Billie Holiday Quotes - Page 2

Quotes about:

• If I don't have friends, then I ain't nothing.

  Billie Holiday

  Friendship, Ifs

  12 Copy quote

• God bless the child that's got his own.

  Billie Holiday

  Children, God Bless, Bless

  "God Bless the Child" (song) (1941).

  16 Copy quote

• If you think dope is for kicks and for thrills, you're out of your mind. There are more kicks to be had in a good case of paralytic polio or by living in an iron lung.

  Billie Holiday

  Dope, Thinking, Iron

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (1956). “Lady sings the blues”

  21 Copy quote

• I can't stand to sing the same song the same way two nights in succession. If you can, then it ain't music, it's close order drill, or exercise or yodeling or something, not music.

  Billie Holiday

  Song, Exercise, Night

  Lady Sings the Blues ch. 4 (1956).

  79 Copy quote

• There's no damn business like show business - you have to smile to keep from throwing up.

  Billie Holiday

  Smile, Throwing Up, Damn

  25 Copy quote

• In this country, don't forget, a habit is no damn private hell. There's no solitary confinement outside of jail. A habit is hell for those you love. And in this country it's the worst kind of hell for those who love you.

  Billie Holiday

  Country, Love You, Recovery

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.220, Broadway Books

  9 Copy quote

• I hate straight singing. I have to change a tune to my own way of doing it. That's all I know.

  Billie Holiday

  Change, Music, Hate

  24 Copy quote

• The blues to me is like being very sad, very sick, going to church, being very happy ... it's sort of a mixed up thing. You just have to feel it.

  Billie Holiday

  Sick, Church, Very Sad

  14 Copy quote

• So I asked him to play "Trav'lin' All Alone." That came closer than anything to the way I felt. And some part of it must have come across. The whole joint quieted down. If someone had dropped a pin, it would have sounded like a bomb. When I finished, everybody in the joint was crying in their beer, and I picked thirty-eight bucks up off the floor. . . . When I showed Mom the money for the rent and told her I had a regular job singing for eighteen dollars a week, she could hardly believe it.

  Billie Holiday

  Mom, Jobs, Believe

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.45, Broadway Books

  38 Copy quote

• Love is like a faucet, it turns off and on.

  Billie Holiday

  Love, Pregnancy, Turns

  10 Copy quote

• Mom and Pop were just a couple of kids when they got married. He was eighteen, she was sixteen and I was three.

  Billie Holiday

  Funny, Marriage, Hilarious

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.13, Broadway Books

  46 Copy quote

• I've been told that nobody sings the word 'hunger' like I do.

  Billie Holiday

  Music, Jazz, Hunger

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.198, Broadway Books

  14 Copy quote

• And when you're poor, you grow up fast.

  Billie Holiday

  Growing Up, Poverty, Poor

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.13, Broadway Books

  22 Copy quote

• I never had a chance to play with dolls like other kids. I started working when I was six years old.

  Billie Holiday

  Music, Work, Kids

  88 Copy quote

• All dope can do for you is kill you... the long hard way. And it can kill the people you love right along with you.

  Billie Holiday

  Dope, Long, People

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (1956). “Lady sings the blues”

  14 Copy quote

• One day a whole damn song fell into place in my head.

  Billie Holiday

  Song, Umpires, One Day

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.108, Broadway Books

  16 Copy quote

• I joined Count Basie's band to make a little money and to see the world. For two years I didn't see anything but the inside of a Blue Goose bus, and I never got to send home a quarter.

  Billie Holiday

  Home, Blue, Years

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.70, Broadway Books

  15 Copy quote

• I try to improvise like Les Young, Louis Armstrong or someone else I admire. What comes out is what I feel.

  Billie Holiday

  Trying, Armstrong, Young

  12 Copy quote

• Lust may be in the heart, though it be not seen by others; as guests may be in the house, though they look not out at the windows.

  Billie Holiday

  Heart, House, Lust

  12 Copy quote

• The only reason they're out there is to see me fall into the damn orchestra pit.

  Billie Holiday

  Fall, Pits, Orchestra

  13 Copy quote

• New Orleans is the only city in the world you go in to buy a pair of nylon stockings they want to know your head size.

  Billie Holiday

  New Orleans, Cities, Nylon

  11 Copy quote

• Singing songs like 'The Man I Love' or 'Porgy' is no more work than sitting down and eating Chinese roast duck, and I love roast duck.

  Billie Holiday

  Song, Men, Ducks

  Billie Holiday, William Dufty (2011). “Lady Sings the Blues: The 50th-Anniversay Edition with a Revised Discography”, p.51, Broadway Books

  16 Copy quote

• I never sing a song the same way twice.

  Billie Holiday

  Song, Way, Jazz

  14 Copy quote

• When Lester plays, he almost seems to be singing; one can almost hear the words.

  Billie Holiday

  Play, Singing, Jazz

  13 Copy quote

• I can't stand to sing the same song the same way two nights in succession, let alone two years or ten years.

  Billie Holiday

  Song, Night, Years

  Lady Sings the Blues ch. 4 (1956).

  9 Copy quote

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