Celebrating Black History Month: “Strange Fruit”

Chocky

Gilles Petard Collection * with permission

Billie Holiday, 1939

Made famous by Billie Holiday in 1939, “Strange Fruit”  proved to be the beginning of protest through song at a time when it was most needed. Ironically the song was written by a white man. It originated as a poem by Abel Meeropool, he called out the crimes against humanity being done to black people. During times of segregation and Jim Crow laws, lynching had become a horrifyingly common crime committed against African Americans beginning during the reconstruction era. The lyrics allude to the strange fruit being that of African American people hanging from trees in the south. Some would consider the meaning graphic, but this image is needed to create an impact in the audiences mind and question their morals.

Each performance of the song to a white audience was a risk, however Holiday powered on, fighting for what she believed in. This became Billie Holiday’s most sold song. As expected, it wasn’t well relieved by many white people at the time. The lyrics below express the inhumanity of the time period below, and bravery shown by Meeropole and Holiday.

Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh,
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh.

Here is fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for the trees to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.

The haunting lyrics paired with true pain felt in Billie’s raspy voice create the eerie feeling of pure grief.