Billie Holiday by Billie Holiday & Khanya Mtshali

Author:Billie Holiday & Khanya Mtshali
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Melville House
Published: 2019-07-29T16:00:00+00:00

VOICE OF AMERICA JAZZ HOUR

INTERVIEW WITH WILLIS CONOVER

MARCH 20, 1956

Editor’s Note: The introductory question to this interview was not preserved.

BILLIE HOLIDAY: I think I copied my style from Louis Armstrong, because I always liked, um, the big volume and the big sound that, uh, Bessie Smith got when she sang. But when I was quite young, I heard a record Louis Armstrong made called the “West End Blues,” and…he doesn’t say any words, you know? And I thought, “This is wonderful,” you know? And I liked the, the feeling you got from it. So I wanted Louis Armstrong’s feeling and I wanted the big volume that Bessie Smith got. But, I found that it didn’t work with me because I didn’t have a big voice, you know? So, anyway, between the two of ‘em, I sorta…got Billie Holiday. [laughs]

WILLIS CONOVER: Well, what other musicians have had some sort of influence upon the development of your singing style?

HOLIDAY: Well, I, uh, I like Lester Young. I always liked—well, Lester came much later in my life, but I liked Lester’s, um, feeling, you know? You know, everyone, when he first started, thought, “Man, his tone is too thin,” you know? For a tenor sax, you know? Everybody thinks it has to be real big, and Lester used to go out of his mind getting reeds, you know, to sound big like Chu Berry, which was—he was very popular in those days. And I told him it doesn’t matter because—I said, “You have a beautiful tone.” I said, “And you watch, after a while everybody’s going to be copying you.” [laughs] And it came to be, you know?

And then, well, I made my first record with Benny. Benny came to a club Harlem to hear me, the Log Cabin. At that time, he was not Benny Goodman; he was just another musician. [laughs] He worked in the studio band, down at NBC, and he came up one night and he just thought I was wonderful. So he had a recording date under his own name, and uh, John Hammond—you must of heard of him, he’s a music critic—and uh, they thought I was it, for the vocalist. And the funniest thing, [laughs] I got there and I was afraid to sing in the mic, because I never saw a microphone before, and I said, “Why do I have to sing in that thing? Why can’t I just sing like I do at the club?” I was scared to death of it. And, uh, Buck and Bubbles,*1 um, uh, Buck played the piano on that day. Can you imagine? All those studio men and Buck, he can’t read a note, he’s playing the piano! Well, that’s the way Benny is. He likes the music. You don’t have to read, or write, or anything. Just play it, you know? So, Buck says, “You not gonna let these people think you’re a square, are you?” He goes, “Come on, sing it.” And I sang, “Your Mother’s Son in Law,” and on the other side was “Riffin’ the Scotch.

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