Body and Soul LP

Norman Granz put a small, sharp band behind Billie Holiday for this 1957 Verve session: Ben Webster on tenor, Harry Sweets Edison on trumpet, Barney Kessel on guitar, Jimmy Rowles at the piano. Her voice had roughened by then, sitting between Lady Sings the Blues and Songs for Distingue Lovers in her catalog, but it lost none of its pull. Critics at the time marked her as one of jazz's most distinctive vocal stylists even this late in the run. The band plays close and lets her carry the weight.