Benny Goodman dragged the frightened singer to her first studio session. Between 1933 and 1944, she recorded over 200 "sides," but she never received royalties for any of them.
Despite a lack of technical training, Holiday's unique diction, inimitable phrasing and acute dramatic intensity made her the outstanding jazz singer of her day. White gardenias, worn in her hair, became her trademark.
"Singing songs like "The Man I Love" and "Porgy" is no more work than sitting down and eating Chinese roast duck, and I love roast duck," she wrote in her autobiography. "I've lived songs like that." Her own compositions included "God Bless the Child," espousing the virtues of financial independence; "Don't Explain," lament on infidelity; and "Strange Fruit," a haunting protest against the racial discrimination she encountered throughout her career. Billie Holiday, a musical legend still popular today, died an untimely death at the age of 44.
Billie Holiday is one of my favorite jazz singers. Her songs talked about real life and real love. One of my favorite songs is "Strange Fruit." In "Strange Fruit" she described the terrible conditions of racism in America and the horrible lynching that were going on at the time. The song was very controversial because nobody wrote songs about the political and social issues of that time. "Southern trees, bear the strangest fruit, Blood on the leaves and Blood on the roots," in this line Holiday describes the lynchings in the south. Lynching happened so often in the South, that the bodies looked as if they grew from the trees. .
Langston Hughes was born in Joplin, Missouri, in 1902. His father, who had studied to become a lawyer, left for Mexico shortly after the baby was born. When Langston was seven or eight he went to live with his grandfather, who told him wonderful stories about Fredrick Douglas and Sojourner Truth and took him to hear Booker T. Washingston.