popupTrigger.css('visibility', 'visible'); popupTrigger.css('visibility', 'visible'); Nalleys Ballads for Billie is now available on CD or as a digital album. I do not see the same attention given to Miles Daviss or Charlie Parkers drug use or their abusive relationships. [2] Kuehl, in that period of eight years, began to see parts of herself in Holiday. (Its hard to believe he didnt know.) Cafe Society owner Barney Josephson says that it wasnt unusual for white customers to walk out of the club and complain if Holiday performed the song. This unusual, ambitious doc doubles down on the challenge, adding an extra frame to the portrait: the obsession that drove journalist Linda Lipnack Kuehl to toil for years on an epic biography of . The most important takeaway from Jo Jones is that anyone who believes music has no color negates the experiences of African American musicians who lived with racism dictating almost every aspect of their lives. if ('' == 'left') During the famous 1957 Sound of Jazz television recording of Fine & Mellow others have described Holidays face as smacked out on drugs or liquor; instead, this film makes it clear that the ecstasy on Holidays face is from hearing the sounds of her musical soulmate saxophonist Lester Young play. There never was a black critic in swing music. } var readyStateOverflowInterval; Her body as usual is still as a statue; only her hands wave occasionally in small restrained circles. captainformCustomVars['772605'] = ''; Linda Lipnack Kuehl . So many people have rhapsodized about her voice that we often forget that for those who saw her sing live her face was also a powerful vehicle of emotion. }); Nalleysmany philanthropic endeavors include founding theKim Nalley Black Youth Jazz Scholarshipat the California Jazz Conservatory. Elle fut la premire icne de la protestation contre le racisme ce qui lui a valu de puissants ennemis. The proof existed as early as Symphony in Black, the 1935 rhapsody of black American life in which she sang the broken-hearted "Saddest Tale". Intending to write a biography of Billie Holiday, she interviewed friends, fellow performers, and key figures in Holiday's life, but died before its completion. The tapes have never [] Read the full article: Glasgow Film Festival 2020: Billie Glasgow Film Festival 2020 Glasgow Film Festival 2020: Anderson Falls }; Occasionally, pieces of Kuehls own life enter into the picture, but never with much attempt to build a connection. Basies saxophonist Lester Young is credited with giving Holiday the nickname Lady Day. if (document.getElementById('captainform_js_global_vars') == null) { The documentary is also organized around approximately 200 hours of interviews conducted over the course of a decade by Linda Lipnack Kuehl, who, as the film notes, didn't like seeing Holiday . captainForm772605PreloadInterval63c877fb83722 = setInterval(function(){ Some people in the documentary allude to Holiday being fond of sex orgies. One is the subject Billie Holiday and the other, her biographer Linda Lipnack Kuehl. Function: _error_handler, File: /home/ah0ejbmyowku/public_html/application/views/page/index.php That voice. The girl looks absolutely nothing like Holiday. KUEHLLinda (Lipnack). Many books have been written about her success and ongoing struggles. } Her drug problems led to her multiple arrests at the height of her fame. Intending to write a biography of Billie Holiday, she interviewed friends, fellow performers, and key figures in Holiday's life, but died before its completion. } (Its one of the reasons why biopics about Holiday portray her in very different ways.). else if ('' == 'right') She began working on the Holiday biography in 1971 and interviewed an impressive number of people. Line: 315 captainformDomReady(function() { Find Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok profiles, images and more on IDCrawl - free people search website. They got married in 1957. Line: 479 clearInterval(captainForm772606PreloadInterval63c877fb829bf); resize77260663c877fb829bf(wrapper); The images of her are legion. A new documentary, Billie, will delve into the life of jazz great Billie Holiday with the help of hours of never-before-heard interviews. var captainformThemeStyle = {}; Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in, Linda Lipnack Kuehl was writing a biography