Track Listing

1. I'm a Fool to Want You [Edited Master]
2. For Heaven's Sake
3. You Don't Know What Love Is
4. I Get Along Without You Very Well
5. For All We Know
6. Violets for Your Furs
7. You've Changed
8. It's Easy to Remember
9. But Beautiful
10. Glad to Be Unhappy
11. I'll Be Around
12. End of a Love Affair [Mono Version]
13. I'm a Fool to Want You [Take 3][#][*]
14. I'm a Fool to Want You [Take 2 - Alternate Take][#][*]
15. End of a Love Affair: The Audio Story [#][*]
16. End of a Love Affair [Stereo][#][*]
17. [Pause Track]

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #9211 in Music
• Released on: 1997-09-23
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Enhanced, Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered

Album Description
Limited 'Millennium Edition' reissue of classic 1958 album in a deluxe heavyweight miniaturized LP sleeve complete with inner sleeve and a Japanese-style obi strip on the spine. 12 tracks. Individually numbered. 1999 release.

Amazon.com essential recording
A harrowing classic, Billie Holiday's personal favorite among her '50s albums captures the singer 17 months before her death, her once honeyed voice, scarred and weakened from punishing life, its ravages highlighted by the 1958 session's crisp sonics and the contrasting "satin" of Ray Ellis' sleek string arrangements. Yet it is that very contrast that explains the power of these performances: In revisiting its torchy standards, Holiday reduces them to their core of pain and longing, transforming "I'm a Fool to Want You," "You Don't Know What Love Is," and "You've Changed" into naked declarations as mesmerizing and unsettling as a horrific accident. Any postrocker that presumes pop standards and string sections automatically translate to "easy listening" hasn't listened to this. This 1997 version adds unreleased takes and a beautiful 20-bit digital transfer to extract every shivering pang of Holiday's music. --Sam Sutherland

Customer Reviews

Far from easy listening, but unforgettable & near saddening
When I buy a CD, most often it's on impulse, just eager to hear what it's like. A very select few are ones I buy because of the acclaim I've heard about them. With LADY IN SATIN, it was the mixed reviews that got my interest peaked. Good, bad, in the middle, I don't care. I had to hear for myself. Needless to say, I'm glad I went with my gut, for I've heard truly one of the most authentically heartbreaking pieces of music ever in my life.

When LADY IN SATIN was recorded, Billie Holiday was definitely at the end of her life. Years of rough living & heroin addiction had all but put her formerly-honey sweet voice to shame. She was still a trooper though, for even as she was approaching yet another trial for drug possession, Billie approached this recording with the best of professionalism & even with her by-now-fading voice, she succeeded triumphantly.

It's safe to say you shouldn't approach this album without a box of tissues close by, for the performances on LADY IN SATIN are so true to life & heartbreaking, you're sure to be moved by hearing a once-great artist sounding like she's clinging to that last shred of life. The titles of songs like "Glad To Be Unhappy", "I Get Along Without You Very Well", "You Don't Know What Love Is" & most notably, "You've Changed" speak volumes. To say this album might be her the story of her life would only be stating the obvious.

But the song that really says the most about this whole album is "The End Of A Love Affair". The version that made it onto LADY IN SATIN is a wonder enough, but the bonus track that has Billie singing a cappella & later saying she doesn't even know how the song goes is the tell-tale sign that as good as this whole album did turn out, it wasn't exactly a labor of love. In fact, in only 17 more months, she'd be dead.

Some say that Ray Ellis's string arrangements are a hinderance to the album more than a help, but they provide the best back-up for Billie's war-weary-yet-still-resonant voice. Both are very beautiful in their own ways, whether they're light or dark. The result is not all that different from Frank Sinatra's influential albums that he was recording at around the same time.

When LADY IN SATIN was released, controversy abounded from many corners. Some said that the album should not have even been released & was an insult to Billie Holiday's once-marvelous talent. But the more open-minded hailed it as a masterpiece, albeit a dark one. Even Billie herself claimed it as her favorite. The fact that she managed to hang on while she recorded this album is truly a work of nature when you consider her state of mind & life at the time. She would record one more album before her death at the age of 44.

However, it's rare that an artist can end their career having known they've recorded their masterwork. But with LADY IN SATIN, maybe Billie was right in singing its praises. Sure, she may not have been in the best of shape & her better days were behind her. Yet some of the best music comes from a lifetime's worth of experience & actually living the life of the music. With LADY IN SATIN, Billie Holiday did that & then some. Of course, listening to an artist at the end of her tether will not be an easy feat. Once you take the plunge, though, you'll feel greatly rewared that you did.

Lady In The Rear View Mirror...
This is not an easy record to warm up to. Have patience...once you've reconciled the tone and manner of Lady Day's fragile, fading, sorrowfull voice with the sweeping elegance of Ray Ellis' orchestrations, you might find yourself in love with this CD...Billie's voice is at once brilliant and shattered, like a broken mirror, especially in the studio cuts added as narrative to the original set. My favorite song, "The End of A Love Affair", is a haunting testimonial to romance gone bad; the music and the lyrics are unforgettable. Lady In Satin is not for the squirmish; not even, perhaps, for alot of Holiday fans. But if you don't mind a front row seat to the closing act of the tragic opera that was Holiday's life; if you can find beauty in sorrow and hope in pain, this CD will unveil a new meaning for the term "soul music"...

Handle with care.
This is an unavoidable album, though admittedly not one I'm fond of playing. The line between "art" and "life" has never been so blurred--in fact, the entire album, by combining these classic songs and lush orchestrations with Holiday's frail, fading voice, raises the question about the relationship between art and life, the beautiful and the tragic. Perhaps the most haunting and heartbreaking moment in the history of recorded music occurs when Billie comes in for the second chorus of "But Beautiful." Listen to her voice crack when she gets to the word "heartache," the emotional climax of a song about the paradoxes of life and love. I don't play the record much because I don't need to--Billie inscribes these songs deep in your heart forever, but it requires a painful surgical incision. I'm glad I had it done, but for me it's now simply enough to know the album is in my collection.