Nina Simone. Brave, talented, different. She became a voice of black America against repression and one of the most inspiring women in history. She was a musical genius.

I remember the first time I heard Nina on the radio. I was still in elementary school. I Put A Spell On You was the song. At first I was thinking that I’m listening to a man- angry and passionate man who is singing about a girl who is only his. I wanted to know more about the singer, and after a while I learned he is a she, and that her name is Nina Simone. The Excitement didn’t stop there, it became only bigger. Nina with her powerful voice just won me all over. She dragged me easily into her harsh and real world, where you are in constant struggle and where you have to fight for everything, because nothing comes easy in life. The admiration and love for this singer never stopped, even today she is my favorite singer, for all times.

Nina Simone was born as Eunice Katleen Waymon on 21st February, 1933 in North Carolina as the sixth child out of eight. Nina was playing the piano in church at the age of six. Her mother was working as a housemaid and the lady of the house got interested in Nina and paid for her piano lessons. Nina became student of Muriel Massinovitch, who was in love with Bach, and her love for Bach was carried to Nina. When you hear Nina playing, you can feel the passion as well as discipline. Nina was on her way to become the first black concert pianist. The last year of high school she got the scholarship to Julliard, New York and that was just one step closer to prestige Curtis Institute in Philadelphia. But, what happens is, that she gets rejected with the excuse she is not good enough. Nina got disappointed, but decides to work hard and try next year. She gave up on that idea when she found out, that the true reason of her rejection was the color of her skin.
Nina became a piano teacher in Philadelphia, where she moved with her family. Soon she realizes that some of her students earn more money with playing in clubs in Atlantic City. That was her next step. Since her mother was deeply religious, she had to change her stage name, so here mother would not find out how she is making money. She was playing for six hour in a club, just taking a brake for a cup of milk at the bar. She was combining the classical and gospel with the newest hits. The owner of the club told her, that if she wants to earn some money, she will have to start with singing too.
The audience at the club where Nina was performing, starts to change. There are no longer only local drunks, lot of young people starts coming to hear new style of music. She starts playing in better clubs and she gets the first record contract. Nina was never good with money and men. After she recorded her first album, she signed a contract where she renounced her rights, and that costs her more than million dollars.

Plying in clubs all over America, she met racial intolerance. Her temperament was harsh, and she was never able to stop herself in saying something which sometimes was a suicidal gesture. There is not so many women and artists who were brave as she was. She became a voice of social and racial movement. Her version of Strange Fruit will make you shiver. After bombing of a church in Alabama and death of four children and murder of Medgrad Evers she writes a song Mississippi Goddam.

She was very socially engaged. She wrote songs as Backlash Blues, Old Jim Crow, Four Women, To Be Young, Gifted and Black which became hymns. Her personal life was left behind, and she gets divorced 1970. She was not able to see her daughter to often because of her arrangements, and two of them get estranged. After the murders of Martin Luther King Jr, Mallcom X and Lorraine Hansberry she loses faith in America. She moves to Barbados in 1974 and after that in Libya. Her daughter comes along with her. For getting her a proper schooling she moves to Switzerland. At that moment her carrier was going nowhere. She goes to London in attempt to bring it up to life again. In London happens the well known story. She meets a con who promised a lot and instead he beaten her, robed her and left there. When authorities in London do nothing to find the man, she attempts suicide with sleeping pills. Fortunately she wakes up next morning in a British hospital.

After 15 years of exile she returns to America, where she has some new public. Her song My Baby Just Cares For Me became an international hit after being used for a Chanel commercial.

She was and will be a true hero forever and her life and struggle should be an inspiration to all of us. She shown what strength is. She had a lot of feelings, and a lot of suffering in her, you can hear it in her songs, but after all she remained true to herself and to what she believes. She died in the South of France 2003, in her sleep.