North Sea Jazz Festival. The Legends - Nina Simone

The first edition of the North Sea Jazz Festival took place in 1976 in the Nederlands Congresgebouw in The Hague. Some numbers in those early days: six venues, three hundred artists and about nine thousand visitors. In this very first festival year internationally renowned jazz legends performed, such as Sarah Vaughan, Count Basie, Dizzy Gillespie and Stan Getz, as well as most Dutch avant-garde artists. In 2006, the festival moved to its current, bigger, location in Rotterdam. 

Nowadays the North Sea Jazz Festival is staggering in size, touted as the world's largest indoor jazz festival and that's certainly a good bet. With 13 stages running from late afternoon until the early morning hours, it's far more than a smorgasbord. More like an avalanche, but one where the music fan happily stands at the bottom of the mountain. North Sea Jazz is known all over the world because of the many musical genres it has to offer, ranging from traditional New Orleans jazz, swing, bop, free jazz, fusion, avant-garde jazz and electronic jazz; to blues, gospel, funk, soul, R&B, hip hop, world beat and Latin.

I had an opportunity to attend on the North See Jazz Festival in 2010 and indeed it was very impressive.  It was the 35th edition of North Sea Jazz Festival, and I have enjoyed performances by Earth Wind and Fire, Diana Krall, Corinne Bailey Rae, Pat Metheny Group, Joss Stone, Sonny Rollins and Norah Jones, Stevie Wonder, Macy Gray and many others.

The Legends - Part Eleven

Nina Simone

Eunice Kathleen Waymon, better known by her stage name Nina Simone, was born in Tryon, North Carolina on February 21st, 1933. The child prodigy played piano at the age of four. With the help of her music teacher, who set up the "Eunice Waymon Fund", she could continue her general and musical education. She studied at the Julliard School of Music in New York.

To support her family financially, she started working as an accompanist. In the summer of 1954 she took a job in an Irish bar in Atlantic City, New Jersey. The bar owner told her she had to sing as well. Without having time to realize what was happening, Eunice Waymon, who was trained to become a classical pianist, stepped into show business. She changed her name into Nina ("little one") Simone ("from the French actress Simone Signoret").

In the late 50's Nina Simone recorded her first tracks for the Bethlehem label. These are still remarkable displays of her talents as a pianist, singer, arranger and composer. Songs as Plain Gold Ring, Don't Smoke In Bed and Little Girl Blue soon became standards in her repertoire.

One song, "I Loves You, Porgy", from the opera "Porgy and Bess", became a hit and the nightclub singer became a star, performing at Town Hall, Carnegie Hall and the Newport Jazz Festival. Even from the beginning of her career on, her repertoire included jazz standards, gospel and spirituals, classical music, folk songs of diverse origin, blues, pop, songs from musicals and opera, African chants as well as her own compositions.

Her gift to give new and deeper dimensions to songs resulted in remarkable versions of "Ain't Got No... I Got Life" (from the musical "Hair"), Leonard Cohen's "Suzanne", Bee Gees songs as "To Love Somebody", the classic "My Way" done in a tempo doubled on bongos, "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" and four other Bob Dylan songs. This gift culminated on her record "Emergency Ward": she set up an atmosphere that left no illusions and no escape, performing two long versions of George Harrison songs: "My Sweet Lord" (to which she added a David Nelson poem, Today is a Killer) and "Isn't it a Pity".

But Nina tried to escape anyway. She felt she had been manipulated. Disgusted with record companies, show business and racism, she left the USA in 1974 for Barbados. During the following years she lived in Liberia, Switzerland, Paris, The Netherlands and finally the South of France. In 1978 a long awaited new record was released, "Baltimore", containing the definite rendition of Judy Collins' My Father and an hypnotizing Everything Must Change.

Her next album, "Fodder On My Wings", was recorded in Paris in 1982 and is based on her self-imposed "exile" from the USA. More than ever determined to make her own music, Nina wrote, adapted and arranged the songs, played piano and harpsichord and sang in English and French. The 1988 CD re-release of this album included some bonus tracks, e.g. her extraordinary version of "Alone Again Naturally", reminiscing her father's death.

In 1984, one of her concerts at Ronnie Scott's in London was filmed, resulting in a captivating video, featuring Paul Robinson on drums. A song from her very first record, "My Baby Just Cares For Me", became a huge hit and "Nina's Back" was not only the title of a new album; her concerts would take her all over the world again.

In 1989 she contributed to Pete Townsend's musical "The Iron Man". In 1990 she recorded with Maria Bethania; in 1991 with Miriam Makeba. That same year, her autobiography, "I Put A Spell On You" was published. It was translated into French ("Ne Me Quittez Pas"), German ("Meine Schwarze Seele") and Dutch ("I Put A Spell On You, - Herinneringen").

In 1993 a new studio album was released. "A Single Woman" includes several Rod McKuen songs, Nina's own "Marry Me", her version of the French standard "Il n'y a pas d'amour heureux" and a very moving "Papa, Can You Hear Me?"

No less than five songs from her repertoire were used in the 1993 motion picture sound track of "Point Of No Return" (also called "The Assassin", code name: "Nina"). Many other films feature her songs (e.g. "Ghosts of Mississippi", 1996: "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel To Be Free", "Stealing Beauty", 1996: "My Baby Just Cares For Me "and "One Night Stand", 1997: "Exactly Like You").

Her music continues to excite new and young listeners. "Ain't Got No... I Got Life" was a big hit in 1998 in The Netherlands, just as it had been there 30 years before...

Together with her regular accompanists Leopoldo Fleming (percussion), Tony Jones (bass), Paul Robinson (drums), Xavier Collados (keyboards) and her musical director Al Schackman (guitar), she still excites audiences all over the world. At the Barbican Theatre in London in 1997 she sang Every Time I Feel The Spirit as a tribute to one of America's first and foremost leaders in the cause of Civil Rights, peace and brotherhood, singer and actor Paul Robeson. More spirituals and "blood songs" would follow: Reached Down And Got My Soul, The Blood Done Change My Name and When I See The Blood.

Nina was the highlight of the Nice Jazz Festival in France in 1997, the Thessalonica Jazz Festival in Greece in 1998. At the Guinness Blues Festival in Dublin, Ireland in 1999 her daughter, Lisa Celeste, performing as "Simone", sang a few duets with her mother. Simone has toured the world, sung with Latin superstar Rafael, participated in two Disney theatre workshops, playing the title role in Aida and Nala in The Lion King.

On July 24, 1998 Nina Simone was a special guest at Nelson Mandela's 80th Birthday Party. On October 7, 1999 she received a Lifetime Achievement in Music Award in Dublin. In 2000 she received Honorary Citizenship to Atlanta (May 26), the Diamond Award for Excellence in Music from the Association of African American Music in Philadelphia (June 9) and the Honorable Musketeer Award from the Compagnie des Mousquetaires d'Armagnac in France (August 7).

Dr. Simone passed away after a long illness at her home in her villa in Carry-le-Rouet (South of France) on April 21, 2003. As she had wished, her ashes were spread in different African countries.

Here is my top 10 of her songs:

1.   "My Baby Just Cares For Me"
2.   "I Loves You Porgy"
3.   "Feeling Good"
4.   "Sinnerman"
5.   "Don't Smoke In Bed"
6.   "Mississippi Goddam"
7.   "My Way"
8.   "Here Comes The Sun"
9.   "Love Me Or Leave Me"
10. "I Put Spell On You"