I demand perfection in what I do, and I practice very hard before I give a concert-sometimes three to six hours a day.
NINA SIMONEYou’ve got to learn to leave the table When love’s no longer being served”.
More Nina Simone Quotes
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Music is an art and art has its own rules.
NINA SIMONE -
I made wine from the lilac tree/Put my heart in its recipe/It makes me see what I want to see/And be what I want to be.
NINA SIMONE -
I play piano, by ear. Yes, I write songs and good ones.
NINA SIMONE -
Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood,” a song that was written for Simone, she confronted the band’s lead singer, Eric Burdon. “So you’re the honky,” she said, “who stole my song and got a hit out of it?
NINA SIMONE -
I’m a real rebel with a cause.
NINA SIMONE -
My job is not done. I address my songs now to the third world. I am popular all over Asia and Africa and the Middle East, not to speak of South Africa, where I’m trying to go to see Nelson Mandela.
NINA SIMONE -
It was always Marx, Lenin, and revolution – real girl’s talk.
NINA SIMONE -
Greed has driven the world crazy. And I think I’m lucky that I have a place over here that I can call home.
NINA SIMONE -
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.
NINA SIMONE -
My love is like the wind and wild is the wind. Give me more than one caress, satisfy my hungriness. Let the wind blow through your heart for wild is the wind.
NINA SIMONE -
I love the classics but there are many new ideas to be made into reality. I’d rather be concerned with my own thing. There are many masters of classical piano so I’ll leave it to them.
NINA SIMONE -
I would like a man now who is rich, and who can give me a boat – a sailboat. I want to own it and let him pay for it. My first love is the sea and water, not music. Music is second.
NINA SIMONE -
Life is short. People are not easy to know. They’re not easy to know, so if you don’t tell them how you feel, you’re not going to get anywhere, I feel.
NINA SIMONE -
Birds flying high you know how I feel Sun in the sky you know how I feel Breeze driftin’ on by you know how I feel And this old world is a new world And a bold world For me And I’m feeling good I’m feeling good.
NINA SIMONE -
I had heard blues and jazz all my life but I was never aware that it was associated with nightclubs and drinking.
NINA SIMONE -
Music is a gift and a burden I’ve had since I can remember who I was.
NINA SIMONE -
When a child is gifted, people try to help that child.
NINA SIMONE -
You can’t help it. An artist’s duty, as far as I’m concerned, is to reflect the times.
NINA SIMONE -
What kept me sane was knowing that things would change, and it was a question of keeping myself together until they did.
NINA SIMONE -
If I want to take a particular form of blues somewhere else I have the equipment to do it but I never even thought of it.
NINA SIMONE -
My name sounds French but that’s just a stage name.
NINA SIMONE -
I try to swim every damn day I can, and I’ve learned to scuba dive and snorkel.
NINA SIMONE -
I do love to sing Jacques Brel songs, intensely. I get terribly excited, just by reading a couple of lines in any one of his songs.
NINA SIMONE -
It doesn’t matter to me what is going on today because my music encompasses every kind of mood that exists in human beings. That’s my stick.
NINA SIMONE -
Theory and harmony broadened my mind in music. I know what music is made of.
NINA SIMONE -
It’s a good time for black people to be alive.
NINA SIMONE