"Strange Fruit" is a song written and composed by Abel Meeropol (under his pseudonym Lewis Allan) and recorded by Billie Holiday in 1939. It was written by a white, Jewish high school teacher from the Bronx and a member of the Communist Party. Abel Meeropol wrote it as a protest poem, exposing American racism, particularly the lynching of African Americans. These lynchings had occurred in the South but also in other regions of the United States. They transformed the poem into a song and performed it as a protest song in New York venues, including at Madison Square Garden. The lyrics were drawn from a poem by Meeropol, published in 1937.

Billie Holiday was an American jazz singer. Her distinctive tone and emotional delivery made songs feel extraordinarily personal. She was born as Eleanora Fagan in Philadelphia, but was raised primarily in Baltimore. She had a hard childhood, experiencing poverty and extreme hardship. As a young teenager, Holiday began singing in nightclubs in Harlem. She began performing as a teenager, and working with musicians in New York, she gained a lot of recognition. Billie Holiday was given the nickname “Lady Day” by Lester Young, whom she worked with. In 1939, she recorded “Strange Fruit”, one of her most famous songs. It was very politically significant, and was a shock to the pop music scene during that time as the lyrics contained direct confrontation to racism.

The music is so effective because the environment and atmosphere of the piano and trumpet, accompanied by Billie Holiday’s somber voice, really draws listeners in. Her vocals are filled with so much power and character, as if she’s telling you a story directly. In the 1930s, jazz was meant for dancing and entertainment, and it rarely addressed serious or political subject matter. So when listeners encountered “Strange Fruit”, it demanded attention. It made listeners really focus on the message of the song. For historical context, this song appeared during the same period that racial segregation was just part of American culture and society. Billie Holiday was a Black woman. She faced too much racism, one example being her father dying after being denied medical treatment. However, through all of this, she still performed this song with her power as a performer, knowing that this was incredibly risky. Columbia records did not even want to record this so she recorded it for Commodore Records instead.

Billie Holiday was hunted down, and the stress of her political persecution may have contributed to her early death. Harry J. Anslinger, an American politician, hated jazz. It was against everything he stood for. One night, in 1939, Billie Holiday stood on stage in New York City and sang a song that was unlike anything anyone had heard before. “Strange Fruit” was a song against lynching. It imagined black bodies hanging from trees as a dark fruit native to the South. Immediately after, Billie Holiday received her first threat from the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. Anslinger had heard she was using heroin, which was a reason he sent officials to follow her every move. She was caught many times, with a heroin addiction, but when she was in court, She told the judge she didn’t want any sympathy. She just wanted to be sent to a hospital so she could kick the drugs and get well. Instead, she was sentenced to a year in prison. She was stripped of her performer’s license on the grounds that listening to her might harm the morals of the public.

Many musical influences have shaped “Strange Fruit” and how Holiday performs it. Since the lyrics were originally a poem, there is direct influence from Abel Meeropol. In my global history class, we were looking at African music and how many of the songs were sung with minimal instrumentation, highlighting deep sadness and hardship that many singers were facing during a time of slavery. In “Strange Fruit”, it sounds like there is influence from a lot of these songs, sung like poems.

To Black listeners at the time, it was powerful in a way that the song acknowledged something people would never talk about in society. For white listeners, it was probably extremely unsettling and uncomfortable. The song allowed them to sit with the lyrics and sit with the injustice in American society. The song could’ve also meant that more artists could sing what they believed in, bringing in more courageous people to stand up for their beliefs.

“Strange Fruit” is deeply influential. It helped guide the idea that popular music wasn’t always happy all the time, but a form of political protest. The song brought a lot of attention to lynching. 

One song that I love is “Mississippi Goddam” by Nina Simone, and “Strange Fruit” inspired Nina Simone to write and perform “Mississippi Goddam”. Nina Simone later recorded and performed “Strange Fruit” six years after Billie Holiday passed away. Simone delivered a fierce and raw interpretation during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement. She adopted it as a central pillar of her activist repertoire to channel rage and demand racial justice. Many other notable artists have also covered the song, including Siouxsie and The Banshees (1987), Jeff Buckley (1995), Tori Amos (1994), and Naomi Westwater (2020). Each artist turned to the track as a definitive statement on moral conscience, grief, and protest against racial terror.

Billie Holiday died on July 17, 1959, at the age of 44 at Metropolitan Hospital in New York City. While admitted and dying in May and June 1959, she was placed under arrest by federal narcotics agents for alleged illegal possession of narcotics. She died of liver circosis and heart failure resulting from years of substance abuse and alcohol/drug addiction.

To this day, “Strange Fruit” is a historic part of America’s memory, and it will remain engrained in our culture forever.

Works Cited

Billie Holiday – Strange Fruit Lyrics | Genius Lyrics, genius.com/Billie-holiday-strange-fruit-lyrics. Accessed 19 Oct. 2026.

“Billie Holiday.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 7 Sept. 2026, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billie_Holiday.

“Billie Holiday’s ‘Strange Fruit’ (1939).” Smithsonian Music, music.si.edu/object-day/billie-holidays-strange-fruit-1939. Accessed 19 Oct. 2026.

Fields, Liz. “The Story behind Billie Holiday’s ‘Strange Fruit.’” PBS, Public Broadcasting Service, 27 Aug. 2025, www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/the-story-behind-billie-holidays-strange-fruit/17738/.

“Follow Nina.” The Official Home of Nina Simone The High Priestess of Soul, www.ninasimone.com/film/tribute-to-billie-holiday-film/. Accessed 19 Oct. 2026.

Hari, Johann. “The Hunting of Billie Holiday - Politico Magazine.” Politico Magazine, 17 Jan. 2015, www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01/drug-war-the-hunting-of-billie-holiday-114298/.

Hunter, Lauren. “How Billie Holiday Inspired Nina Simone before Hating Her.” Far Out Magazine, 25 May 2025, faroutmagazine.co.uk/billie-holiday-inspired-nina-simone-turned/.

Mason, Amelia. “Naomi Westwater’s Cover of ‘Strange Fruit’ Links George Floyd to Lynchings of the Past.” WBUR News, 6 Aug. 2020, www.wbur.org/news/2020/08/06/naomi-westwaters-cover-of-strange-fruit-links-george-floyd-to-lynchings-of-the-past.

Telesubjective. ..:: “..:: Audio-Music Dot Info ::..” [CD] Nina Simone: Sings Billie Holiday / Gospel According to Nina Simone, www.audio-music.info/htm/s/Simone_Nina_Sings_Billie_Holiday_and_Gospels.htm. Accessed 19 Oct. 2026.