Billy Holiday – Lady in Satin – 1958

[Roland Bru]

Billy Holiday has been dead for almost 50 years. To the initiated this will come as no surprise. After all, this singer is one of the cornerstones of vocal jazz, so she is bound to be dead. However, what is interesting about this record is that she is actually dying during the performance. Don’t be confused, yes, she would live another 17 months after this session (to die at the tender age of 44 years, due to drug abuse and alcohol). In fact she would record one more studio album after this one. This particular one, my friends, must however be ranked among her justifiably famous sessions of the 30’s and early 40’s, where she had a totally different voice.

You either like her voice or you are a moron.

This is not so much a musical statement as an emotional statement (as the liner notes by arranger Ray Ellis mention as well. There may be singers that are technically more gifted (Ella Fitgerald is one, although she, likewise, was hardly a schooled singer). But it is difficult, if not impossible, to find a singer, or indeed an album, where the performance is so hard hitting emotionally. You get the feeling she is suffering for you. This is a perspective I do not necessarily like (Silly attention grabbing, I say. Go slash your wrists! See if I care!). But it works. This is an album you cannot stand to listen to every day (you have you own Dren to wade through). But you need it anyway.