Unfortunately, one of the ways she endures is the appropriation and misappropriation of her most famous song. The pathos of Holiday's life seems to ooze out between the notes in her voice. For many listeners, one suspects, the personal life is inextricable from the professional. Most of all, there's her long battle with heroin, a struggle about which she was unusually open. There's her birth to a teenaged, unmarried mother her rape and work in prostitution before her 14th birthday her many marriages and entanglements and her death. And as John Szwed notes in a new book, her myth is also an essential part of her continued appeal. Even people who can't tell Ella Fitzgerald from Peggy Lee know that voice, so recognizable and so difficult to describe. What accounts for her longevity? For one thing, she's arguably the greatest jazz singer ever. Since her death, Holiday has been the subject of a film, starring Diana Ross a play, in which she was portrayed first by Ernestine Jackson and last year by Audra McDonald (who won a Tony for the role) and countless tribute albums, including two particularly strong new interpretations of Holiday's catalogue timed to her centennial. The artist, who would have turned 100 this month, seems to endure, even beyond Clueless references, which is all the more impressive given that she died in 1959, 56 years ago.

Louis Armstrong? Still loved by musicians, but mostly known in the general public for his treacly late-career anthem to optimism, 'What a Wonderful World.'īillie Holiday, though-she's got a claim. Ol' Blue Eyes remains an icon, but Bob Dylan tributes aside, Sinatra sounds, well, old.

Take Frank Sinatra, who was born in December 1915. How many musicians are relevant at 100? Given how quickly styles and sounds change, it's hard to stay current for more than a decade, much less a century.

John szwed billie holiday