Strange Fruit, performed by Billie HolidayThe song Strange Fruit was written and set to music by the Jewish-American poet Abel Meeropol in the early 20th century as a protest song against racial injustice and lynching in the United States. Holiday's performances of the song across New York in the 1940s became the spark of the burgeoning civil rights movement, which would be fanned into flame by the murder of Emmett Till a decade later.