QuoteCivil Rights

"It reminds me of how Pop died, but I have to keep singing…" — Billie Holiday

c. 1956(Approximate date)· Billie Holiday (speaker)

“It reminds me of how Pop died, but I have to keep singing it, not only because people ask for it, but because twenty years after Pop died the things that killed him are still happening in the South.”
Speaker
Billie Holiday
Occasion
Lady Sings the Blues (autobiography, with William Dufty), 1956

Billie Holiday on why she kept singing "Strange Fruit" — tying the anti-lynching song to her father's death and the ongoing violence of the South.

Sources & citations

  1. 1.en.wikipedia.orgwikipedia
"It reminds me of how Pop died, but I have to keep singing…" — Billie Holiday · We've Been Protesting