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Nina
Simone CDs
Forever
Young, Gifted & Black: Songs of Freedom and Spirit (2006)
/
Anthology (2003)
Nina: The Essential Nina Simone
(2000, 2003)
The Very Best Of Nina Simone, 1967-1972 : Sugar
In My Bowl (1998) /
The Blues (1968, 1991) /
Compact Jazz: Nina Simone
(1989-1991)
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Remembering Nina
By Amin Sharif
Back when I was in high school, I was given
an album of Nina Simone’s songs. And, I immediately fell in
love with Nina. You see, at the time, young blacks who were
really hip had stopped listening to R&B. The Temptations,
James Brown, the Supremes were considered too commercial to have
anything “real” to say to a generation of
blacks who were growing more and more militant. New icons
were rising on a cultural landscape that was changing. The
Blues, Cool Jazz, and Be Bop were in if you were “really”
black. Miles Davis, the Jazz Messengers, Monk, Dizzy, Max Roach,
Abby Lincoln and Coltrane and hundreds of others were making
music that was centered in a new Black Consciousness.
All this Black Consciousness was fed by the
Civil Rights and the Black Power Movement. Entertainers like
Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poiter, Eartha Kitt and others who had
for years suffered under an artistic version of Jim Crow rushed
to put their prestige and their careers behind political
movements for justice and equality. And right in the middle of
it all was Nina Simone.
Nina, from the very beginning, presented
something different visually and vocally for black audiences.
First, she displayed the beauty of a real Black Woman. What I
mean by that is that Nina wore her hair natural. She looked
partly like an African Queen and partly like one of those fine
Sisters a Brother might run into at a Cabaret. Was Nina sexy?
Damn skippy. Her voice was sensual, raw, and illuminating. Her
stage presence was awesome. When she performed a song she not
only made it her own, but she also wrote the words of that song
upon the very soul of the listener.
Nina wasn’t afraid of controversy. When she
recorded her classic Four Women, a song which bespoke
of the way skin color within the black community determined
social status, many black radio stations refused to play it. But
these same radio stations filled the air waves with her
generational black anthem Young,
Gifted, and Black.
Nina was called the High
Priestess of Soul and there is more than just mere
admiration in the title. Unlike the title Queen
of Soul, the term Priestess
has a connotation of holiness attached to it. The term Priestess
of Soul is inscribed on a background of ancientness. And,
for black people, the term Priestess
is culturally charged. As a people of African descent, we
probably had Priestess long before we had Queens. Nina, in posture and attitude,
captured in the mind’s eye all that a Priestess
should be. Her words and songs held a magic reborn, passed down
from generation to generation, from slavery to freedom. She
literally “cast a spell” on every person who heard her sing
or gazed upon her womanhood. The spell remains. And it will
remain as long as she will be remembered. And that will be a
very long time indeed.
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update 6 July 2008 |
