Personnel includes: Billie Holiday (vocals).
This compilation gathers some of Lady Day's best known recordings on a single disc. As evidenced by the full choir that lends theatrical accompaniment on the opening "God Bless The Child," the selections borrow heavily from Holiday's more commercial period. But it is difficult to dim the light of this greatest of jazz singers.
Holiday displays all of her characteristically superb vocal techniques here-her laid-back, instrument-like phrasing, her sensitive inflection, and her bittersweet tone and timbre. The track list is also outstanding. "Lover Come Back," "Miss Brown To You," "Tain't Nobody's Business If I Do," and her chilling signature song, "Strange Fruit," are all included-many as rare, live performance tracks. GOLDEN HITS is a fine sampler of work from this incomparable jazz legend.