Promotional copies were smashed by a Carolina radio station and returned to Philips.Īfter "Mississippi Goddam", a civil rights message was the norm in Simone's recordings and became part of her concerts. The song was released as a single, and it was boycotted in some southern states. This was her response to the June 12, 1963, murder of Medgar Evers and the September 15, 1963, bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, that killed four young black girlsĪnd partly blinded a fifth. On her debut album for Philips, Nina Simone in Concert (1964), for the first time she addressed racial inequality in the United States in the song "Mississippi Goddam". She had always included songs in her repertoire that drew on her African-American heritage, such as "Brown Baby" by Oscar Brown and "Zungo" by Michael Olatunji on her album NinaĪt the Village Gate in 1962. In 1964, Simone changed record distributors from Colpix, an American company, to the Dutch Philips Records, which meant a change in the content of her recordings. Lisa, but later he abused Simone psychologically and physically. In few years, he became her manager and the father of her daughter Simone remarried a New York police detective, Andrew Stroud, in December, 1961. In 1958, she befriended and married Don Ross, but quickly regretted their marriage. She kept this attitude toward the record industry for most of her career. Only to make money to continue her classical music studies, and was indifferent about having a recording contract. (notably for the 1980s re-release of her version of the jazz standard "My Baby Just Cares for Me") and never benefited financially from the album's sales.Īfter the success of Little Girl Blue, Simone signed a contract with Colpix Records and recorded a multitude of studio and live albums.Ĭolpix relinquished all creative control to her, including the choice of material that would be recorded, in exchange for her signing the contract with them.Īfter the release of her live album Nina Simone at Town Hall, Simone became a favorite performer in Greenwich Village. Because she had sold her rights outright for $3,000, Simone lost more than $1 million in royalties It became her only Billboard top 20 success in the United States, and her debut album Little Girl Blueįollowed in February 1959 on Bethlehem Records. In 1958, she recorded George Gershwin's "I Loves You, Porgy" (from Porgy and Bess), which she learned from a Billie HolidayĪlbum and performed as a favor to a friend. Simone's mixture of jazz, blues,Īnd classical music in her performances at the bar earned her a small but loyal fan base. Knowing her mother would not approve of playing "the Devil's music", she used her new stage name to remain undetected. In 1954, she adopted the stage name "Nina Simone". Whose owner insisted that she sing as well as play the piano, which increased her income to $90 a week. In order to fund her private lessons, Simone performed at the Midtown Bar & Grill on Pacific Avenue in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Taught piano from her home in Philadelphia. She took a job as a photographer's assistant, but also found work as an accompanist at Arlene Smith's vocal studio and Lessons with Vladimir Sokoloff, a professor at Curtis, but never could re-apply due to the fact that at the time the Curtis institute did notĪccept students over 21. Only 3 of 72 applicants were accepted that year,īut as her family had relocated to Philadelphia in the expectation of her entry to Curtis, the blow to her aspirations was particularly heavy.įor the rest of her life, she suspected that her application had been denied because of racial prejudice. With the help of this scholarship money, she was able to attend Allen High School for Girls in Asheville, North Carolina.Īfter her graduation, Simone spent the summer of 1950 at the Juilliard School as a student of Carl Friedberg, preparing for an audition at theĬurtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Simone's music teacher helped establish a special fund to Simone's mother, Mary Kate Waymon was a Methodist ministerĪnd a housemaid and her father, Rev. Her classical concert debut, was given when she was 12. The sixth of eight children in a poor family, she began playing piano at the age of three or four. Simone was born Eunice Kathleen Waymon on February 21, 1933, in Tryon, North Carolina.
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