Billie+Holiday+1950

__The Rise and Fall Of Billie Holiday__ By: Jodi Aquino   As I stood there looking up at her from the crowd, her beauty was striking –I had never seen anyone more beautiful. Her voice was so powerful that my whole body shook as I stood at the edge of the stage singing along to her song. She took over the room as if she was the only one on stage, singing and dancing to the meaningful words of her music. The crowd was screaming and cheering for her, wanting more. But who was she? To many people she was just another women preaching out to America but to others she was Billie Holiday, the beautiful singer that sang about the issues the were affecting many people that idolized her. Billie Holiday was amazing at singing which made her liked and disliked. That is what made her such a controversial person.  Billie Holiday was a [|jazz] singer who brought controversy to America through her songs, such as [|Strange Fruit], which is about [|poverty] and racism. Struggling with her drug addition made her journey in to American History very hard. She had a major impact on her field and on the American society because of what a controversial person she came to be. Through her struggle as an artist and a drug addict she made many supporters as well as many enemies who thought that her real outlook on the world was too much for the public to hear.  Her real name was Eleanora Harris, but used Billie Holiday after [|Billie Dove] ; she was born on April 7, 1915 in [|Philadelphia] . Billie grew up having a tough life. She was brought up needing to work as a maid and living with abusive relatives. She could not handle her daughter. Having a bad childhood messed up her life for the future. She was caught for truancy and was sent to [|The House of Good Sheppard for Colored Girls]. She then become a druggie and got involved with the wrong men and drugs. Her father, who wasn’t around much, was a talented guitarist, which helped inspire Billie to sing. Two other inspirations were [|Bessie Smith] , and  c who she would often refer to as “a major influence as a singer.” A white jazz singer first heard her music in early 1933, and she had her first scheduled recording session that November with Columbian Records. Then the following year she met a saxophonist, [|Lester Young] . He became “her soul mate musically,” and she called him Prez, short for president. Billie and her band soon become known for their songs that spread controversy about racism, poverty, and drugs. They continued to grow, but Billie began to sink. She proceeded with her drug addictions that ranged from [|marijuana] to [|heroin]. When her addiction became extremely severe she got to the point where she stopped eating, drinking, and going to the bathroom. She was in and out of hospitals and jail, and was last hospitalized in May 1959. She was then arrested in her bed for possession of narcotics. Billie died on July 17, 1959 because of her horrific drug addiction. Her mother soon died after of her own drug addiction. Billie was known for her talented singing but in the background her life was being torn apart and she could do nothing to stop it. Her music was the only way of escape. She needed to let people know how people like her lived and the consequences that came of it. Many people did not approve of what she was doing but at the same time these addictions helped make her work famous.   <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'">Billie Holiday was controversial because of her songs that were about poverty, racism, drugs, and her men. //Strange Fruit// was the song she became most famous for. It was about blacks being hung from trees and being left out to rot. This song brought controversy to America because she was a black woman in a white band, singing about the way blacks that were being killed by whites. Many people didn’t like her music but especially not her song, //Strange Fruit// because it was not something people were used to hearing about. But on the other hand many loved her songs a supported her beliefs. //Strange Fruit// was a heart wrenching song and many other black musicians related to the words that Billie soon became known for. Once this song was heard throughout America she became talked about by many different groups of people and she soon became controversial because of her songs and her personal life. Some of her other songs were about the men she loved or the drugs she had been taking. Her song [|Lover Man]was written for her by Jimmy Davis; it was about a girl that never knew love. It not only referred to the men she loved but also her young life where she learned not to trust anyone. Being let down and not being able to love anyone, over time influenced her to sing the songs that made her famous but also made her extremely controversial. <span style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'">Billie was a big impact on jazz, she was not only the first black women in a white band, but she also sang songs about things that were new to the jazz world. For a long time jazz was set a certain way. To see a black woman in a white band touring all over the south was a big deal to jazz as a whole because she opened the door for other blacks to do as she did. Now in 2008 blacks and whites sing, dance, act, etc together with no problems. Billie Holiday was the first women to do it. She also sang about racism, poverty, and other things that were unusual to her field of jazz. To change the way that society felt about having two different races together, was a huge impact on America. <span style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 12pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'">When Billie would sing she would affect not only the people that would listen to her, but everyone that heard about how she was changing jazz forever. It brought out new controversy in society. Back up to paragraph two, //Strange Fruit// was a very controversial song because of how people either took offence to it, or supported her from day one. She became an inspiration to many other artists. [|Lillian Smith] <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'">was an author that heard the song //Strange Fruit// and wrote a book about it and named it after Billie’s song. She also inspired others, John Hammond, her influential patron; her talent inspired him to work. She sang with many well known singers such as Fletcher Henderson, <span class="yshortcuts" style="BACKGROUND: none transparent scroll repeat 0% 0%; CURSOR: hand; BORDER-BOTTOM: #0066cc 1px dashed">Lester Young , Artie Shaw , Duke Ellington , etc. Billie influenced all of these artists and more to want to sing with her because of her amazing voice and talent. She sang about topics that most people would not even dare to speak about. She brought about the many controversies that went on in the Black society. This opened many eyes to the real world. Billie was able to show everyone the struggles that people faced. Because she was in an all white band the white society also began to open their eyes to some of the issues going on. Some people did not accept what she was singing and denied that anything she sang about was just causing trouble while others began to sympathize for wheat was going on. Many people even began to take her ideas and help her by writing about them with their own twists. <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'"> <span style="FONT-SIZE: 13pt; LINE-HEIGHT: 200%; FONT-FAMILY: 'Times New Roman', 'serif'">Billie Holiday became a part of American History by her controversial songs and the way she made such a big impact on American Society. She let people know that it was okay to be different. She influenced the people that listened to her, other musicians, and authors. She was a very talented singer that expressed her feelings through her powerful lyrics. She lived a short life because of drugs and making the wrong decisions. But she was still able to make an amazing impact on the history of jazz music.