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Drawings inspired by Nina

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Information on the Four Black schoolgirls killed in Birmingham church bombing, the turning point in Nina’s life  

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A brilliant timeline of a lot of Nina Simone’s career and important events

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“Railway Piano Bank” Making Part 2

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“Railway Piano Bank” Making Part 1

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The design of the piggy bank

The idea is change the piggy bank into Railway Piano Bank.

Nina’s  Piano

The railway represents the separation of white society and black society.

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Speech for the final video

You can rely on the old man's money High and dry, out of the rain You don’t have to live next to me  Just give me my equality It's so easy to hurt others when you can't feel pain Hound dogs on my trail School children sitting in jail You know it's true Our dreams shall not be deferred Because when you hurt my brother You hurt me too

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These are all of the clips that make up the new lyric collage for part one of our project. In editing them together I have removed one line that this process allowed me to see didn’t fit. From listening to the way Nina say each line originally I want to find something in this which ties it all together so I can create a new song from this. It is not going to be easy! 

Tumblr didn’t allow me to upload the whole clip.

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Tips on preaching

Sermon Close-SomeThing Good Is Going To Come Out of This-Pastor HB Charles Jr. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYk6PFUEVb4

I love how this pastor integrates singing and the music in slowly as what he is saying gets closer to the point and he becomes more passionate about what he is preaching. 

It reminds me of musical theatre where the actors only start singing when their words are not enough and they only dance when singing is not enough. This is to express that how intense emotion they are feeling of communicating and can be an effective tool to communicate with an audience.

From my research there are some key points to being a good preacher.

1. Finding your own voice, or for the purpose of our excises as we don’t have the 11 years some preachers claim it takes, we must find a voice which seems honest to ourselves. 

 2. Preparation. We only have a short length of time to spread our message so preparing ourselves intellectually and emotionally/spiritually is key. This could be meditating but I don’t think that is in line with what Nina Simone would do. 

I can’t find anything on how she prepared but I know that all singers might do vocal warmer ups to prepare their voices and prevent damage. Tongue twisters can also assist in preventing mistakes. It is also important to do breathing exercises to reinforce how you should be breathing while singing which is normally only in between sentences or you create a confusing gap. Some songs do not allow for this gap or require a long time between breath so this is a good thing to include to improve your performance. Warming up your body should not be forgotten either, singing takes your whole body and Nina loved to dance and move around a lot so a warm up would have assisted her. Finally doing some piano practice beforehand like doing scales could have been part of her practice.

Trying these could help us to jump into the speech without any awkward transition from us to our preaching. 

3. Focus on the message and the wider context instead of yourself

4. For us remembering why Nina and we should be passionate about this cause should help us communicate our message. This is like a pastor would remember why it is important to preach the word of God. We could achieve this by watching video or might I suggest listening to parts of Martin Luther Kings speech, ‘I have a dream’ one Nina would have been inspired by. Or even one from the recent black lives matter marches to remind us why Nina’s message is still relevant today. Final suggestion, one of Nina’s songs like Mississippi goddam or Old Jim Crow.

5. Pacing and the peak

Preaching often starts slower and more considered with space for the audience to react. It the slowly builds in volume, pace and of course passion. We should mark these parts out and apply them to any work we do with words of Nina’s.

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First Draft of the possible song

You can rely on the old man's money (while) High and dry, out of the rain - The only word I added :) It's so easy to hurt others when you can't feel pain

You know it's true When you hurt my brother You hurt me too

I thought I had you beat Now I see you walkin' And talkin' up and down my street

I can't stand the pressure much longer Somebody say a prayer

Hound dogs on my trail School children sitting in jail Black cat cross my path I think every day's gonna be my last

You don't have to live next to me Just give me my equality

Always living with the threat of death ahead Folks you'd better stop and think Everybody knows we're on the brink

How I long to know the truth There are times when I look back And I am haunted by my youth

Oh but my joy of today Is that we can all be proud to say To be young, gifted and black Is where it's at

