Simone on Simone

“It’s time to get to me.” Simone, the daughter of the late Nina Simone states after she lets out a sigh of relief. It has taken her 16+ years to release her debut album, Simone on Simone. The finished project includes eleven original Nina Simone tracks, one she and Nina Simone performed together and one in which Simone wrote in dedication to her mother, titled Child in Me. Though she resembles her mother aesthetically, she is definitely an artist in her own right.

Simone is delicate. Alike her mother, she paints pictures with her voice. Vivid portraits of love, pain and growth shape the pedigree she’s grown to appreciate and uses to her benefit. Ancestry is a beautiful thing. Aligning herself with her roots by definition to sustain an internal stability in whom she is and where she comes from determined progression in her life. “Music is freedom to me; it’s the ultimate form of self expression in my world.” Sharing a passion for music was not Nina Simone’s desire for her daughter. 1994 was the first time Nina Simone saw her daughter perform at Shanghai Reds in L.A. Simone often recounts how often her mother tried to discourage her from getting into the corrupt world of music especially the business behind it.

“To me that wasn’t pressure; just regular paying my dues. Some people may think that’s pressure to me, but it’s not. My mother thought it was pressure when she was trying to talk me out of being in the music industry. People are going to expect that you will sound like me, play the piano and sing civil rights songs, she’d say. I’d say that 75% of people are going to be impressed by what they do hear, despite the fact that I’m Nina Simone’s daughter.”

Recounting the many pitfalls her mother had in the entertainment industry, Simone was determined not to make those same decisions. “With me being the administrator of my mother’s estate; I’ve learned many things on the business end. And this is the music business and if your business isn’t right, then your music won’t go far. Look at the whole James Brown thing on TV when he died; that’s an example of many artists of my mothers era that were victims of bad deals, that benefited the people around them, then the artist themselves.”

Honoring her mother was a natural choice when approaching a music career. Born Lisa Celeste Stroud, she adopted the name Simone to pay respects to the “one that walked before her” and has passed that name onto her daughter. “A lot of people are surprised that I have decided to come out and cover my mothers’ music instead of doing my own thing. I’ve had reporters ask me…most kids try to make their own mark, why did you choose to do this type of process instead? I’m very secure with who I am and where I come from. I don’t need the approval of the world to have my own identity. We don’t spend enough time as a generation to honor it and get to know it. A lot of us are walking around not knowing who we are. I’m paying tribute to my mother, and then I can get to myself.”

Simone on Simone includes well known songs sung by Nina Simone such as; Keeper of the Flame, Love
Me or Leave Me, Black is the Color of My true Love’s Hair and Go to Hell. Working with producer Bob Beldon, she has refined an original and creative project, including working with a big band. Classifying herself as a funk and R&B girl, considering jazz was a step in a different direction. Comparing jazz to gospel, she states she could do it in her sleep. Tragically passionate and emotional is how you could describe Simone on Simone. It’s a tour de force of musical reflections from the past represented in such a manner that will impress present day listeners. Those new and familiar with Nina Simone will get the best of both worlds; music that could never be repeated sung by a legends daughter that knows how to represent an image carefully preserved in more memories then her own.

It‘s easy being Nina Simone’s daughter. No matter how confident and down to earth Simone’s sincerity is in being her own artist; she’s the spawn of a woman that transcended music, crossed genres and sustained a respect worldwide. Natural and easy going, Simone’s voice exudes confidence and there isn’t a moment of sheer insecurity. “My music is for me and it encompasses a lot of the lessons I’ve learned and experiences I’ve had in my life; with the hope that they will receive something positive. It starts with me and is conveyed to the audience with hopes that it will help someone.”

Beyond Simone on Simone, Simone has maintained her mother’s estate and foundation, respectively named The Nina Simone Foundation; a non-profit organization whose mission is to raise money towards the education of African American children and children in Africa. Not realizing how extensive sustaining a foundation would be, she fully dedicated herself to her music first. “I’m so glad to be finish with that twist and turn. It’s taken me 16-17 years to do my debut CD and the last time I was very close to doing my project, my mom passed away and it didn’t take a whole lot for me to put first thing first and I was dealing with the estate for 4 years. So, I went ahead and went in the studio and did Simone on Simone and now I’m glad it’s over and really glad to be self actualizing this point in my life. I didn’t realize how extensive that (The Nina Simone Foundation) was, it’s a career in itself and all of a sudden this huge thing grew from the earth. And right now, it’s about giving to my music and my dream and the rest will take care of itself.”