International Sad Hits

“I’ve Got My Love to Keep Me Warm” (Irving Berlin), Billie Holiday and her Orchestra, 1937.

Among the miracles of 20th-century jazz was its ability to pluck a run-of-the-mill tune off the hit parade and turn it into high art. Billie Holiday, Teddy Wilson (piano), Ben Webster (tenor sax), Jonah Jones (trumpet), Edgar Samson (clarinet), Allan Reuss (guitar), John Kirby (bass), and Cozy Cole (drums) made this landmark record the same year Irving Berlin’s song debuted in the film On the Avenue, where it’s a forced comedic number for Dick Powell and Alice Faye:

https://youtu.be/LRmGYCwsPpM

The film version is all clichés. Billie Holiday uses the same words - but you feel the cold, and the heat.