I really enjoyed watching part of the Nina Simone documentary and reading about her. She was a very influential woman. Although I admire what Nina did with her life and her music I believe the way she went about it was what eventually led to her downfall. Nina Simone fought for what she believed for which is truly inspirational. She said all the things that African American women all over  American were too afraid to say. She stood up for what she believed in and fought for what she thought was right. In the beginning her dedication was admired, but once she began rearranging her whole repertoire to revolve around racial issues people started to be less supportive. I believe that Nina Simone would have had a more positive legacy ( for everyone not just African American women) if she sang about racial and political issues on a smaller scale and did not sing just those types of songs. I think her managers would have allowed her to sing about it for longer than they did if she continued to sing songs meant for entertainment as well. Nina Simone is still a huge inspiration to people everywhere, I just believe she could have been even bigger if she approached things differently.

Nina Simone

Nina Simone is definitely one of the most important figures America ever had.  The documentary about Nina Symone showed more than a super talented African American Women, but it also shows sides of Nina Symone that people might not agree with, like how she would rather use her talent to make songs about problems that society used to face at time.  It is reasonable to think she had more potential to just right about problem that most affected black community and put black people through lots of injustice and indignity, however I personally believe that Nina Symone, as someone who would not measure her words as she puts them in a lyrics of a song, a women who found in the music a way to bring awareness to problems society was trying to hide because it only affected black people as I mentioned before.  Nina Simone just like Martin Luther King Junior and Malcom Max had a similar purpose even though the way they chose to peruse it.  If people thought it was not a smart action to take as she mostly sang about songs like “Mississippi Goddam” they might not understand her purpose in first place.  Maybe her purpose was never ton be seen as just a great artist with a power voice and great piano skills. Nina Simone always slicked with her true character.  People close to her like her husband and her daughter did mention on the documentary how sometimes she failed as a wife and a mother because she was that “Nina Simone 24/7 and if I was to mention a part of her life where she let thigs got out of control and put her happiness in jeopardy I would say it was definitely how she let her strong personality get in  the way of her close relationships.  I do not agree she should’ve been the type of artist that sings about typical topics.  Even though she ended up losing fans because of her singing preference I still think she did the right thing by sticking with singing about things that made her feel good about herself.  It was who she was, and she was loved for that by the rest of fans that never left her side.  Maybe that is the problems with artists now a days: they let the music industry pick who they should be as a singer instead of who they want to be. 

What a Story

While watching “What happened, Miss Simone?” a Netflix documentary, I was blown away with the amount of footage they had of Eunice Waymon throughout her life.  I enjoyed the interviews with her and others in her life.  Eunice Waymon started a powerful career under the name Nina Simone.

As I watched the story unfold the messages and passion throughout her music tend to develop into more of a life style then just a performance.  From the start of the movie I could see how powerful Nina must have felt to be singing as an African American woman.  This was not appreciated at the time but with the amount of talent she had, she moved people whether they were black or white.  Her music was “within the political and cultural terrain of Black suffering, disavowal, and rage” which ended up being part of her personal life as well (Mena, Saucier 248).

As much footage as we got to see I could tell that Nina was going crazy. In the beginning of the film her daughter said she was “Nina 24/7” whether preforming or not.  This was a foreshadow to the career we were about to be exposed too.  Nina sung about a lot of things but by the end of her career she was more politically inclined than anything. 

I really appreciated this video and learning about her career.  I think it impacted me the most because she stuck up for what she believed.  At this time period it was hard enough for women.  For an African American women to be singing and speaking out for the civil rights movement so passionately and not worrying about a thing, that’s remarkable.  Even to this day listening to her songs can impact anyone who understands the time period and the messages she tries to send.

           

            

Nina Simone: Dont let me be Misunderstood/Netflix Movie

Nina Simone was a very influential music artist she took political things that were happing in real life and put them in to her lyrics. At first her songs seem to be more civilized, but later on in here career her songs looked like there were getting more violent and I feel like thats what caused her downfall and eventually caused her to move out of the country. I found it really interesting that she was able to team up with important African Americans such as Martin Luther King Jr and even Malcolm X. They could all put there ideas together and they wanted to have a world where everybody is treated equal. The thing that stood out to me the most was how she went from performing in her local church as a piano player then becoming a legit musical artist. Her goal was to become to first classical pianist. She got lessons on how to play the piano and then see became unbelievable. Her job playing in a church turned in to her own music career. It was tragic all the things she suffered from, but her song help people realize that they needed to fight for civil rights even if it caused violence. It was unfair what Africans went through and thats what her songs portrayed.        

"Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood"

     In the article “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” it helped me to more clearly understand what Nina Simona was all about. Every song that she wrote served as a purpose to get a point across or to tell a story about her life. Nina Simone’s songs expressed political topics like women empowerment and oppression and she also expressed her psychological issues through singing. In the article there was a quote that said “the importance of message delivery has been noted by Stephen Duncombe (2002), who states “it is one thing to read lyrics on a page, quite another to hear them sung with emotion or laid over a danceable beat”. I agree with quote because just from my own personal experience of reading some of Nina Simone’s song and then going back and actually listening to her sing them it helped me to really understand and feel the emotion and story that she was trying to get across. Listening to the lyrics being sung with a “danceable beat” helped me to connect with her songs and better understand what she is feeling, it gives you a much different effect then just reading the lyrics. 

     What I found most interesting to learn about Nina Simone in this article was the fact that she suffered from psychological issues, such as bipolar disorder and substance abuse, late in her career. “The presence of topics related to mental illness in Simone’s lyrics encourages a breaking of the silence and normalizing mental illness experiences, thus increasing the

acceptability of support and mental health services.”  This quote shows another way that through expressing something that she battle in her life and fat strongly about she was able to raise awareness to an issue that was not seen as “normal”. She was able to bring attention to a lot of uncommon issues of the time which made her such an influential singer and written. 

Nina Simone - A Powerful Soul

        When we first started watching the Netflix documentary on Nina Simone, I was completely unaware of what to expect. When listening to some of her music that we had discussed in class, I deemed myself uninterested in her voice and music. However, when I started to watch the video, my thoughts surrounding her and her musical position changed completely. She was no longer a random and boring singer from back in the day, but rather, in my opinion, a pinnacle of strength.

Growing up she did not have intentions of writing and performing such controversial and powerful songs. Her dream was to be the first African American classical piano player. As years passed, her dream of becoming a poised classical pianist began to slip away. She turned instead to performing at bars during the late hours of the night. The music she was playing was no where near classical and when she was asked to sing in order to keep her job, she decided to change her name to Nina Simone. Too fearful that her mother would find out the type of place she was working at.

From there, her music and popularity skyrocketed. Issues surrounding the civil rights movement began to arise and become more prevalent. Her songs soon began reflecting the struggle that her people were facing. Her passion and honesty is what I believe made her so influential. Although, as time went on, the issues surrounding Blacks and Whites became more and more violent and heartbreaking. Against her husbands better judgement, she decide to pursue the cicil rights aspect of her music more so than the popularity and success.

        I believe that her desire to make an impact quickly became an obsession. No matter how good something may be, when it is overextended or exhausted, it becomes ineffective and often destructive. It was completely heartbreaking to watch the documentary and see how someone so talented and influential can crumble before your eyes. I find that the things that make a persons heart ache, are often what inspires them to do amazing things. Nina Simone is just one example of the living proof. 

Blog #3

Kayla Leland

Professor Santos

EN 003

February 12, 2016

 

Nina Simone

This week in class we have discussed the meaning behind Nina Simone’s lyrics and the messages she was trying to evoke about Black History. One particular thing that stood out to me was the reading ‘“Don’t let me be misunderstood”: Nina Simone’s African womanism’ written by Jasmine Mena and P. Khalil Saucier. Nina Simone had a commanding presence and had such a passion for her singing that she wasn’t afraid to speak out. Nina Simone was the only one to speak out as many others wanted to but were too afraid to say anything. In this reading the author chose to break down and analyze 44 songs of Nina Simones in order to reveal the messages she had at the time.  As a result, this revealed the impact the messages in her lyrics had on African Americans and the politics. It is quite an experience to be able to hear the music come to life as by reading the lyrics to the song you do not get the full effect or message of the song. When just looking at lyrics you do not get to feel emotion or hear the tone change in the artist’s voice. Similar to what we have discussed in class a few weeks ago is that it is very important and powerful to have meaning in the lyrics as this allows one to relate to the audience. That is just what Nina Simone did as she used her lyrics to try to unite people on the issues and contribute to the progressive politics.

