Nina Simone died today. She was 70. O I will miss her! I might have made fun of her sometimes, but it was only because I admired her. She did not compromise herself. Reading about Lester Young right now I see so many parallels in their lives, only Nina somehow managed to live longer. I think she was able to channel the anger caused by racism more effectively into her music than Lester was. Lester focused that in on himself and it ruined his health.

It’s sad that they never worked together; although they were very different, almost diametric opposites, I think deep down they had similar feelings about society. They just expressed themselves differently, each in their own way: Lester Young played “Stardust” and Nina Simone played “Young, Gifted and Black.”