The story behind puzzle No. 51
Billie Holiday · Single · Okeh · 1941
Billie Holiday said the song came out of an argument with her mother about money. A line she said that day became the title.
Holiday recorded God Bless the Child for Okeh on May 9, 1941, with Eddie Heywood and his Orchestra, including Roy Eldridge on trumpet.
She wrote the song with Arthur Herzog Jr. It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1976.
In her autobiography, Holiday said her mother refused to help her with money. Holiday answered, God bless the child that's got his own.
The song turns that moment into a lesson about self-reliance, and about how people tend to help you only once you already have something.
Listen to how Holiday sings slightly behind the beat, taking her time with every line.
The band stays quiet and warm behind her, and Eldridge's trumpet adds a few lines of commentary without stealing the spotlight.
Who's on it
Keep listening
Revisit Strange Fruit (puzzle No. 25), recorded two years earlier, for Holiday at her most powerful.
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