Nina Simone

“I think that the artists who don't get involved in preaching messages probably are happier - but you see, I have to live with Nina, and that is very difficult.”

“Once I understood Bach's music, I wanted to be a concert pianist. Bach made me dedicate my life to music, and it was that teacher who introduced me to his world.”

“At this crucial time in our lives, when everything is so desperate, when every day is a matter of survival, I don't think you can help but be involved.”

“Greed has driven the world crazy. And I think I'm lucky that I have a place over here that I can call home.”

“You feel the shame, humiliation, and anger at being just another victim of prejudice, and at the same time, there's the nagging worry that maybe... you're just no good.”

“Slavery has never been abolished from America's way of thinking.”

“To me, we are the most beautiful creatures in the whole world. Black people. And I mean that in every sense.”

“I'm a real rebel with a cause.”

“The protest years were over, not just for me but for a whole generation, and in music, just like in politics, many of the greatest talents were dead or in exile, and their place was filled by third-rate imitators.”

“What I was interested in was conveying an emotional message, which means using everything you've got inside you sometimes to barely make a note, or if you have to strain to sing, you sing.”

“As a political weapon, it has helped me for 30 years defend the rights of American blacks and third-world people all over the world, to defend them with protest songs. To move the audience to make them conscious of what has been done to my people around the world.”

“I'm not a blues singer, I'm a diva.”

“When I'm on that stage, I assume honor. I assume compensation, and I should.”

“Desegregation is a joke.”

“I try to swim every damn day I can, and I've learned to scuba dive and snorkel.”

“I flirt all the time. I like men! I don't think we can do without them.”

“I had spent many years pursuing excellence, because that is what classical music is all about... Now it was dedicated to freedom, and that was far more important.”

“I don't like rap music at all. I don't think it's music. It's just a beat and rapping.”

“Did you know that the human voice is the only pure instrument? That it has notes no other instrument has? It's like being between the keys of a piano. The notes are there, you can sing them, but they can't be found on any instrument. That's like me. I live in between this. I live in both worlds, the black and white world.”

“To most white people, jazz means black and jazz means dirt, and that's not what I play. I play black classical music.”