Today's #StrangeFruitMOTD is a haunting reimagining of Abel Meeropol's anti-lynching song, "Strange Fruit." Tony award winner Tonya Pinkins delivers a powerful performance of "Strange Fruit, Revisited," a George Floyd protest song which tells a modern story of anti-Black violence.
Strange Fruit Mention of the Day: The lyrics to "Strange Fruit" were not subtle; the song's author Abel Meeropol juxtaposed the "pastoral scene of the gallant south" against graphic depictions of lynching, which the article describes as a "sickening historical tale."
According to PBS, Billie Holiday began performing "Strange Fruit" live at Cafe Society in NYC and would end her show with it each night ("nothing could follow it"). Even today, the song "has the power to startle," still unnervingly resonant with "a legacy of violence, hurt and fear" the U.S. has yet to overcome.