Kelly Clarkson's Sultry Billie Holiday Cover Features a Truly Next-Level High Note
Clarkson's voice shines on this classic song.
Kelly Clarkson performing a Billie Holiday classic? Yes, please.
During the November 4 episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show, Clarkson offered up a Kellyoke performance of Holiday's "All of Me" that will blow your mind.
While most Kellyoke performances see Clarkson's powerhouse pipes take center stage, "All of Me" was slightly different. Clarkson and My Band Y'all bounced along in rhythm to the song's jazzy beat in such a fun way that the music and vocals seemed to blend effortlessly. (Of course, Clarkson's understated performance still featured a high-octane belting moment at the end that is pretty jaw-dropping.) Watch above!
The longtime music director for The Kelly Clarkson Show, Jason Halbert, revealed in a September interview with TV Insider that Clarkson strives to put her own spin on the songs she chooses for Kellyokes.
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"I don't think we were focused on ever bettering the original, because even Kelly would say, it's not an either-or. It's a different interpretation of it," he explained. "But we get super excited and we send texts to each other. Kelly's gotten excited when an artist reposts it and says they love it. It's nice getting the stamp of approval from somebody that you really admire and look up to."
What to know about "All of Me" by Billie Holiday
Originally written in 1931 by Gerald Marks and Seymour Simons, "All of Me" is considered a jazz standard — in other words, a composition widely known and performed among jazz musicians.
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Although many artists have had their own versions of "All of Me" over the years (including Louis Armstrong, Frank Sinatra, and Willie Nelson), Holiday's version stands out for many fans.
In the book The Jazz Standards: A Guide to the Repertoire, author Ted Gioia raved about Holiday's "All of Me," saying the singer "staked a claim of ownership that no one has managed to dislodge in subsequent years." However, the track failed to attain any success on the Billboard charts since its release in 1941.
