“White people had Judy Garland — we had Nina,” Richard Pryor once said. Nina Simone’s honey-coated, slightly adenoidal cry was one of the most affecting voices of the civil rights movement — “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free” is still heartbreaking, “To Be Young, Gifted and Black” life-affirming. She could belt barroom blues, croon cabaret and explore jazz — sometimes all on a single record. “I heard her sing a song in French — I didn’t even know what she was saying, and I started crying,” says Mary J. Blige, who will play Simone in an upcoming feature film. “Then she goes from that to ‘Mississippi Goddam,’ singing it like a church record, but she’s cursing out the system. Nina could sing anything, period.”

Source:rollingstone.com