A Quote by Ruth Brown

I was trying to do Billie Holiday, because she was the voice to be heard at that time.

Ruth Brown

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Because Heard Holiday She Time Trying Voice

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Ruth Brown
American - Musician
January 12, 1928 - November 17, 2006

The first time I heard a Billie Holiday record, I thought, 'What's so great about Billie Holiday?'

Diana Ross

I had no desire to become a singer until I heard Billie Holiday. The first time I heard her on a record, it was a revelation. She sounded like a woman singing about herself.

Susannah McCorkle

If you look at the other singers of Billie Holiday's time, they were really trying to entertain. They were trying to make people feel good. They were singing fast - and she was singing the blues.

Jose James

When I heard Billie Holiday's voice, Nina Simone's and Ella Fitzgerald's - there was something about their voices to me that was such a different texture than what I was used to listening to at the time. Hearing those jazz voices were so different, and I think I just gravitated toward it.

Andra Day

Billie Holiday's voice was the voice of living intensity of soul in the true sense of that greatly abused word.

Leonard Feather

I have the ability to sing with emotion and feeling, but if you say I sound like Billie Holiday, that's cool. Let's look at who Billie was: she was this person, this singer, this beautiful diva who could move the audience with the slightest gesture of her hand.

Erykah Badu

I listened to Billie Holiday a lot in order to learn to sing. She remains one of the extraordinary jazz singers. But my intent is to become my own voice, to be able to interpret these songs in my own way.

Madeleine Peyroux

There is no singer I can think of who can touch Ella Fitzgerald. And when Billie Holiday sings, she's merciless about it. Her voice has just this immaculate sadness - even in happy songs, there was something that was so broken about it.

Hozier

I really pulled from that repertoire that Billie Holiday was singing, and the way she sang it. It's sort of this beautiful, not really midpoint, but a period of her career where she really still had her voice. She had that deep wisdom that we've come to associate her with. To me, that's her at the height of her powers.

Jose James

My vocal influences are a lot of jazz singers: Billie Holiday, Julie London, they had this tenderness to their voice.

Borns

The best vocalists I can think of are female. There is no singer I can think of who can touch Ella Fitzgerald. And when Billie Holiday sings, she's merciless about it. Her voice has just this immaculate sadness - even in happy songs, there was something that was so broken about it.

Hozier

Probably to me the greatest singer, female voice, is Billie Holiday. And one of the most moving for me, I don't know why - maybe it's nostalgia, maybe because my life is one of constant partying, whatever.

Wole Soyinka

[Billie Holiday] was keeping it super real, and you can feel that to this day. Everything that she sang, she believed in. So I had to pick songs that I felt the same about.

Jose James

I remember, one time, my dad took me and Billie to a fair. I was probably 7 years old, Billie must have been 3, and she put footie pyjamas on and then put a second pair of underwear on over the pyjamas. I remember being like, 'What is Billie wearing?!' and my dad was like, 'She's happy with it. Let's go!'

Finneas

I think I copied my style from Louis Armstrong. Because I used to like the big volume and the big sound that Bessie Smith got when she sang ... So I liked the feeling that Louis got and I wanted the big volume that Bessie Smith got. But I found that it didn't work with me, because I didn't have a big voice. So anyway between the two of them I sorta got Billie Holiday.

Billie Holiday

I really like Billie Holiday's husky voice, and I'd definitely like to find out more about her.

Michelle Ryan

A Quote by Ruth Brown

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