VOICE ONE:

I'm Shirley Griffith.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Steve Ember with the VOA Special English program, PEOPLE IN AMERICA. week we tell about a person in the of the United States. This week, we tell about Billie Holiday. She was one of the greatest jazz in America.

In the late , Billy Holiday sang with Artie Shaw's as it traveled around the United States. She was one of the black to with a white band. But separation laws in America made travel for her.

this time, a new nightclub in the area of New York called Village. It was the first that had both black and white . And it both black and white people to hear the . The nightclub was called Cafe .

It was here that Billy Holiday sang a song called " Fruit." A school named Lewis Allan had it for her. The song was about injustice and of black people in the part of the United States. It told about how of white men had black men by them from trees.

Many people to the song. It was any other popular song. But it was a hit. Here is Billie Holiday singing " Fruit."


trees bear fruit,
on the leaves and at the root,
Black bodies swinging in the breeze,
fruit hanging from the poplar trees.