VOA慢速英语2011--Billie Holiday, 1915-1959: The Lady Sang

PEOPLE IN AMERICA - Billie Holiday, 1915-1959: The Lady Sang the Blues¹

SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: I'm Shirley Griffith.
STEVE EMBER: And I'm Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program, PEOPLE IN AMERICA. Every week we tell about a person important in the history of the United States. This week, we tell about Billie Holiday. She was one of the greatest jazz singers in America.
(MUSIC:"God Bless the Child")
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: That was Billie Holiday singing one of her famous songs. She and Arthur Herzog wrote it. Billie Holiday's life was a mixture of success and tragedy. Her singing expressed her experiences and her feelings.
STEVE EMBER: Billie Holiday was born Eleanora Fagan in nineteen fifteen in Baltimore, Maryland. Her parents were Sadie Fagan and Clarence Holiday. They were young when their daughter was born. Their marriage failed because Clarence Holiday was not at home much. He traveled as a musician with some of the earliest jazz bands.
Sadie Fagan cleaned people's houses. But she could not support her family on the money she earned. So she moved to New York City where the pay was higher. She left her daughter in Baltimore with members of her family.
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: The young girl Eleanora Fagan changed her name to Billie, because she liked a movie star, Billie Dove². Billie Holiday loved to sing. She sang and listened to music whenever she could. One place near her home had a machine that played records. The building was a brothel where women who were prostitutes had sex with men for money. 
Billie cleaned floors and did other jobs for the prostitutes so she could listen to the records. It was there that young Billie first heard the records of famous black American blues artists of the nineteen twenties. She heard Bessie Smith sing the blues. And she heard Louis Armstrong play the horn. Both musicians had a great influence on her.
STEVE EMBER: Billie Holiday once said: "I do not think I'm singing. I feel like I am playing a horn. What comes out is what I feel. I hate straight singing. I have to change a tune³ to my own way of doing it. That is all I know."
Here is Billie Holiday singing a popular song of the nineteen thirties, "More Than You Know."
(MUSIC)
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Billie Holiday had a tragic⁴ childhood. When she was ten, a man sexually⁶ attacked her. She was accused of causing the man to attack her and sent to a prison for children.
In nineteen twenty-seven, Billie joined her mother in Harlem, the area of New York City where African-Americans lived. Billie's mother mistakenly sent her to live in a brothel. Billie became a prostitute at the age of thirteen. One day, she refused the sexual⁵ demands of a man. She was arrested and spent four months in prison.
STEVE EMBER: Two years later, Billie's mother became sick and could not work. Fifteen-year-old Billie tried to find a job. Finally, she was given a job singing at a place in Harlem where people went at night to drink alcohol and listen to music.
For the next seventeen years, Holiday was one of the most popular nightclub singers in New York. She always wore a long white evening dress. And she wore large white flowers in her black hair. She called herself "Lady Day."
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In the early nineteen thirties, a music producer, John Hammond, heard Billie Holiday sing in a nightclub. He called her the best jazz singer he had ever heard. He brought famous people to hear her sing.
Hammond produced Holiday's first records. He got the best jazz musicians to play. They included Benny Goodman on clarinet, Teddy Wilson on piano, Roy Eldridge on trumpet⁷ and Ben Webster on saxophone. They recorded many famous songs with Billie Holiday.
"I Wished on the Moon" is one of them.
(MUSIC)
STEVE EMBER: In the late nineteen thirties, Billie Holiday sang with Artie Shaw's band as it traveled around the United States. She was one of the first black singers to perform with a white band. But racial separation laws in America made travel difficult for her.
During this time, a new nightclub opened in the area of New York called Greenwich Village. It was the first club that had both black and white performers. And it welcomed both black and white people to hear the performers. The nightclub was called Cafe Society.
It was here that Billie Holiday first sang a song called "Strange Fruit." A school teacher named Lewis Allan had written it for her. The song was about injustice⁸ and oppression of black people in the southern part of the United States. It told about how mobs⁹ of white men had killed black men by hanging them from trees.
Many people objected to the song. It was unlike any other popular song. But it was a huge hit. Here is Billie Holiday singing "Strange Fruit."
(MUSIC)
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: In the nineteen forties, Holiday started using the illegal drug heroin¹⁰. Soon her body needed more and more of the drug. It began to affect her health.
In nineteen forty-seven, Billie Holiday was arrested for possessing illegal drugs. She was found guilty and sentenced to nine months in prison. When she was released, New York City officials refused to give her a document that permitted her to work in any place that served alcoholic¹¹ drinks. This meant Holiday no longer could sing in nightclubs and jazz clubs. She could sing only in theaters and concert halls.
Ten days after her release from jail, she performed at New York's famous Carnegie Hall. People filled the place to hear her sing. This is one of the songs she sang at that concert. It is called "I Cover the Waterfront."
(MUSIC)
STEVE EMBER: In nineteen fifty-six, Billie Holiday wrote a book about her life. The book was called “Lady Sings the Blues.” A friend at the New York Post newspaper, William Dufty, helped her write the book. A few months later, she was arrested again for possessing illegal drugs. But instead of going to prison, she was permitted to seek treatment to end her dependence¹² on drugs. The treatment was successful.
That same year, she performed her second concert at Carnegie Hall. Here is one of the songs Holiday sang that night. It is called "Lady Sings the Blues." She and Herbie Nichols wrote it.
(MUSIC)
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: Billie Holiday's health was ruined by using illegal drugs and by drinking too much alcohol. Her last performance was in nineteen fifty-nine. She had to be led off the stage after singing two songs. She died that year. She was only forty-four. But Lady Day lives on through her recordings¹³ that continue to influence the best jazz singers.
(MUSIC: “You Go to My Head”)
STEVE EMBER: This Special English program was written by Shelley Gollust. It was produced by Lawan Davis. I'm Steve Ember.
SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: And I'm Shirley Griffith. Our programs are online with transcripts¹⁴ and MP3 files at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can find us on Facebook and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

