Musical Trailblazers– Nina Simone: Racism in the U.S. Music Industry (Part 6/8)

In a bleak time of the Cold War and Civil Rights eras, there were musicians that became a beacon of light for the people that needed it. They pushed social boundaries and became activists, fighting for their beliefs and ultimately, changing the musical landscape of the period. Next up, Nina Simone.

Image: The Guardian

Another artist that used music to participate in the Civil Rights movement was a Black female artist named Nina Simone. Simone’s music “was dedicated to a purpose more important than classical music’s pursuit of excellence; it was dedicated to the fight for freedom and [what she referred to as] the historical destiny” (Simone and Cleary 91) of Black people in the U.S. (Brooks, 178) She separated herself from other Black female musicians of the 1960s by generating an aesthetic of “protest music” (Brooke, 178). Her music not only informed her listener about stories of Black loss, exploitation, discrimination, and tragedy, but was a direct challenge against White supremacy in the United States. In her song “Mississippi Goddam'', Simone sang of White and American betrayal, the burden of dehumanizing Black stereotypes, and the American government’s political accusations about Communism. She wrote the song immediately after four young girls in Birmingham Alabama were killed in a church bombing (Cohodas). Her lyrics were a direct address to the force she was fighting against– White supremacy. She accused the government of political irony: “they say it’s all a communist plot; all I want is equality” (Simone). In this line she questioned the government for accusing her desire for equality to be part of a pro-Communist agenda. However, throughout the entire Cold War era, the people in power of the international image of the United States attempted to portray a facade of unity and equality amongst the American people. It seems hypocritical that a government that supposedly supported equality also shamed it for political reasons.

Other lines that Simone sang were “Washing the windows… Picking the cotton… You're just plain rotten… You're too damn lazy… The thinking's crazy” and “Yes you lied to me all these years, You told me to wash and clean my ears, And talk real fine just like a lady, And you'd stop calling me Sister Sadie, Oh but this whole country is full of lies'' (Simone). She outlined the dehumanizing stereotypes of Black people in United States society– the expectations to pick cotton and the perception of laziness. The term “Sister Sadie” was a demeaning term that White people used when refusing to address Black people by their titles– despite their age or position (Cohodas). Simone used that term in context to emphasize the dishonesty and deception of America, which exploited her and gave her false hope as Black person living in the country. In her performance of the music, Simone became heated in her unrest with the past and current racial situation of the United States. She said, as quoted in Cohodas: “And I was beginning to get angry then. First you get depressed… and then you get mad. And when these kids got bombed, I sat down and wrote this song. And it’s a very moving, violent song cause that’s how I feel about the whole thing” (Cohodas). Simone’s commentary on her own music aligned with certain definitions of political music from earlier on in the essay– where music described a social problem in emotional terms (Dunaway). Evidently, Simone’s music showed the other role of political music during the Cold War and Civil Rights Movement– a way of expressing frustration with a certain social issue and directly addressing the root of the problem (White authority, in this case).

Bibliography

Brooks, Daphne A. "Nina Simone's Triple Play." Callaloo 34, no. 1 (November 2011): 176-97. Accessed May 19, 2021. https://www.jstor.org/stable/41242603.

Cohodas, Nadine. "'Mississippi Goddam'—Nina Simone (1964)." Library of Congress. Last modified 2018. Accessed May 6, 2021. https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-recording-preservation-board/documents/MississippiGoddam.pdf.

Dunaway, David King. "Music and Politics in the United States." Folk Music Journal 5, no. 3 (1987): 268-94. Accessed May 19, 2021. https://www.jstor.org/stable/4522239.

Simone, Nina. "Mississippi Goddam." 1964.

#ninasimone #mississippigoddam #civilrights #coldwar #musicaltrailblazer