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Sections of Nina Simone’s activists songs

Rich Girl

'Cause you know it don't matter any way You can rely on the old man's money It's a bitch, girl but it's goin' too far Don't you know woh, that it's wrong, yeah To take what he's givin' you? So far gone, oh, you can get along You can try to be strong but you'll never be strong, yeah High and dry, out of the rain It's so easy to hurt others when you can't feel pain 

Old Jim Crow

Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over now Old Jim Crow You've been around too long Gotta work the devil 'Til your dead and gone Old Jim Crow You know it's true When you hurt my brother You hurt me too Old Jim Crow I thought I had you beat Now I see you walkin' And talkin' up and down my street

Mississippi Goddam 

I can't stand the pressure much longer Somebody say a prayer 

Hound dogs on my trail School children sitting in jail Black cat cross my path I think every day's gonna be my last

You don't have to live next to me Just give me my equality

Young, gifted and black

Young, gifted and black How I long to know the truth There are times when I look back And I am haunted by my youth Oh but my joy of today Is that we can all be proud to say To be young, gifted and black Is where it's at

"Why? (The King Of Love Is Dead)"

Always living with the threat of death ahead Folks you'd better stop and think Everybody knows we're on the brink

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How the Jim Crow laws effect black people today

This song was written by Nina Simone. I think it is a brilliant and powerful song. Only Nina could have written this song it really captures her passion and anger towards the black civil rights movement.

"Old Jim Crow" Old Jim Crow Where you been baby Down Mississippi and back again Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over now Old Jim Crow What's wrong with you It ain't your name It's the things you do Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over now Old Jim Crow You've been around too long Gotta work the devil 'Til your dead and gone Old Jim Crow Yes, don't you know It's all over now It's all over now Old Jim Crow You know it's true When you hurt my brother You hurt me too Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over now

Old Jim Crow I thought I had you beat Now I see you walkin' And talkin' up and down my street Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over now

Old Jim Crow You've been around too long Gotta work the devil 'Til your dead and gone Old Jim Crow don't you know It's all over All over Oh Lord, it's all over All over It's all over It's all over It's all over now.

The Jim Crow Laws

In the 1890’s the Southern states made a new set of laws, black codes, called “Jim Crow.” These laws made it illegal for black and white people share public facilities. “Separate but equal”- this was a constitutional law that was supposed to present that racial segregation did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution. But these laws hurt a lot of people not just many people of color but white people as well. Even if it was as simple as not using the same water fountain that white people drank out of.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/wj73j9/health-effects-jim-crow-laws-cancer

Jim Crow may have been legally outlawed in 1964, but many of its health effects may only now be emerging for black Americans who lived under its racist rule in their early childhoods.

What researchers increasingly believe is that “health in adulthood is shaped by the environment experience early on in life”

We should remember that black American’s born when Jim Crow laws where still in effect could be as young as 57.

White nurses where able to refuse black patients care and even the blood supply being segregated. Hospitals which treated black patients were limited and by 1946, fewer than 10 percent of all births of black children in Mississippi took place in a hospital compared with nearly 70 percent of white births. This would have cause higher infant mortality, preventable health complications that could lead to long term effects, and this would also put the mother in more danger of death and other health issues.

Today there is a striking disparity in maternal and infant mortality rates between African American women and non-Hispanic white women in the United States. African American women across the income spectrum and from all walks of life are dying from preventable pregnancy-related complications at three to four times the rate of non-Hispanic white women, while the death rate for black infants is twice that of infants born to non-Hispanic white mothers. This is caused by many factors. We can only overcome this if African American women and infants are prioritized and inequality and racism within America’s structures and institutions are addressed. 

