HOLIDAY, PERFORMING AT THE
APOLLO THEATER IN 19371939
Billie Holiday
Singular voice
Billie Holiday knew the dangerous power of “Strange
Fruit” when she first sang it at a Manhattan club in 1939.
As written by the schoolteacher Abel Meeropol, with its
images of black bodies hanging like bruised fruit, the bal-
lad was already a vivid protest of lynching. But filtered
through Holiday’s smoky vocals, it took on an even greater
urgency. It was so incendiary that Columbia Records re-
fused to let her record it, some radio stations banned it,
and federal agents tried to stop her from singing it.
And the song, released on an alternative label, did strike
a nerve— starting a conversation about racially motivated
hate crimes and giving Holiday a national audience. Her
rise was surprising in a musical era dominated by belters:
Holiday, by contrast, had a small range and a conversational
singing style that often dragged behind the beat. But it was
this approach that unlocked a personal subtext in songs,
whether it be deep pathos or low- burning sultriness.
While Holiday earned her way into venues like Carnegie
Hall, she was plagued by one challenge after the next: drug
addictions, domestic abuse, racist audiences. Thanks in
part to her outspokenness about inequality and racism,
federal agents hunted her for her entire life. They jailed her
in 1947 and revoked her cabaret card on the grounds that
her songs might harm the “morals” of the public.
In 1956, Holiday published her autobiography, Lady
Sings the Blues, which biographer John Szwed tells TIME
is “probably the most damning document of America
ever produced.” Three years later, she died, bitter and
broke. But her legacy would only grow. Twenty-six years
after Holiday’s rendition, at the height of the civil rights
movement, Nina Simone would record a cover of “Strange
Fruit” that Kanye West would sample 48 years after that.
Through it all, Holiday’s version retains its ummatched
potency. —A.R.C.1938SELF-PORTRAIT WITH MONKEY, 1938FULANG-CHANG AND I, 1937. © ARS, NY; SELF-PORTRAIT WITH MONKEY, 1938: ALBRIGHT-KNOX ART GALLERY /ART RESOURCE, NY. © ARS, NY; ITZCUINTLI DOG WITH ME, C. 1938: PRIVATE COLLECTION, USA. PHOTO: ERICH LESSING/ART RESOURCE, NY. © ARS, NY; FULANG-CHANG AND I,
S SOCIETY (ARS), NEW YORK; HOLIDAY: MPTVIMAGES