Billie Holiday - The Commodore Master Takes
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Category: Music CD
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Billie HolidayEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2000-02-08
Music Label: Polygram Records
Soundtracks:
- Strange Fruit
- Yesterdays
- Fine And Mellow
- I Gotta Right To Sing The Blues
- How Am I To Know?
- My Old Flame
- I'll Get By
- I Cover The Waterfront
- I'll Be Seeing You
- I'm Yours
- Embraceable You
- As Time Goes By
- He's Funny That Way
- Lover, Come Back To Me
- Billie's Blues
- On The Sunny Side Of The Street
Free Music Notes for The Commodore Master Takes
Free Music Review: At her peak
Hit: 5 Stars
This is the great (and quite possibly the greatest) Billie Holiday at her peak, singing "Fine and Mellow", "I'll Get By", "Billie's Blues", "I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues"...
I'm not such a big fan of "Strange Fruit", although I recognize and commend its political and ethical significance.
It is only a pitty the fine musicians, such as Frankie Newton on trumpet or Vic Dickenson on trombone were not put to a better use...
Billie's earlier recordings with the Prez, Teddy Wilson, Roy Eldridge and other jazz giants prove how even she can grow in good company; her late recordings, where she had very little voice left also speak for this; on Sound of jazz she delivered Fine and Mellow as fine and mellow as anything she had ever recorded, and with Ben Webster and Harry Edison, her late (and potentially sad) recordings still provide some fine music...
Still, this IS Billie at her peak; her rhythm, melody and timbre impeccable, gently swinging like no other singer...
The Commodore Master Takes Poster
These historic recordings--made mostly in 1939--represent a crucial period for Billie Holiday, who had already achieved some success as a jazz singer recording for Columbia but had yet to really reach her peak as a performer or icon. The Commodore Master Takes, recorded for Milt Gabler's small independent label, were a step towards Holiday's eventual infamy, thanks notably to the recording of "Strange Fruit," a controversial song about lynching that Columbia Records simply refused. Recording with several small bands that seemed to understand the nuances of her voice perfectly, Holiday is in full command of her faculties here, without a trace of her later deterioration. Instead, we have a singer bearing all the bittersweet conviction of the best blues stylists. Songs like "How Am I to Know?" and "My Old Flame" simply smolder, and the band's support is understated, not overpowering. Holiday is the show here. In its own way, that sets a precedent, considering this was still the big-band era, and a jazz singer with such sparse backing was still an anomaly. Excellent liner notes by Orrin Keepnews--who explains how his own relationship with Billie Holiday was sometimes rocky--complete the picture. --Joe S. HarringtonJazz Music CDs
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