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-beginning/202003/racial-disparities-in-us-maternal-and-infant-mortality-rates

White scientists, to justify that black people should be kept as slaves argued that black women feel less pain and there for all black people must feel less pain. The discrimination and sexism was a foundation for slavery to be justified and to what extent does the impact the black infant mortality rate? One reason given by black women give that could contribute to this disparity is that they are not believed in the same way that non-Hispanic white women are about how their feels and the pain they are in.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT0rL4TvX-I

A new study on the connection between breast cancer and Jim Crow adds to this growing body of literature. Krieger and her colleagues found black women born before 1965 in Jim Crow states were more likely to have estrogen-receptor-negative breast cancer, which tends to be more aggressive and more difficult to treat. But black women born after the abolition of Jim Crow showed no such Jim Crow effect, a finding that suggests the racial disparity in more aggressive breast cancer is the product of racism.

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The only song I can find Nina sang about money

I have put usable lines in bold

"Rich Girl" You're a rich girl and you're goin' too far 'Cause you know it don't matter any way You can rely on the old man's money You can rely on the old man's money It's a bitch, girl but it's goin' too far 'Cause you know it don't matter any way Say money, money won't get you too far Won't you too far Don't you know woh, that it's wrong, yeah To take what he's givin' you? So far gone, oh, you can get along You can try to be strong but you'll never be strong, yeah You're a rich girl and you're goin' too far You know it don't matter any way You can rely on the old man's money You can rely on the old man's money It's a bitch, girl but it's goin' too far 'Cause you know it don't matter any way Say money, money won't get you too far Get you too far High and dry, out of the rain It's so easy to hurt others when you can't feel pain Don't you know that a love can't grow 'Cause it's too much to give 'Cause you'd rather live for the thrill of it all Rich girl and you're goin' too far 'Cause you know it don't matter any way You can rely on the old man's money You can rely on the old man's money It's a bitch, girl, but it's goin' too far 'Cause you know it don't matter any way Say money, money won't get you too far Say money, money won't get you too far Say money, money won't get you too far Won't get you far

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=POFMiT6PsIM - a link to Nina singing it.

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Nina Simone’s Child

Lisa Simone 

Nina Simone had one child, Lisa, from her marriage to Andrew Stroud. However, Lisa and her mother did not have a good relationship, and Lisa has been outspoken about abuse she suffered from her mother. Nina Simone was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and was known to have violent episodes. Lisa Simone was in the Air Force for ten years, and she has performed on Broadway.

Later in her life when she started performing on Broadway Lisa joined her mother on stage in multiple performances. After her mothers death she continued to do tribute performances like ‘SIMONE ON SIMONE’, my tribute to ‘The Great One Who Walked before Me”.

On her website which begins by going through her life, which I can only assume is to make sure she is the author of her own story, she says this:

April 21, 2003, Nina Simone died in her southern France home. From that day forward, I stopped using my given name, often saying “When Nina died, Lisa did, too”.  3 months later I left Broadway and my theatrical career behind.

In the Netflix documentary: What Happened, Miss Simone?, released in 2015, Lisa Simone Kelly served as the film's executive producer along side others. In an interview on live American television she said that she made a pledge to her mother when she passed away that she would ensure that she would be remembered properly in a way that she deserved. Lisa said that her mother was one of the greatest entertainers of all time but she paid a price. Her heart and her peace of mind and many of the goals and material processions she could have had she forwent to stand up for what she believed in. 

It was clear from the interview that Nina’s dream of becoming a classical pianist being destroyed because of the colour of her skin had a great impact on her. Also the fact that she had to go against her mother and play ‘the devils music’ (worldly music) to make a living and hide it from her would have also taken a toll even though she was happy to be playing and being recognised.

She further emphasised what a dramatic shift took place and said Nina broke  when the four black children where murdered and characterised that part of her life as the mad stage from which she never returned. Because of the decisions she made to stand up for the greater good and feel like she was contributing in a way that most other artists were not doing she ended up being alone, personally and professionally.

Lisa said that it is wrong to assume Simone became Nina Simone on stage when really that’s who she was all the time, this was a problem for her. This is helpful for us as this means that we already know more about than if it was just a character or another version of herself. 