of Holiday when she died suddenly in 1978, though her family believe she may have been murdered, Find your bookmarks in your Independent Premium section, under my profile. } [7][3][8] Her archive on Holiday included these interviews on 125 audio tapes[8] as well as "a long paper trail, including police files, transcripts of court cases, royalty statements, shopping lists, hospital records, private letters, muddled transcripts and fragments of unfinished chapters. var captainformDomReady = captainformDomReady || function(e){var t=!1,n=function(){document.addEventListener? Her predilection for weed, opium and coke gave them the excuse to hound her relentlessly. That archive is where director James Erskine first began pulling . "[9] However, Kuehl did not complete the book. Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies, Wondrous sounds: Billie Holiday in the early 1950s. By the time that Holiday was arrested in 1947, she listed her marital status as separated. She and Monroe got divorced the same year. if(typeof cfJsHost != 'undefined'){ popupTrigger.css('visibility', 'visible'); Billie Holiday was born Eleanora Fagan on April 17, 1915, in Philadelphia, but she was raised in the Pigtown slum of Baltimore, Maryland. [6] In 1971, she began plans for a biography of Holiday, who had died aged 44 in 1959. id: "captainform_js_global_vars", Song list and samples here.She portrayed Holiday on stage in C.J.Verburgs play Lady Day in Love. Her death was ruled as a suicide. It also brings up a few necessary, if rarely confronted questions. captainformThemeStyle['772605'] = ''; The problems became too much for her, and she quit working with Artie Shaw and His Orchestra. Before her mysterious death in 1978, Lipnack Kuehl had taped over 200 hours of interviews. var popupParams = { And the only way to save her was to have her knocked out by the government. George H. White, who was a narcotics agent at the time, says Holidays lavish lifestyle also made her a target for the FBI and other law enforcement: Billie flaunted her way of living.. formId: '772605' The first of the two films - "Billie" is a documentary built around some previously unheard audio interviews conducted by Linda Lipnack Kuehl, who was working on a comprehensive biography on Billie Holiday before her untimely death in 1978.Ms. captainformDomReady(function() { if ('' == 'left') Kuehl died in what was deemed. Kuehl was twice-divorced with no children, while Basie was married with children. In his estimation, Holiday was a psychopath strictly in the sense that she was ruled by impulse. FISHER Satisfies the Appetite, Memorable and Best Forgotten Thanksgivings. Her archive passed to a private collector and was later used in other writers' biographies of Holiday. Presentations and performance on Billie Holiday include: Rethinking Billie Holiday on her Centennial (Google Talk), Blues Legacies and Black Feminism with Angela Davis (SFJAZZ), Your email address will not be published. jQuery(wrapper).css('top', jQuery(window).height() * 0.4 - wrapper.outerHeight()); In the 1970s, journalist Linda Lipnack Kuehl embarked on a deep dive into Billie Holiday's history with an eye towards writing a more comprehensive and truthful biography than that which was available. [4], She was a Jewish feminist[5] and a fan of Billie Holiday. The book was left unfinished, Kuehls tapes buried away until now. }); Her second drug bust came in San Francisco in 1949, but she didnt get any prison time for that arrest. Meanwhile, Basie doesnt offer much insight about Holiday in his interview commentary, because he claims he didnt really know what was going on when she was in his band. captainform_create_form_popup(popupParams); Intending to write a biography of Billie Holiday, she interviewed friends, fellow performers, and key figures in Holiday's life, but died before its completion. She has also been seen playing folk guitar, singing R&B and spirituals as well as being an avid Lindy Hop and blues dancer. else if ('' == 'right') Line: 24 textContent: 'var frmRef=""; try { frmRef=window.top.location.href; } catch(err) {}; var captainform_servicedomain="app.captainform.com";var cfJsHost = "https://";', She sang in clubs in Harlem and. She was terribly worried about whether or not God would forgive her.. window.addEventListener('resize', function(){ There are