[78-L] Strange Fruit

[Michael Biel]

Taylor Bowie wrote:
> My gripe is not that the song is making a political or social
> statement, but that it just doesn't seem very musical to me.
 
I consider it more of a poem set to music, much like the later beatnik
poems with cool jazz accompaniments.  As has been mentioned earlier,
today this would have been done as a rap, which of course is all rhythm
with no discernible melody.

There is a very good discussion of it on Billy Crystal's highly
recomended DVD/CD tribute to his Uncle Milt Gabler.  I played this
segment in my Media Literacy class during the past years before my
retirement.  Especially with my freeze-framing the lyrics long enough so
they could read them, it always had quite an impression.  Of course
there were always a few dunces who answered the question on the final
exam that Strange Fruit was a 1950s rock dance.  College students today
tend to not be very smart.

Mike Biel  mbiel at mbiel.com