On This Day in 1959, Famed Singer Behind Controversial Jazz Standard Considered a “Declaration of War” Died at 44

On July 17, 1959, the famed singer behind a controversial jazz standard once condemned as a “declaration of war” died—an ironically tragic end to an internal war the singer endured in the final years of her life. Billie Holiday, nicknamed Lady Day and known for her acute musical sensitivity and defiance of societal (and legal) standards, died of heart failure two short months after her 44th birthday.

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Holiday’s unique vocal timbre and commanding stage presence made her a much beloved singer of the times, but her notoriety didn’t come without a price. At a time when the Civil Rights Movement was still a distant dream, Holiday’s insistence on singing controversial songs like “Strange Fruit” put her in the crosshairs of the federal government.

The “Declaration Of War” That Became Her Legacy

Few songs evoke such painfully strong imagery of the violently segregated South of the early 20th century as “Strange Fruit,” and few singers could emote as potent a blend of anger, grief, and defiance as the legendary Billie Holiday. The New York City-based jazz singer first heard what would become one of her signature songs when its writer, Abel Meeropol, visited Holiday at a nightclub where she was working called Café Society in 1939. He presented the song to her and, after a few questions from Holiday regarding the lyrics, finally heard her sing the grim song with “the bitterness and shocking quality I hoped the song would have,” per the Library of Congress.

The song described the horrors of the Jim Crow South, during which white citizens lynched and murdered Black men and women by the hundreds. To sing the words, Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze, strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees, in the late 1930s and early 1940s wasn’t just controversial. It was an act of rebellion that put targets on the back of those brave enough to sing those lyrics in public—Holiday included. Governmental agencies like the Federal Bureau of Narcotics and the FBI began pursuing Holiday for her drug use and, perhaps more covertly, her public displays of anti-lynching views.

Holiday’s 1939 track “Strange Fruit” is one of the first blatant protests of racism in the musical world. Atlantic Records co-founder Ahmet Ertegun described it as “a declaration of war” and “the beginning of the Civil Rights movement.” The jazz singer purposefully put the song at the end of her set so that she could escape the venue quickly in the event that Holiday’s critics, government officials, or other potential threats were in the crowd.

Billie Holiday Died On July 17, 1959

Billie Holiday struggled with addiction to h***** and alcohol for years, and complications from this substance abuse ultimately led to her demise in the early morning hours of July 17, 1959 at the Metropolitan Hospital in New York. Her official cause of death was pulmonary edema and heart failure, both of which were caused by her cirrhosis of the liver, a diagnosis she received earlier that year. The singer of the controversial jazz standard had been under police supervision after law enforcement officials arrested her for narcotics possession.

Her final moments were quiet, sterile, and supervised. Her abusive husband at the time of her death, Louis McKay, infamously stole Holiday’s money and did little to pay for a proper ceremony or burial upon her passing. The jazz singer whose legacy was a musical “declaration of war” is buried at St. Raymond’s Cemetery in the Bronx—a solitary resting place in which she can finally get some peace.

Photo by Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images