Linda Lipnack Kuehl

Linda Lipnack Kuehl (January 24, 1940 – February 6, 1978)[1] was an American arts journalist, based in New York City. Intending to write a biography of Billie Holiday, she interviewed friends, fellow performers, and key figures in Holiday's life, but died before its completion.[2] Various other writers' biographies on Holiday have drawn upon Kuehl's material, as did the film Billie (2019), which is narrated by Kuehl's recorded interviews.[3] She worked as a high school teacher and free lance writer.[3]

Arts journalism career

Interviews that Kuehl conducted with writers were published in The Paris Review in 1972 and 1978.[4]

She was a Jewish feminist[5] and a fan of Billie Holiday.[6] In 1971, she began plans for a biography of Holiday, who had died aged 44 in 1959.[3] She interviewed almost 200 people—friends, family members, band members, peers from 1930s Harlem, piano players, psychiatrists and a pimp—and was still finding people in 1978.[7][3][8] Her archive on Holiday included these interviews on 125 audio tapes[8] as well as "a long paper trail, including police files, transcripts of court cases, royalty statements, shopping lists, hospital records, private letters, muddled transcripts and fragments of unfinished chapters."[9] However, Kuehl did not complete the book.[3] In 1978 she was found dead on a Washington, D.C. sidewalk,[3][8][10] after attending a Count Basie concert.[11] "Police deemed it suicide, Kuehl having supposedly jumped from her hotel room, although there was no proof of this",[3] and her family believe she may have been murdered.[8]

Kuehl's research revealed that Holiday's addictions were "becoming a crutch for a life beset with violence, misogyny and racism."[2]

Legacy

Her archive passed to a private collector and was later used in other writers' biographies of Holiday.[3] The interviews were a major source for the text in Robert O'Meally's book of photographs Lady Day: The Many Faces of Billie Holiday (1991)[12] and around the same were used for the script for a Masters of American Music series documentary of the same name.[13] Some of Kuehl's material was used in Donald Clarke's 1994 biography, Wishing on the Moon[14] and her interviews were used in Julia Blackburn's 2005 biography With Billie: a New Look at the Unforgettable Lady Day.[11][14][15] Documentary director James Erskine bought the rights to Kuehl's tapes[3] and his subsequent film, Billie (2019), is "a journey through Holiday's life, narrated by the voices on those tapes",[3][14][16][17] including Kuehl's.

Personal life

Kuehl's parents were Sol and Ida Lipnack and she had a sister, Myra Luftman.[1]

References
  1. "Deaths (Published 1978)". The New York Times. 9 February 1978. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-11-25.
  2. "Billie documentary review – an oral history of Billie Holiday". City A.M. 12 November 2020. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
  3. "Singer, activist, sex machine, addict: the troubled brilliance of Billie Holiday". The Guardian. 6 November 2020. Retrieved 2020-11-22.
  4. "Linda Kuehl". The Paris Review. Retrieved 2020-11-25.
  5. O'Sullivan, Charlotte (13 November 2020). "Billie is a fanatical yet fascinating portrait of an immortal talent". www.standard.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-24.
  6. "A gripping portrait: Billie reviewed". www.spectator.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-24.
  7. "Billie — a powerful documentary about the life of the singer". www.ft.com. 18 November 2020. Retrieved 2020-11-22.
  8. "Documentary Billie squanders its incendiary premise – review". The Independent. 13 November 2020. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
  9. Zwerin, Mike (15 June 2005). "Biography covers range of a vocalist (Published 2005)". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-11-25.
  10. Maher, Kevin. "Billie review — a double tragedy of destruction and obsession". The Times. ISSN 0140-0460. Retrieved 2020-11-24.
  11. "Song, sex and stimulants". The Telegraph. Retrieved 2020-11-24.
  12. Davis, Francis (25 September 1994). "One Scats, the Other Doesn't (Published 1994)". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
  13. "Billie Holiday". American Heritage (magazine). Retrieved 2020-11-24.
  14. "Observer review: With Billie by Julia Blackburn". The Observer. 17 April 2005. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
  15. "Billie review – a truer, historical spin on the great Billie Holiday". The Guardian. 12 November 2020. Retrieved 2020-11-22.
  16. Leland, John (24 April 2005). "'With Billie': The Lady Sang Jazz Ballads (Published 2005)". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
  17. "Fine and mellow". www.spectator.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-23.
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