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Happy Birthday, Lady Day

  • Billie Holiday in 1958. Photograph courtesy Dennis StockMagnum.
  • Holiday in Harlem in 1935 with Ben Webster left Johnny Russell right and an unidentified guitar player. Photograph...
  • Holiday Duke Ellington and Leonard Feather in 1945. Photograph courtesy Hulton ArchiveGetty.
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Billie Holiday in 1958. Photograph courtesy Dennis Stock/Magnum.

Today would have been the ninety-ninth birthday of the jazz singer and songwriter Billie Holiday. In a joint Profile of the American singers Teddi King, Mary Mayo, and Barbara Lea in the February 27, 1978 issue of the magazine, Lea said of Holiday:

What she did, especially in the early days, was terribly honest and direct. She flattened out the melody of her songs. She could swing incredibly. Sweet-and-sour, dill pickles, strong, cutting—she was an absolute. She sprang full grown from the head of Jove.