Billie Holiday | Complete Commodore Masters | Vinyl

This collection compiles the sixteen sides Billie Holiday recorded for Milt Gabler’s independent Commodore label across sessions in 1939 and 1944, including her first-ever studio recording of “Strange Fruit,” the anti-lynching protest song her main label had refused to release. The Commodore sessions also produced “Fine and Mellow” and “I Cover the Waterfront,” recordings now considered among the most important of her early career. Made independently outside her main label contract, these sides capture Holiday at her most direct, backed by small combos rather than the larger orchestras she would later record with. This Wax Time vinyl reissue collects the complete Commodore output onto a single LP.

Track List

Side A

1. Strange Fruit
2. Yesterdays
3. Fine and Mellow
4. I Gotta Right to Sing the Blues
5. How Am I to Know
6. My Old Flame
7. I’ll Get By
8. I Cover the Waterfront

Side B

1. I’ll Be Seeing You
2. I’m Yours
3. Embraceable You
4. As Time Goes By
5. He’s Funny That Way
6. Lover Come Back to Me
7. I Love My Man (Billie’s Blues)
8. On the Sunny Side of the Street

Release Details

• UPC: 8436542019927
• Label: Wax Time
• Format: LP Vinyl — Standard
• Genre: Jazz
• Release Date: 11/20/2015