Born Irene Armstrong, Kitchings was known by several names during her lifetime. For a time she led an all-female jazz trio under the name Irene Armstrong Eadie; she was Irene Wilson during her brief and ill-fated marriage to pianist Teddy Wilson; on a second marriage she took the name Irene Kitchings. She has also been confused with another Billie Holiday collaborator, Irene Higginbotham.
Kitchings learned piano from her mother and was already playing gigs in Detroit by age thirteen. She was soon leading (mostly male) bands at various Detroit clubs, which at the time were heavily influenced by Al Capone's gang.
In 1931 she met Teddy Wilson, and they were soon married. By 1933 she had largely given up her career, in part due to appease her mother-in-law and in part because she was more concerned with Wilson's career than her own. She also began to experience eye problems due to Eales disease.
Shortly afterward she was persuaded to make several recordings with Billie Holiday, with whom she quickly became close. Although she eventually gave up performing entirely, it was around this time she began to compose. Holiday introduced her to the lyricist Arthur Herzog, with whom she collaborated many times. Her first number, "Some Other Spring," remains her most popular.
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