--- title: Nina Simone: What the Singer Was Like in Concert description: A 1970 music review in LIFE magazine described Nina Simone, subject of the new biopic 'Nina,' as a powerhouse performer with indifference toward her audience. canonical: https://time.com/4264792/nina-simone-performer/ author: Eliza Berman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2016-04-22T14:30:04.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-08-04T07:56:02.124Z og:title: What Nina Simone Was Really Like as a Performer og:description: A 1970 music review in LIFE magazine described Nina Simone, subject of the new biopic 'Nina,' as a powerhouse performer with indifference toward her audience. og:url: https://time.com/4264792/nina-simone-performer/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0764f27f5616ff29/69888ba0524fc033dadf73fd/160318-nina-simone.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Nina Simone og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: What Nina Simone Was Really Like as a Performer twitter:description: A 1970 music review in LIFE magazine described Nina Simone, subject of the new biopic 'Nina,' as a powerhouse performer with indifference toward her audience. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt0764f27f5616ff29/69888ba0524fc033dadf73fd/160318-nina-simone.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # What Nina Simone Was Really Like as a Performer > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: 'Nina' Trailer [Watch (HLS stream): 'Nina' Trailer](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/jhi6Rx89.m3u8) (2:30)  _Published 2016-03-04. Zoe Saldana stars as the legendary singer Nina Simone._  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Apr 22, 2016 2:30 PM UTC  Nina Simone performs at the Salute to Freedom benefit concert. August 5, 1963. Nina Simone performs at the Salute to Freedom benefit concert. August 5, 1963. Grey Villet—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Apr 22, 2016 2:30 PM UTC The Nina Simone biopic [_Nina_](http://time.com/4245177/zoe-saldana-nina-trailer/), out April 22, has been plagued by controversy ever since it was first announced in 2012 that the actress Zoe Saldana had been cast to play its subject. The casting decision was [described](https://www.buzzfeed.com/kateaurthur/how-nina-became-a-disaster-movie#.sw4KKJRgZj) by some as evidence of colorism—hiring a lighter-skinned actress to play a woman who celebrated her beauty as a dark-skinned black woman—and Simone’s [family](http://time.com/4246449/nina-simone-zoe-saldana/) said that its storyline was false. There has been so much acrimony surrounding the movie that the subject central to the film—Simone’s music—has been all but lost in the noise. When LIFE magazine ran a review of one of her shows in the fall of 1970, written by critic Albert Goldman, Simone was emerging from a decade that had cemented her as a voice of the Civil Rights Movement. She had responded to tragedies like Medgar Evers’ and Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassinations and the bombing of Birmingham’s 16th Street Baptist Church with songs like “[Mississippi Goddam](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fVQjGGJVSXc)” and “[Why (The King of Love Is Dead)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Uy8cyVWU2A).” She performed regularly at civil-rights meetings and used her music as a venue for incisive social commentary. From the moment she took the stage, Goldman said, the “High Priestess of Soul” was utterly captivating. Clad in “an exotic white gown, hair held high in an Afro topknot, a regal circlet of pearls girdling her forehead,” Simone began her set with “Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair,” her “soft, hazy voice cover\[ing\] the mind like the morning mist.” He compared her to Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday but noted that, where the popularity of jazz had faded with the rise of the Woodstock Generation, she had found a way in. “She has built her reputation so high as the toughest, funkiest, most hand-clappin’ ‘n’ finger-poppin’ of soul sisters,” he wrote, “that all she has to do is walk out on the stage of the Fillmore and the kids start taking the place apart.” In retrospect, it’s perhaps not surprising that Goldman found Simone’s presence between songs less appealing than the music itself. It was around this time that her deep frustration with America’s racial politics had her thinking about leaving the country behind—which she soon would, eventually settling in France. Though Goldman critiqued what he perceived as her hostility toward her audience, there was no question about why fans still showed up to listen: “Her hard, dark voice rises and falls,” he wrote, “with the imploring intonations of the blues.” ## Transcript [ BLANK_AUDIO ] [ MUSIC ] Do you know who I am? Yeah. My mother used to listen to you. Nina Simone. [ APPLAUSE ] I want you to come with me. I will pay you $ 2, 000 a month. In return you take care of all my affairs. Plane leaves at 9AM ask your momma. When you get sunshine pain and bring it upstairs. I brought you some food and your medication. I didn't ask for any of [ MUSIC ] [ NOISE ] She's a complicated lady. [ MUSIC ] [ NOISE ] Tell him to give me my money! Drinks, smokes? She is out of shape. [ MUSIC ] [ NOISE ] Want to go to the gym? [ LAUGHTER ] No! What happened Nina? Why are you playing in front of 100 people and not 20, 000? I'm dying. No one wants to see to see her play the way she is now. I won't make it. Yes you will. [ UNKNOWN ] help, you make this happen. I'll try. [ MUSIC ] I don't wanna hear about Nina's comebacks. [ MUSIC ] She needs this. I wanna feel free. [ MUSIC ] You're astonishing. This song kept us marching. Made me believe that we had a chance. [ MUSIC ] What is freedom to you? I'll tell you what freedom means to me. No fear. If I can have that for half of my life, no fear, that's the only way. Way that I can describe it. Everyone thinks that you are- Crazy. 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