so many photos in circulation of Holiday at the end of her life when she was skeletal it might be shocking for some to realize that for most of her life she was plump. Kuehl died by suicide in 1978, though her sister appears in the documentary and asserts that she believes her sister was murdered. type: "text/javascript", Linda delivers due diligence and interviews all the people involved to come up with an answer, or answers, that are closer to the truth than any other biographer. var captainformDomReady = captainformDomReady || function(e){var t=!1,n=function(){document.addEventListener? Allen shows the cell where Holiday stayed and describes Holiday as quiet and certainly no trouble ever. captainform_preload_form_popup(popupParams); }, true); var captainformCustomVars = {}; A 1938 portrait, when she appeared at Cafe Society in NYC with a swatch of gardenias in hair hairstyle, which from then on became her trademark. When she was released from jail at age 14, she left prostitution for good and set her sights on singing for a living. setTimeout(function () { Did someone consider the pairs intimacy a threat? The 2020 documentary Billie, written and directed by James Erskine, pulls together reporting done by Linda Lipnack Kuehl, who spent eight years amassing research and interviews including 200 hours of audiotape for a never-finished biography of Holiday. window.addEventListener('resize', function(){ var popupParams = { Hopefully someday a filmmaker will be able to tackle the intersectionality of Holiday being both Black and a woman when neither had many rights, and Holiday as a jazz genius when singers were considered neither musicians nor geniuses. Afterwards she ran errands at a whorehouse where she heard Bessie Smith records which Holiday claimed to be a seminal influence along with Louis Armstrong. }, 50); She was a woman of breath-taking talent and global popularity while also stirring controversy. formId: '772606' Kuehl had even grown close to some of her interview subjects, including Holidays former bandleader Count Basie. Racism is still an enduring feature of Black life in America, but it does pull the viewer out of Holidays time too much. She wasnt like a slut. ("elementType"in e))return!1;var n=null;if(n=e.following?e.following.parentElement:e.inside?e.inside:e.replacing?e.replacing.parentElement:"script"==e.elementType?document.head:document.body,null==n)return!1;var l=document.createElement(e.elementType);delete e.elementType,l=jQuery.extend(l,e),e.replacing?n.replaceChild(l,e.replacing):n.appendChild(l)}; Kuehl is remarkable for interviewing lesser known people who had a lot of contact with Lady Day. resize77260663c877fb834ac(wrapper); Milt Hilton, a bass player who worked with Holiday during her last music recording sessions, remembers: She was in pretty bad shape. He took many of the widely published photos of her during these last sessions. The biopic will follow Holiday's life through the eyes of Linda Lipnack Kuehl, who as a fan and literary journalist in 1970 began a biography of Holiday. The scene in Harlem was dense with famous clubs, famous musicians and a seemingly endless supply of white patrons eager to slum and see African American entertainment. elementType: "script", It was a different kind of poor We were happy with what we had. Mary Pony Kane, a childhood friend of Holidays, remembers that Eleanor was foul-mouthed, even as a child. formId: '772606' Detroit Red, a dancer work worked with Holiday at The Hot Cha, remembers: At that particular time, the only vice she had was smoking [marijuana] reefers. Later, Holiday became an alcoholic and addicted to cocaine and heroin. var append_element = append_element || function(e){if(void 0==e)return!1;if(! Greenwich Entertainment released Billie in select U.S. cinemas, on digital and VOD on December 4, 2020. var captainformCustomVars = {}; UNSUNG HEROES THROUGH THE NIGHT- Special Free Screening Thursday, Jan. 19, NEW YEARS CHEER- A Nostalgic Look at Past New Years Through Images, Movies and Music, They Were Calling It the Twentieth Century, THE ART OF EATING: THE LIFE OF M.F.K. Other people interviewed in the documentary include trombonist Melba Liston and singer Carmen McCrae. Linda Lipnack Kuehl was an American arts journalist, based in New York City. Over 8 years, she tracked down and tape-recorded over 200 