 

Nina Simone saw the world as cancer as “freedom can only be realized when all systems of oppression are destroyed.”  Many people argued that the experience of African woman were being mislabeled and Nina Simone tried to get rid of these stereotypes through her lyrics. Just as many feminists began to create communities based of their own race as people were not dealing with the issues that black women had to through so, they created their own feminist ideas. Black women united together based of how they were related on their racial identity and used this against oppression. Similarly, Nina Simone used her lyrics to bring African Americans together on these issues in order to overcome them together as a whole. As a result, her messages became more and more political which may have led to her downfall as her performances led to less and less uniting. Nina Simone focused so heavily on the political aspect that she lost her followers which in the end consumed her and made her crazy.

“Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood”: Nina Simone’s Africana Womanism

I had found it very interesting learning about Nina Simone.  By watching her performances it was clear to see just how deeply she cared about what she was singing about. It felt as if almost all of her songs were sung to bring awareness to the public about what is going on in the world when it comes to racism. She did not hold back when it came to singing about a political issue. It was put perfectly that “Nina Simone did not only entertain, rather she helped raise her listeners’ consciousness of various sociopolitical issues (e.g., anti-Black oppression and Africana womanist perspective), thus preparing them for political action” (247). Her words were so powerful and got a point across to anyone who was listening to her song. I was also very impressed when she performed ‘Mississippi God damn’ seeing that language like that was never used in music at that time. I think putting out that song really showed the world who Nina Simone really was and how much she was willing to do whatever it took to get the word out about racism.

It was also very interesting to see the article split all of Nina Simone’s songs into categories. Gendered racism, Anti-Black oppression, Revenge for oppression and more intense topics like depression and suicide were all sang about in Nina Simone’s music. I had actually really enjoyed learning about Nina until she had mentioned that she is for the idea of violence. She would talk about during her performances how she is ready to “kill” and did not want to hold back with the violence. I completely agree with her that what was being done to the black people at that time was extremely wrong, but fighting violence with violence will not solve anything and will just result in more issues. Overall, learning about Nina Simone was very interesting and her music seemed extremely powerful.

"Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood": Nina Simone's Africana Womanism

                  Prior to reading, “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood”, I had never heard of Nina Simone before, or all of the powerful music she had produced. I found it very interesting, and smart, how Nina Simone had not only used her music for entertainment, but also to raise awareness to her listeners about many issues that were going on at the time. I found this very powerful of her, because she made music to express her feelings about political issues and also her psychological issues. She didn’t just write songs about nothing, every single song that she wrote had a special meaning to her.

                  One of the quotes that I had come across, really stuck out to me. This quote was noted by Stephen Duncombe (2002), and it states, “it is one thing to read lyrics on a page, quite another to hear them sung with emotion or laid over a danceable beat” (248). This quote stuck out to me so much not only because of the significance relating to Nina Simone’s music, but also my personal thoughts on music. If someone handed me a paper full of lyrics to a song, I could read them and not feel a single thing, but if someone handed me a pair of headphones and told me to listen to a song, I would feel all kinds of emotions. This same thing is true with Nina Simone’s music. When I had read her lyrics, it didn’t really make me feel the power within the song, but her strong voice and how she sang the words, could really get the attention of a crowd. Through her voice, Nina Simone had gotten many important messages out to the public, and raised awareness to many different movements, and Africana womanism members. She had made African women feel comfortable enough to be proud of who they were and to represent their culture, values, and experiences. She had given them the power to love themselves and be comfortable in their own skin. Nina Simone’s songs and political ideas stayed very consistent and gained the interest of African Americans from all over the country. I find it amazing that one woman had given so much powerful words through music alone.

Melanie Santos

Professor Santos

02/11/16

ENGL 199-003

“Music influence emotions, cognitions, and behavior”.  This quote in the article “Don’t let me be misunderstood”: Nina Simone’s Africana Womanism, is a quote that can pretty much summarize Nina Simone’s music.  Her music was indirect protest towards racial inequalities in America. Her music was filled with a lot of emotions, pain, and experiences. While reading this article, another quote that stood out me was, “Simone infused the Black Liberation Movement with an Africana Womanist sensibility, illustrating not only her dis- gust with the unrelenting and persistent racial oppression in America, but also used her music to confront the intersecting dimensions of racism, patriarchy, and class”. I personally find this quote important because not only did Nina Simone’s music really mean a lot to her and was on what was going on back then, but also she made others feel like they were not alone. Although, Nina Simone’s career ended up not being so successful in the future, she still made a statement that had to be solved and made people understand what the black community was going threw that time.

Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood- Nina Simone

I feel like the article, Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood and the movie we watched in class, What Happened Miss Simone portrayed two different images of Nina Simone. The article made her seem less violent than the movie did. In my response I am going to reference both the article and the documentary. In both the article and movie, it is very clear that Nina Simone was extremely passionate about her rights as a black woman/citizen. She displayed her passion for the equal rights movement in her song lyrics. The article states, "Simone was aware of her ability to captivate her audience and chose to be an activist as well as an artist.... In other words, Simone used her talent to go beyond entertainment, to contribute to pro-agressive politics." (248) In the documentary, it said that she had many auditions to play piano, but was turned down because of the color of her skin. That was one of the many times it hit her how segregated the US really was, especially in the South where she lived. Nina was experiencing it. She felt isolated. Although she started singing to support her family, she began to create song lyrics based on her experiences and the racial equality she dreamt of. "How can you be an artist and not reflect on the times?" She asked in the documentary. She wanted to sing to help her people (the Black Power Movement), so she began singing civil rights music.

I also found it interesting that the article broke down her songs and coded them.  One of her biggest hit's Mississippi God Damn, "expresses disgust for anti-Black violence, and the false promises of integration. For example, “Mississippi Goddam” lyrics include, “Picket lines, school boy cots, they try to say it’s a communist plot, all I want is equality for my sister my brother my people and me”"(257). It was then that the radios started refusing to play it, and she started losing fans. She was proud of being black, but did not fit the revolutionary women image. "She was aggressive and wanted to expose how messed up the American System is." She told Martin Luther King that she was,"not non violent." Her violence started harming her career. "My mother was Nina Simone 24/7. Thats why it became a problem." Her daughter expresses, during the documentary.

“Don’t let me be misunderstood”: Nina Simone’s Africana Womanism

I appreciated reading “Don’t let me be misunderstood”: Nina Simone’s Africana Womanism by Jasmine A. Mena. I think that this reading really helped me understand what Nina Simone was trying to say through her songs, as well as her emotions in it. I liked the fact that this article actually took Miss Simone’s songs and decoded them to hear her messages. I never knew that there was such technology that could decipher artist’s lyrics to retrieve messages, because I usually just sit and listen to the song, over and over again so I thought that was interesting to learn.

            Me personally, when I listened to some of her music, I couldn’t quite comprehend what she was saying because of all the metaphors, especially how they were used back in the day compared to now, so this helped me a lot to understand where she was coming from. My favorite part of the article was the actual decoding of which song carried a certain emotion. For example, Mena states “A variety of themes were identified that pertained first and foremost to love, oppression, psychological and emotional vulnerabilities, strengths, and Africana womanist perspectives.”- (254) Nina Simone incorporated so many types of stories of her life in her music, which is what made it so much more powerful.   

            The part that stood out most in this article would have to be the number of emotions they recovered in all forty-four songs. Nina Simone went from feeling in love, to feeling depressed, and feeling suicidal, which is a huge jump in emotions. It wouldn’t matter what she wrote about, it would always have some type emotion behind it, and story of her life. Not too many artists write about what their feeling nowadays, so I think that it is special for her to just come up with it easily.

            Now that I know what Simone’s songs were meant to put out, like for example, women empowerment, and oppression, it makes me enjoy her music much more, because like I stated earlier, I barely understood her lyrics and the metaphors she put out.

Strange Fruit

Before I read "Strange Fruit" by Angela Davis I wasn't completely sure who Billie Holiday was.  I had heard her name tossed around before but I didn't actually know she was a female. I like that Billie considered her song "Strange Fruit" her personal protest against racism. I believe that music and lyrics are something that are very personal. A single song can say so much, not only for the artist or author, but also to those who are listening to and interpreting it.  I found it interesting that at first it almost seemed like Billie didn't know exactly what she was singing about and just how much meaning and power the song had. At first it seemed to me that she just sang the song because she was asked to, and after she first sang the song was when it started to have more meaning towards her. For Billie  the song hit close to home when her father passed away when he did not receive treatment from inhaling poisonous gas because of segregated hospitals at the time. I think seeing her father unable to receive the help he deserved motivated her intentions behind the song.  Billie could also relate to the song because she her self as a African American female artist had to deal with racism to the full extent. As a vocalist in an all white band many people didn't want to hear her sing.  I could never imagine witness a lynching right in front of my eyes.  The lyrics "black bodies swinging in the southern breeze" makes me feel uneasy. Those lyrics creates an unpleasant image in my head and makes me feel sympathetic and ashamed for the victims of those lynchings.  It disgusts me that anyone could let alone preform this act and then take a picture and sell it.   This song had the power to waken the political activism that some people didn't know that they had because it brought attention to acts they might have been blind. The power of music is a very strong thing.