The mirror -   'My mother Nina Simone gave me such beatings but now I know she really did love me'

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-2687770/Nina-Simones-daughter-Lisa-My-mummy-never-cared-me.html

Lisa has more painful memories.

She can vividly recall the last time her mother subjected her to a vicious beating. It was 1977 in Geneva, Switzerland, the latest in a string of locations she’d been dragged to after her parents split up.

Lisa had endured many violent rages at the hands of the singing legend. But the latest took her sadistic cruelty to a different level.

“I came home and she was waiting for me with the branch of a tree,” Lisa says. “I got such a beating and was left with a black eye.

“I also remember when I was 10 years old she beat me with a money belt filled with coins. When my schoolmates would see me afterwards they’d burst into tears.

Already struggling with being bipolar, Nina would often take out her frustrations on her daughter.

Lisa - “I was so tired of hurting, moving places and being ripped away from people I cared about and feeling lonely and unwanted,” she says. “I just wanted it to stop.”

Lisa escaped to start a new life with her father in New York.

The claims made in this article are supported by a similar article in the daily mail (https://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/event/article-2687770/Nina-Simones-daughter-Lisa-My-mummy-never-cared-me.html). It goes into more detail about their difficult relationship past her childhood and the physical Nina herself suffered.

Lisa now says that she remembers her mother with great love and misses her. She followed this by saying believe it or not, I’d love to spend time with her in the place that I am now as an older mature woman. This hints at their troubled relationship but claims that as she has grown up she has forgiven and understands and has fondness for her mother in a way that she couldn’t before.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbKU_lE_8Hk

https://lisasimonemusic.com/about/

https://study.com/academy/answer/did-nina-simone-have-children.html

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Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister and civil-rights activist who had a seismic impact on race relations in the United States, beginning in the mid-1950s. 

Nina Simone was a great admirer of Martin Luther King and believed that, like Nelson Mandela did in South Africa, he would have become president of America if he wasn’t assassinated in 1968. Furthermore she believed there hasn’t been a man like him since that could overcome racism and become a black president as there was just something about him that was unlike anybody else. Nina knew him personally as said there was no difference between who Martin was in public and who he was in private. 

"I Have a Dream" is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963, in which he called for civil and economic rights and an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., the speech was a defining moment of the civil rights movement and among the most iconic speeches in American history. 

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” 

Nina Simone released the song Mississippi Goddam in 1964 so so most definitely would have heard this speech before writing the song.

Other Martin Luther King Jr.’s quotes 

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly."

—"Letter from Birmingham Jail," April 16, 1963

“We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor, it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

—"Letter From Birmingham Jail," April 16, 1963

In 1965 when Martin Luther King lead thousands marching 54 miles for the black right to vote in Alabama and the south, Nina decided to take the song Mississippi Goddam there to perform it to an audience who would appreciate it unlike a lot of her white followers who rejected her for this song. 

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Goddam Mississippi was released in 1964

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Lorraine Hansberry

 Pushed Nina to use her art as a form of social protest

Hansberry was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. She died on January 12, 1965. After her death, Nemiroff adapted a collection of her writing and interviews in To Be Young, Gifted and Black, which opened off-Broadway at the Cherry Lane Theatre and ran for eight months.

A Raisin in the Sun is considered one of the hallmarks of the American stage and has continued to find new audiences throughout the decades

“Seem like God didn't see fit to give the black man nothing but dreams -but He did give us children to make them dreams seem worth while.”

“Something always told me I wasn't no rich white woman.”

Quotes from A raisin in the sun which could be seen as relevant to Nina.

“To Be Young, Gifted and Black” - Written by Nina Simone in response to Hansberry’s death.

In the whole world you know There's a million boys and girls Who are young, gifted and black And that's a fact

When you're feeling really low Yeah, there's a great truth that you should know When you're young, gifted and black Your soul's intact

There are times when I look back And I am haunted by my youth 

https://www.biography.com/writer/lorraine-hansberry