Billie Holiday Quotes

46 quotes in 615 categories

• You've got to have something to eat and a little love in your life before you can hold still for any damn body's sermon on…
• 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…
• 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…
• 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.
• If I don't have friends, then I ain't nothing.
• The difficult I'll do right now. The impossible will take a little while.
• 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…
• 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…
• Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what's more than enough.
• The whole basis of my singing is feeling. Unless I feel something, I can't sing.
• The only reason they're out there is to see me fall into the damn orchestra pit.
• In this country kings or dukes don't amount to nothing. The greatest man around then was Franklin D. Roosevelt, and he was the President; so…
• 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…
• I never sing a song the same way twice.
• When Lester plays, he almost seems to be singing; one can almost hear the words.
• There's no damn business like show business - you have to smile to keep from throwing up.
• 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…
• People don't understand the kind of fight it takes to record what you want to record the way you want to record it.
• I can't stand to sing the same song the same way two nights in succession, let alone two years or ten years.
• I try to improvise like Les Young, Louis Armstrong or someone else I admire. What comes out is what I feel.

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