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Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday and the Biography of a Song
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About Strange Fruit: Billie Holiday And The Biography Of
Product Description Learn the story behind the song performed by Andra Day in "United States vs. Billie Holiday" now on HuluRecorded by jazz legend Billie Holiday in 1939, “Strange Fruit” is considered the first significant song of the Civil Rights movement and the first direct assault against racial lynchings in the South. First sung in New York’s Café Society, these revolutionary lyrics have taken up a life of their own, as David Margolick discusses in his revealing account of the song and the struggle it came to personify.Voted the “Song of the Century"” by Time, “Strange Fruit” is a searing evocation of lynching. And when Billie Holiday sang it, she held audiences in rapt attention, moving some to tears, others to anger, and all to a heightened awareness of the racist violence that was still, nearly a century after the Civil War, taking the lives of African Americans. Now, David Margolick’s account cuts away the myths that have grown up around both Holiday and her most famous song, allowing readers to discover the true origins of “Strange Fruit"” and the circuitous paths it took to the center of a nation’s conscience.Margolick establishes the political and cultural context that surrounded “Strange Fruit” in 1939—a year in which there were three recorded lynchings and suspicion of many others, and which saw the publication of Gone with the Wind—and traces the song’s journey through the red-baiting 50s and the incipient Civil Rights movement of the 60s, right up to the reverence it still inspires today. Along the way, Margolick includes commentary and reaction to the song from black and white audiences of different eras, and writers and musicians as varied as Lena Horne, Paul Robeson, Pauline Kael, Charles Mingus, Cassandra Wilson, Maya Angelou, among others.Exploring the intricate nexus between jazz, race, and politics, Strange Fruit opens a window onto an extraordinary song, the woman who sang it, and the role it played in our culture’s evolving consciousness of racism. Review "Show-stopper. To hear Billie holiday sing 'Strange Fruit' was to be forever haunted. Like Holiday's performance, Margolick's book is understated but intense, suffused with grace, power and dignity. It works on several levels: as tribute, elegy, homage andcultural history."--"New York Times Book Review"Margolick recreates the tense web of bitterness, guilt, denial and anger that surrounds Holiday's charged performances of 'Strange Fruit.' With thorough research and the smooth writing of a journalist, Margolick has produced a superb piece of cultural history."--"Publishers Weekly"["Strange Fruit], written by an outstanding journalist, David Margolick (New York Times; Vanity Fair), is a fast and fascinating read. It is written with great sincerity and dedication. This book will evoke stirring images of Ms. Holiday and the emerging jazz scene. It will also provide another link showing how modern jazz emerged in tandem with the Civil Rights movement, and how music can be a powerful political statement."--"allaboutjazz.com"With reportorial finesse, Margolick also restores 'Strange Fruit' to its deserved stature in the public consciousness as a piece of shocking reportage--a dispatch from battlesfields where the price of racism and ignorance was tallied in blood."--"Boston Globe"Margolick has nonetheless performed a valuable service: by illuminating the importance of this one song, he has captured an era in microcosm."--"The Providence Sunday Journal"For jazz buffs and anyone interested in popular culture, this slender book by Margolick offers several surprises and revelatons within its pages...This is indeed a job well done."--"Book Page"Strange Fruit explores how just 12 lines of lyrics andan unobtrusive score captivated nightclub audiences, terrified promoters and radio stations, and inspired activists in the 1940s...The effect of Margolick's storytelling technique is nearly as powerful as the song itself, employing the veneer of art to c