hours of interviews with the extraordinary characters that populated the iconic singer's short, tumultuous life. Read jazz pianist Richard Fregulias review of Billie. jQuery(wrapper).find('a').removeAttr('href'); On 6 February 1978, journalist Linda Lipnack Kuehl fell from the balcony of a Washington DC hotel. Particularly jarring is a small girl made up to look as if she was Billie as a child. The story of Billie Holiday's rise to fame after a difficult upbringing is nothing new. Holidays birth name was Eleanora Fagan, and she was born to teenage parents in Philadelphia on April 7, 1915. Hammond says of Goodman, He slept with Billie. Several people in the documentary literally say in one way or another, She loved to get high. And they talk about how she had an unusually high physical tolerance for drugs that was stronger than men who were physically a lot bigger than she was. Holiday deserves a multi-hour Ken Burns treatment on just her life. resize77260563c877fb83722(wrapper); Its implied that her addiction issues were inherited, because Sandy Williams, a bandmate of Holidays father Clarence, describes Clarence as a happy-go-lucky guy who loved his booze and was often drunk. } popupTrigger.click(function(){ Kuehl was a journalist and high school teacher that interviewed close to 200 people that knew Ms. Holliday. Kuehls only objective was to understand Holiday better, which she does better than any other biographer of Billie Holiday. if ('' == 'left') When they reach the top, something tragic happens.. The documentary will thread her story through the eyes of one of her most enamored fans, Linda Lipnack Kuehl, who, in 1971, set out to write a definitive biography. These incredible testimonies reveal Holiday's . Review: Billie (2020), an oral history of Billie Holidays life. Wells, African Americans were most often lynched because they were financially successful or not deferential enough. In the late 60s, journalist Linda Lipnack Kuehl set out to write the definitive biography of Holiday's life, interviewing everyone from jazz greats such as Charles Mingus, Tony Bennett and. captainform_create_form_popup(popupParams); if (document.getElementById('captainform_js_global_vars') == null) { One thing everyone agrees on is that Holiday grew up rough and grew up fast, which undoubtedly shaped the person she became later in life. resize77260563c877fb82c45(wrapper); Her face is an actress as much as her voice. [2] Various other writers' biographies on Holiday have drawn upon Kuehl's material, as did the film Billie (2019), which is narrated by Kuehl's recorded interviews. Culture Representation:The documentary Billie features a group of white and black people, who were associated with Billie Holiday, discussing the life of the legendary jazz singer, who died at the age of 44 in 1959. [7][3][8] Her archive on Holiday included these interviews on 125 audio tapes[8] as well as "a long paper trail, including police files, transcripts of court cases, royalty statements, shopping lists, hospital records, private letters, muddled transcripts and fragments of unfinished chapters. Although she was a heavy user of marijuana, alcohol and cocaine, Holiday was most associated with her use of heroin and other opiates. var readyStateOverflowInterval; Line: 68 var wrapper = jQuery('#captainformForm772605EmbedPopup63c877fb82c45'); Although Luftman couldnt be sure if Basie and her sister had a sexual affair, she thinks those threats might have had something to do with Kuehls death. }, 50); var captainformDomReady = captainformDomReady || function(e){var t=!1,n=function(){document.addEventListener? Function: view, "Billie documentary review an oral history of Billie Holiday", "Singer, activist, sex machine, addict: the troubled brilliance of Billie Holiday", "Billie is a fanatical yet fascinating portrait of an immortal talent", "Billie a powerful documentary about the life of the singer", "Documentary Billie squanders its incendiary premise review", "Biography covers range of a vocalist (Published 2005)", "Billie review a double tragedy of destruction and obsession", "One Scats, the Other Doesn't (Published 1994)", "Observer review: With Billie by Julia Blackburn", "Billie review a truer, historical spin on the great Billie Holiday", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Linda_Lipnack_Kuehl&oldid=1111802271. }, 