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To be young, gifted and black!

Nina Simone

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Nina Simone
Age: 75 †
Born: 1933
Born: February 21
Died: 2008
Died: April 21
Composer
Jazz Pianist
Recording Artist
Singer
Singer-Songwriter
Tryon
North Carolina
Eunice Kathleen Waymon
High Priestess of Soul
Gifted
Black
Young

More quotes by Nina Simone

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I would like a man now who is rich, and who can give me a boat - a sailboat. I want to own it and let him pay for it. My first love is the sea and water, not music. Music is second.
Nina Simone
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I only knew classical music, which to me was the only true music. The only way I could survive at the bar was to mix the classical music with popular songs, and that meant I had to sing. What happened was that I discovered I had a voice plus the talent to mix classical music together with more popular songs, which at the time I detested.
Nina Simone
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I do love to sing Jacques Brel songs, intensely. I get terribly excited, just by reading a couple of lines in any one of his songs.
Nina Simone
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I'm sorry that I did not become the world's first black classic pianist. I think I would have been happier.
Nina Simone
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I don't like to go to strange places.
Nina Simone
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I was not reluctant to become a singer. Singing has been an activity I've done my whole life, without thought.
Nina Simone
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Everything that happened to me as a child involved music. It was part of everyday life, as automatic as breathing.
Nina Simone
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I play piano, by ear. Yes, I write songs... and good ones.
Nina Simone
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I think the rich are too rich and the poor are too poor. I don't think the black people are going to rise at all I think most of them are going to die.
Nina Simone
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Since I was three I've been playing the piano. I've been onstage.
Nina Simone
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I believe the time will come when the whole definition of pop music will change. It will get to the point where a song will not be a good song until it has a high level of creativity in writing and performance. In other words, in order to be popular, songs will have to meet these high standards.
Nina Simone
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My love is like the wind and wild is the wind. Give me more than one caress, satisfy my hungriness. Let the wind blow through your heart for wild is the wind.
Nina Simone
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Many times I feel different like a different person.
Nina Simone
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That's a very high goal to have, study eight hours a day to be a concert pianist.
Nina Simone
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Jazz is a white term to define black people. My music is black classical music.
Nina Simone
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There are all kinds of things that can be done. You can change rhythms, you can change chords, you can change whole concepts. But it will only work, on a record or in a performance, if you can make the people buy it.
Nina Simone
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From the beginning, it has been a no-no for a black man to touch a white woman.
Nina Simone
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This may be a dream, but I'll say it anyway: I was supposed to be married last year, and I bought a gown. When I meet Nelson Mandela, I shall put on this gown and have the train of it removed and put aside, and kiss the ground that he walks on and then kiss his feet.
Nina Simone
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It's logical that people from bad times will reflect their feelings in their communication. Music is part of the communication. If you lived it, you can do it.
Nina Simone
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My job is not done. I address my songs now to the third world. I am popular all over Asia and Africa and the Middle East, not to speak of South Africa, where I'm trying to go to see Nelson Mandela.
Nina Simone