Nina Simone

836 Words2 Pages

On February 21, 1933 in Tryon, North Carolina a jazz legend was born. We know her by her stage name Nina Simone; born Eunice Kathleen Waymon. Nina was born the sixth child into a non-wealthy family where both her parents were ministers and her father a handyman as well. Nina began playing the piano by the age of 3. She showed talent at a young age that could not be overlooked. Nina’s parents, mother Mary Waymon and father John Waymon acknowledged her talent well and the fact that she was able to play back songs by ear was remarkable. Her parents contributed to her studying classical piano starting at her young age. This would be the start of her musical journey and with many ups and downs she did not let any obstacles get in her way and goes on to take the evolution of jazz music by storm (Deming).
Nina studied music throughout her entire childhood and went on to graduate at the top of her high school class. She received a scholarship upon graduating which she used to study at the very popular musical school Juilliard in New York City. Soon after Nina applied to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Nina was denied admission and knowing she did very well in her audition she felt it was racism that took a toll is the denial. She did not let that stop her from wanting to achieve her passion (Deming).
It became time for Nina to find a job to support herself so she began teaching music, and also found a gig playing piano at the Midtown Bar and Grill in Atlantic City. Nina would play and sing many jazz hits, and soon after the word began to spread and she gained an audience that would come watch her perform regularly. Here She adopted the name of Nina [little one] Simone [French star Simone Signoret] to avoid her...

... middle of paper ...

...el. It’s difficult to describe because it’s not something you can analyze; to get near what it’s about you have to play it. And when you’ve caught it, when you’ve got the audience hooked, you always know because it’s like electricity hanging in the air” (Nathan, Ward & Seidel, 2013). She was a remarkable woman with many shown talents and a major influence in the overall world of music.

Works Cited
Deming, M. (n.d.). Artist Biography. In Nina Simone. Retrieved 2014, from All Music website: http://www.allmusic.com/artist/nina-simone-mn0000411761/biography
Nathan, D., Ward, E., & Seidel, R. (2013). Bio. In Nina Simone. Retrieved February 24, 2014, from The Estate of Nina Simone website: http://www.ninasimone.com/about/bio/
Nina Simone. (2014). The Biography Channel website. Retrieved February 22, 2014, from http://www.biography.com/people/nina-simone-9484532.

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