939 onward?

Harry Anslinger ran the Federal Bureau of Narcotics from 1930 to 1962; his agents, among them Jimmy Fletcher, pursued Holiday for years, and the 1947 arrest sent her to prison.

Holiday's 1956 autobiography Lady Sings the Blues was ghostwritten by whom?

William Dufty, a New York Post journalist, wrote it from conversations with her; John Szwed argues it is broadly accurate but was watered down under threat of legal action, and Dufty's son Bevan was her godchild.

Holiday's 1958 Columbia album Lady in Satin featured a 40-piece orchestra arranged and conducted by whom?

Ellis also backed her final 1959 sessions for MGM; Columbia gave the album an unlimited budget.

On which 1957 CBS broadcast did Holiday sing a jukebox hit of hers in a famous final reunion with Prez?

The Sound of Jazz, a Seven Lively Arts special, aired live on 8 December 1957; Coleman Hawkins, Ben Webster and Gerry Mulligan also soloed on her number.

What did Holiday reportedly say after Prez's funeral in March 1959?

'I'll be the next one to go,' she reportedly told friends after Prez's funeral in March 1959; she died four months later, on 17 July 1959, aged 44.

Holiday died of cirrhosis and heart failure in July 1959 with how much money in the bank?

She had 70 cents in the bank and $750 from a tabloid fee strapped to her leg when she died at Metropolitan Hospital; those around her had drained her earnings for years.

Whom did Holiday marry in March 1957?

Louis McKay, a mob enforcer who had been her partner since the early 1950s, married her on 28 March 1957; her first husband, trombonist Jimmy Monroe, she had wed in 1941.

Holiday's final television appearance, on Chelsea at Nine in February 1959, was in which city?

London: on Granada's Chelsea at Nine in February 1959 she sang 'Strange Fruit', 'I Loves You, Porgy' and 'Please Don't Talk About Me When I'm Gone', five months before her death.

Who earned an Oscar nomination for her debut as Holiday in Lady Sings the Blues (1972)?

Diana Ross, in her first film role, earned the Best Actress nomination; Motown Productions made the film, with Billy Dee Williams and Richard Pryor co-starring.

Who won a Golden Globe for playing Holiday in the 2021 film The United States vs. Billie Holiday?

Andra Day, in her first lead role, also earned an Oscar nomination; Lee Daniels directed, and the film went to Hulu after Paramount sold it during the pandemic.

In which year was Billie Holiday's 'Strange Fruit' added to the National Recording Registry?

2002: 'Strange Fruit' was in the Library of Congress's inaugural class of 50 recordings for the National Recording Registry; it had entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1978.

Which of Holiday's 1944 recordings for Milt Gabler's label entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2005?

'Embraceable You', the Gershwin ballad she cut for Gabler's label in 1944, was inducted in 2005; that year she re-recorded several songs from her 1930s small-group sessions for the label.

Holiday's first solo concert, on 16 February 1946, took place at which New York venue?

Town Hall on West 43rd Street hosted her first solo concert on 16 February 1946; it sold out and drew strong reviews, the first time she had headlined a concert hall rather than a club.

Where did Rolling Stone rank Holiday on its 2023 list of the 200 Greatest Singers of All Time?

Fourth, behind Aretha Franklin, Whitney Houston and Sam Cooke; NPR also named her one of its 50 Great Voices.

A statue of Holiday was erected in 1985 in which city?

Panels inspired by 'Strange Fruit' were added in 1993; the US Postal Service put her on a stamp in 1994.

Which crooner said every major pop singer of Billie Holiday's generation had been 'touched by her genius'?

Frank Sinatra told Ebony magazine in 1958 that Holiday was 'unquestionably the most important influence on American popular singing in the last twenty years'.

Which trumpeter, her partner at the time, led the big band Holiday fronted in 1945?

Joe Guy, a bebop trumpeter she took up with in 1944, led the big band she formed in 1945; it toured briefly, lost money and folded, and Guy was arrested alongside her in 1947.

Which pianist was Holiday's regular accompanist from 1957 until her death?

Mal Waldron was her pianist from 1957 to 1959, accompanying her at the first Monterey Jazz Festival in 1958 and on her final European dates; he later settled in Europe himself.

Holiday's rival with the Chick Webb Band in the late 1930s, who later became a friend, was whom?

Ella Fitzgerald sang with Chick Webb while Holiday was with Basie in 1937 and early 1938; the two bands faced off at the Savoy Ballroom in January 1938, and the singers later became friends.

Holiday was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000 in which category?

Early Influence: the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inducted her in 2000 in its category for artists who shaped rock before it existed; she is also in the ASCAP Jazz Wall of Fame.

Holiday's four posthumous Grammy Awards were all in which category?

In her lifetime her main honours were Esquire magazine awards; she was voted into the DownBeat Hall of Fame in 1961.

Holiday's first European tour in 1954 opened in which city?

Stockholm: Swedish impresario Nils Hellstrom organised the 'Jazz Club U.S.A.' package, named after Leonard Feather's radio show, which opened there in January 1954 before moving on through Western Europe.

Which song opens Holiday's 1958 album Lady in Satin?

'I'm a Fool to Want You', a 1951 torch ballad, opens Lady in Satin, recorded in February 1958; 'You've Changed' and 'For All We Know' are also on the album.

The 2021 film The United States vs. Billie Holiday was based on which book by Johann Hari?

Chasing the Scream (2015), Hari's history of the war on drugs, supplied the story of the Narcotics Bureau's pursuit of her; director Lee Daniels wanted to present her as a civil-rights figure rather than a tragic heroine.