Dead at forty-four, killed by a lifetime of fast living with hard men and hard drugs: Billie Holiday. As a figure of trouble, Lady Day has secured a place in the pantheon of American icons. Pop history, fed by her own autobiography, has canonized her in print and film as the image of the star-as-victim, the heroin addict and dupe of a succession of husband-pimp-managers who kept her singing to support themselves.

But in this absorbing and authoritative account of her life and art, Robert O'Meally brings Holiday's musical genius into sharp focus, offering new information about her early musical growth and how she made herself the greatest jazz singer in history. Emphasizing Holiday's artistry and training rather than the more frequently highlighted miseries of her personal life, he uses voluminous archival material, much of it never seen before, to correct common myths about her, including those she herself was responsible for. Chronicling Holiday's rigorous musical apprenticeship in Baltimore, her reception in New York by Benny Goodman and Duke Ellington, and her work with various musicians, particularly Lester Young, Lady Day brings Billie Holiday to life and confirms her place in the annals of American jazz.

ROBERT O'MEALLY, Zora Neale Hurston Professor of English and Director of the Center for Jazz Studies at Columbia University, is the author of The Craft of Ralph Ellison and the editor of The Jazz Cadence of American Culture. He is co-producer of the 5-CD Smithsonian set The Jazz Singers, nominated for a Grammy award. His articles on American music and literature appear in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Atlantic Monthly.

"Billie Holiday deserves a biography in which her musicianship isn't overshadowed by the tragic events of her life. O'Meally has written that book." - ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY

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