10); elementType: "script", Erskine at least benefits from the basic volume of his source material. The testimonies of those who knew Holiday before she became famous help make up for that deficiency. Billie stands in magnificent glory in a dark long-sleeved dress with a portrait collar that shows off her face. Before her mysterious death in 1978, Lipnack Kuehl had taped over 200 hours of interviews. Because McKay was still legally married to Holiday when she died, he inherited Holidays estate and future earnings. var captainformThemeStyle = {}; formId: '772605' Theres a lingering sense that Kuehl understood something deeper, but Billie never seems all that curious to find out what that might be. I was one of the people who didnt. Holiday was the first black singer to work with Goodman in those racially segregated times. Contact Us However, Linda's book was never finished and the tapes never heard . I would expect that at least they could have found a child with the same coloring as Holiday. var wrapper = jQuery('#captainformForm772606EmbedPopup63c877fb834ac'); Yoshi Kato wrote inMetrowith a flowing tone, an articulate delivery and a formidable understanding of musical principles and history, Nalley is comfortable in many a vocal setting. She is the former owner of the San Francisco jazz club Jazz at Pearls and was awarded Most Influential African American in the Bay Area.. Linda Lipnack Kuehl IMDbPro Starmeter See rank Help contribute to IMDb. Even though she performed a historic sold-out concert at Carnegie Hall after she was let out of prison in 1948 (at the time, Carnegie Hall was a venue for classical and opera music, not jazz), the damage to her reputation was done. Jimmy Flashy Monroe [a pimp who became a trombonist in Holidays band] broke them up. Although it may seem counterintuitive to have more audio only interviews for a film documentary instead of videos, we quickly hear the ease and genuineness in the interviewees voices. At the time of her death, she and McKay were separated and not divorced. Whatever the real reasons for Holidays exit from the Count Basie Orchestra, her next career opportunity was one that was groundbreaking but controversial at the time. Her make-up is minimal. Along with Count Basie, we were the Royal Family, Holiday said in an archival interview. jQuery(wrapper).find('a').removeAttr('href'); type: "text/javascript", 9.45pm, BBC Two Director James Erskine brings this detailed, fascinating documentary charting the tumultuous life of jazz singer Billie Holiday, based on hundreds of hours of interviews conducted. Like the singer she idolized and identified with, Linda Lipnack Kuehl had her own bad habits, failed relationships and dreams unfulfilled. They had an instantaneous and passionate romance, married, and in 1963, Linda gave birth to their first child, Heather Louise. She was 38. Contact Us Her family, however, believed otherwise. 2019 Directed by James Erskine Synopsis She sang the truth, she paid the price 'Lady Day' was one of the greatest jazz vocalists the world ever heard. [11] "Police deemed it suicide, Kuehl having supposedly jumped from her hotel room, although there was no proof of this",[3] and her family believes she may have been murdered. (Courtesy of the Kuehl family) Kuehl left behind a trove of notes, transcripts and some 200 hours of interviews on cassette tapesmostly in shoeboxes, some labeled, some not. Skinny Davenport, a pimp who knew Holiday in her prostitution days, describes how the hookers in the neighborhood were treated: Knock em down, kick em in the ass. Linda Lipnack Kuehl (January 24, 1940 February 6, 1978)[1] was an American arts journalist, based in New York City. Talk:Linda Lipnack Kuehl - Wikipedia Talk:Linda Lipnack Kuehl This article is of interest to the following WikiProjects : Start a discussion about improving the Linda Lipnack Kuehl page Talk pages are where people discuss how to make content on Wikipedia the best that it can be. I think she felt the pain of someones struggles. Start your Independent Premium subscription today. Oral history is only as good as the interviewer and Kuehl, a very attractive white woman, put her interviewees at ease by interviewing them most often in bars where they worked and turning off the microphone when asked. jQuery(wrapper).css('top', jQuery(window).height() * 