Top 33 Billie Holiday Quotes on Success (JAZZ)

Top 10 Most Famous Billie Holiday Quotes (BEST)

“You can’t copy anybody and end with anything. If you copy, it means you’re working without any real feeling. No two people on earth are alike, and it’s got to be that way in music or it isn’t music.”
Billie Holiday

The difficult I'll do right now. The impossible will take a little while. — The difficult I’ll do right now. The impossible will take a little while.

Don't threaten me with love, baby. Let's just go walking in the rain. — Don’t threaten me with love, baby. Let’s just go walking in the rain.

Sometimes it's worse to win a fight than to lose. — Sometimes it’s worse to win a fight than to lose.

Somebody once said we never know what is enough until we know what’s more than enough.

“I can’t stand to sing the same song the same way two nights in succession, let alone two years or ten years. If you can, then it ain’t music, it’s close-order drill or exercise or yodeling or something, not music.”
Billie Holiday

A kiss that is never tasted, is forever and ever wasted. — A **kiss** that is never tasted, is forever and ever wasted.

I never hurt nobody but myself and that's nobody's business but my own. — I never hurt nobody but myself and that’s nobody’s **business** but my own.

If I'm going to sing like someone else, then I don't need to sing at all. — If I’m going to sing like someone else, then I don’t need to sing at all.

You can be up to your boobies in white satin, with gardenias in your hair and no sugar cane for miles, but you can still be working on a plantation.

11 Billie Holiday Quotes on Music and Singing

“Dope never helped anybody sing better or play music better or do anything better. All dope can do for you is kill you – and kill you the long, slow, hard way. And it can kill the people you love right along with you.”
Billie Holiday

The whole basis of my singing is feeling. Unless I feel something, I can't sing. — The whole basis of my singing is feeling. Unless I feel something, I can’t sing.

When you sing, always tell the truth. — When you sing, always tell the **truth**.

I don't think I ever sing the same way twice. The blues is sort of a mixed-up thing. You just have to feel it. Anything I do sing is part of my life. — I don’t think I ever sing the same way twice. The blues is sort of a mixed-up thing. You just have to feel it. Anything I do sing is part of my life.

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

“If you find a tune and it’s got something to do with you, you don’t have to evolve anything. You just feel it, and when you sing it other people can feel something too.”
Billie Holiday

People don't understand the kind of fight it takes to record what you want to record the way you want to record it. — People don’t understand the kind of fight it takes to record what you want to record the way you want to record it.

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

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. — 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.

I don't think I'm singing. I feel like I'm playing a horn… What comes out is what I feel. — I don’t think I’m singing. I feel like I’m playing a horn… What comes out is what I feel.

“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

3 Billie Holiday Quotes on Love

“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

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

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 how to behave. — 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 how to behave.

6 Wise Billie Holiday Quotes that will Make You Think (WISDOM)

“They forget what it was like in those days. A whorehouse was about the only place where black and white folks could meet in any natural way. They damn well couldn’t rub elbows in the churches.”
Billie Holiday

God has blessed you when he lets you believe in somebody. — God has blessed you when he lets you **believe** in somebody.

It takes a bad woman to be a good godmother.

I'm always making a comeback but nobody ever tells me where I've been. — I’m always making a comeback but nobody ever tells me where I’ve been.

You can get in just as much trouble by being dumb and innocent as you can by breaking the law.

There's no damn business like show business - you have to smile to keep from throwing up. — There’s no damn **business** like show business – you have to smile to keep from throwing up.

3 Billie Holiday Quotes on her Mom and Dad

“Mom just loved people. Part of this might have come from never wanting to be alone, where she could only brood over Pop. Part of it must have come from her fears for me. She knew she wouldn’t be around for very long to take care of me. There was damn little she could do to protect me after she was gone. All she had was me. All I had was her.”
Billie Holiday

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

“Them that’s got shall get, Them that’s not shall lose. So the Bible says, And it still is news. Mama may have, Papa may have, But God bless the child that’s got his own.”
Billie Holiday