1 blues   

n.抑郁，沮丧；布鲁斯音乐

参考例句：

• She was in the back of a smoky bar singing the blues.她在烟雾弥漫的酒吧深处唱着布鲁斯歌曲。
• He was in the blues on account of his failure in business.他因事业失败而意志消沉。

2 dove   

n.鸽，温和派人物，“鸽派”人物

参考例句：

• A dove is often used as a symbol of peace.鸽常作为和平的象征。
• Paul seemed more impressed by the dove.保尔似乎对鸽子更感兴趣。

3 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

4 tragic   

adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的

参考例句：

• The effect of the pollution on the beaches is absolutely tragic.污染海滩后果可悲。
• Charles was a man doomed to tragic issues.查理是个注定不得善终的人。

5 sexual   

adj.性的，两性的，性别的

参考例句：

• He was a person of gross sexual appetites.他是个性欲旺盛的人。
• It is socially irresponsible to refuse young people advice on sexual matters.拒绝向年轻人提供性方面的建议是对社会不负责任。

6 sexually   

adv.性别上地；按性别地；性欲地；两性之间地

参考例句：

• to be sexually promiscuous 性生活淫乱
• I was depressed,withdrawn and sexually frigid. 我郁郁寡欢，离群索居，没有什么性要求。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 trumpet   

n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘

参考例句：

• He plays the violin, but I play the trumpet.他拉提琴，我吹喇叭。
• The trumpet sounded for battle.战斗的号角吹响了。

8 injustice   

n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利

参考例句：

• They complained of injustice in the way they had been treated.他们抱怨受到不公平的对待。
• All his life he has been struggling against injustice.他一生都在与不公正现象作斗争。

9 mobs   

v.聚众包围( mob的第三人称单数 )；聚众闹事

参考例句：

• There was a raid on a bank by armed mobs yesterday. 昨天发生了一起武装暴徒抢劫银行的事件。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The following day mobs seized the Parliament building. 第二天暴徒占领了议会大厦。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 heroin   

n.海洛因

参考例句：

• Customs have made their biggest ever seizure of heroin.海关查获了有史以来最大的一批海洛因。
• Heroin has been smuggled out by sea.海洛因已从海上偷运出境。

11 alcoholic   

adj.（含）酒精的，由酒精引起的；n.酗酒者

参考例句：

• The alcoholic strength of brandy far exceeds that of wine.白兰地的酒精浓度远远超过葡萄酒。
• Alcoholic drinks act as a poison to a child.酒精饮料对小孩犹如毒药。

12 dependence   

n.依靠，依赖；信任，信赖；隶属

参考例句：

• Doctors keep trying to break her dependence of the drug.医生们尽力使她戒除毒瘾。
• He was freed from financial dependence on his parents.他在经济上摆脱了对父母的依赖。

13 recordings   

n.记录( recording的名词复数 )；录音；录像；唱片

参考例句：

• a boxed set of original recordings 一套盒装原声录音带
• old jazz recordings reissued on CD 以激光唱片重新发行的老爵士乐

14 transcripts   

n.抄本（ transcript的名词复数 ）；转写本；文字本；副本

参考例句：

• Like mRNA, both tRNA and rRNA are transcripts of chromosomal DNA. tRNA及rRNA同mRNA一样，都是染色体DNA的转录产物。 来自辞典例句
• You can't take the transfer students'exam without your transcripts. 没有成绩证明书，你就不能参加转学考试。 来自辞典例句