0.4 - wrapper.outerHeight()); Depending on whom you believe, she either quit or was fired. Holiday co-wrote her 1956 memoir Lady Sings the Blues with William Dufty, and the book became the basis of the 1972 feature film of the same name, starring Diana Ross, who earned an Oscar nomination for her role as Holiday. The film consists almost entirely of Kuehls recordings she had 125 cassettes worth of interviews and snippets of her writing, the latter played out over dramatic reconstructions of hands hovering above a typewriter. Here, Erskine has been given the opportunity to illuminate the lives of two women by seeing where they intertwine. jQuery(wrapper).find('a').removeAttr('href'); Many important details of her life and her musical genius have been overshadowed by a lurid interest in her love life and drug use. For eight years in the 1970s, a journalist named Linda Lipnack Kuehl researched a biography of Billie Holiday, interviewing as many of the great jazz chanteuse's friends, relatives and . She began working on the Holiday biography in 1971 and interviewed an impressive number of people. She was the victim of repeated sexual abuse. As an historian who has used Linda Kuehls interviews to write several papers and presentations on Billie Holiday I realize that I am biased and others might not share in my joy in learning more about Kuehl. window.addEventListener('resize', function(){ She had $750 to her name when she died, according to the documentary. Monroe would become Holidays first husband, whom she married in 1941. Holiday can only be fairly described as oscillating from pleasingly plump to svelte for much of her career. Line: 107 Shortly after she became a professional singer as a teenager, Holiday began working with musician/producer John Hammond, who introduced her to Benny Goodman in 1933. Just click the "Edit page" button at the bottom of the page or learn more in the Biography submission guide. Holidays boxer dog was used as a way to transport drugs underneath the dogs collar. Culture Mix Survey Eleanors favorite curse words were motherfucker and cocksucker., By all accounts, Eleanor started working as a housecleaner/maid before she was a teenager. captainformThemeStyle['772605'] = ''; Lipstick and brow pencil are the hallmark features. View eatdrinkfilmsmags profile on Instagram, View eatdrinkfilmssos profile on Pinterest, BILLIE documentary is Actually Linda Kuehl on Billie. clearInterval(captainForm772605PreloadInterval63c877fb82c45); Add a bio, trivia, and more. After moving to Harlem, she started singing in the local nightclubs, where she was eventually discovered by producer John Hammond. Kim Nalley is on faculty at the California Jazz Conservatory and is writing her Doctoral dissertation on the Globalization of Jazz and Black Cultural Politics.. On 6 February 1978, journalist Linda Lipnack Kuehl fell from the balcony of a Washington DC hotel. A more pertinent flaw would be the ending montage which shows images of current racism against African Americans over Drummer Papa Jo Jones voice. I avsikt att skriva en biografi om Billie Holiday intervjuade hon vnner, andra artister och nyckelpersoner i Holiday's liv, men dog innan den slutfrdes. var popupParams = { Required fields are marked *. captainformDomReady(function() { [2] Various other writers' biographies on Holiday have drawn upon Kuehl's material, as did the film Billie (2019), which is narrated by Kuehl's recorded interviews. That made her a target of the FBI. (The documentary has lots of images of cassette recorders and reel-to-reel tap machines in operation, to give a visual representation of these interviews.) This documentary offers viewers the rare opportunity to see Billie Holiday through the eyes of those who knew her best. Those now-deceased jazz voices include Count Basie, Charles Mingus, John Hammond, Jo Jones and Sylvia Syms. var readyStateOverflowInterval; captainform_create_form_popup(popupParams); When asked if the stories were true that Holiday had to darken her skin when performing with Basie and his band, because she was so much lighter-skinned then they were, Basie also claims ignorance about that issue. Pulled out of school at 11, she worked in a brothel at age 12, and by age 14 she was in Harlem singing at the Hot Cha Club.
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