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Strange Fruit Of Jazz

Billie Holiday had a turbulent childhood with all imaginable abysses. At the age of 12, she began working as a cleaning woman in a brothel and first came into contact with the music of Louis Armstrong. As a young teenager, she began singing in Harlem nightclubs and was discovered. The song Strange Fruit, based on the poem of the same name by the Jewish teacher Abel Meeropol (alias Lewis Allan), and hauntingly addressing the lynching of blacks, made Billie Holiday a star. She enjoyed sensational success with legendary concerts at Carnegie Hall and collaborated with all the jazz greats. Unfortunately, her life also included drug use, conflicts with the law, and even a lengthy stay in prison. Her early decline in health was preordained. Along with Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan, Holiday remains one of the most important jazz singers to this day and changed jazz forever. She won four Grammy Awards, all posthumously, for Best Historical Album. She was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame and the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Several films have been released about her life, most recently The United States vs. Billie Holiday (2021).