Nina Simone

“It was always Marx, Lenin, and revolution – real girl’s talk,” Nina Simone said in her autobiography, I Put a Spell on You: The Autobiography of Nina Simone. 

Born on Feb. 21, 1933 in Tryon, NC, Eunince Kathleen Waymon, known professionally as Nina Simone, was a socialist, Black nationalist, revolutionary, civil rights activist, singer, songwriter, musician, and more, whose art spanned the musical genres and styles of pop, classical, blues, jazz, folk, gospel, and R&B. 

The “High Priestess of Soul” was seen as a prodigy since she was three years old, the age she started playing piano. Simone’s parents Mary Kate and John Divine Waymon saw her talents as a God-given gift of music. 

With her mother being a Methodist minister and her father being a handyman and preacher, Simone was raised in the church and played piano in her mother’s ministry. Simone attended Allen High School for GIrls in Asheville, NC with the help of scholarship funds established by her music teacher. 

Following graduation from high school in 1950, she spent the summer at The Juilliard School, learning from Carl Friedberg and preparing for her audition to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. She suspected that her application was denied because of racial prejudice. 

She continued on in the art world, taking piano lessons with Curtis professor Vladmir Sokoloff, working as a photographer’s assistant, becoming an accompanist at Arlene Smith’s vocal studio, and teaching piano from her home. She also began performing at the Midtown Bar and Grill in Atlantic City, NJ, where singing as well as playing the piano increased her weekly salary to $90. It was 1954 when she adopted the name “Nina Simone”, derived from a nickname given to her by a boyfriend and the French actress Simone Signoret. One of the reasons she went by a different name was to go undetected from her mother, who disapproved of her playing and singing secular music. While performing at the bar, she gained a loyal fan base. 

In 1958, Simone adapted the song “I Loves You, Porgy” by George Gershwin, which would be featured on her debut album Little Girl Blue in 1958 with Bethlehem Records. After her album’s success, she signed a contract with Colpix Records, who she would record multiple studio and live albums with, including the live album Nina Simone at Town Hall. A favorite musician at Greenwich Village, Simone performed pop music in order to make money to continue her classical training. 

In 1964 she began to talk more about racial identity in her music, such as with the songs “Brown Baby” on her album Nina at the Village Gate, “Mississippi Goddam” in Nina Simone in Concert, and “Four Women” in Wild is the Wind, all of which were released under Philips Records.

Along with songs like “Four Women”, which she made to inspire Black women to define eurocentric beauty and identity standards that were imposed on them, Simone performed and spoke at civil rights events, including the Selma to Montgomery marches. Her view on Black liberation aligned more with Malcolm X, her Mount Vernon neighbor, than Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s non-violent approach, as she believed in revolution by any means necessary and Black nationalism. 

With Weldon Irvine, Simone created “To Be Young, Gifted and Black” a song from the unfinished play of the same name by Lorraine Hansberry, which she performed live on her Black Gold album and later released a studio recording as a single. Aretha Franklin did a later rendition of the song for her 1972 album Young, Gifted and Black, as did Donny Hathaway for his album Everything is Everything. 

In 1970, Simone moved to Barbados, and when she returned to the U.S., there was a warrant for her arrest after she protested paying taxes in opposition to the Vietnam War. She then moved back to Barbados and later to Liberia with her friend and fellow singer-activist Miriam Makeba. She left her daughter Lisa Simone Kelly (born Lisa Celeste Stroud), who she had with former husband Andy Stroud, in Mount Vernon, though they would reunite in Liberia later on. 

By 1974, Simone made her last album with the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) called It is Finished. With CTI Records, she released the Baltimore album in 1978, which featured songs like “Rich Girl” and “If You Pray Right”. Simone then released the Fodder on My Wings album in 1982 with Studios Davout. 

Throughout the 1980s, she was a regular performer at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, where she recorded Live at Ronnie Scott’s in 1984 in London. Eventually, she moved to Paris, France, where she performed at Aux Trois Mailletz, a small jazz club.

At the end of the 1980s, in 1988, Simone moved to the Netherlands. Her song “My Baby Just Cares for Me” resurfaced due to a Chanel No. 5 ad, leading her to re-release the song and earned a top spot on the UK’s NME singles charts. She bought an apartment a few corners away from her friend Gerrit de Bruin. A daily caretaker was hired for Simone, and she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder by a doctor De Bruin knew. 

Moving to Amsterdam in 1991, Simone lived there for two years with friends and her caretaker. In 1993, she then settled in Southern France, where she recorded and released her final studio album A Single Woman. She battled breast cancer during her last years, passing away in her sleep at 70 years old on April 21, 2003 at her home in Carry-le-Rouet, France. 

Simone is survived by her daughter Lisa, her art, and activism. All of her music can be streamed on every music platform, including Spotify and Apple Music. More on Simone’s life, career, and art can be found in the documentaries The Amazing Nina Simone and What Happened, Miss Simone?, as well as her autobiography I Put a Spell On You: The Autobiography of Nina Simone.