April 7 marks the 100th birthday of American jazz singer Billie Holiday. Her life and early death at age 44 have been the inspiration for generations of singers, from Janis Joplin to Amy Winehouse.
In March 1939, a then-23-year-old Billie Holiday closed out her set at New York's Cafe Society with a song she hadn't performed before: "Strange Fruit." Written by Jewish schoolteacher Abel Meeropol, ...