In Liz Garbus’s new documentary, What Happened, Miss Simone?, Nina Simone’s guitarist, Al Schackman, explains that the late singer and pianist had a way of taking a piece of music and “metamorphosizing it” – or morphing it into her own experience.
Songs she chose to cover often became standards, and a handful of those are included on Nina Revisited, a Robert Glasper-co-produced companion album to Garbus’s doc. It boasts many beautiful arrangements and performances (especially from Gregory Porter, Jazmine Sullivan and Mary J. Blige), but the only singer who comes close to Simone’s ability to make the personal seem utterly dependent on the political is Lauryn Hill.
Five of Nina Revisited’s 16 songs belong to Hill, a significant contribution for many reasons but mainly because, like Simone, her radical views also alienated her from the pop mainstream. Whether Hill’s singing or rapping, the fearlessness and tempestuous drama in her voice are palpable – and matched by equally raw accompaniment that makes many of the other cuts sound a little too clean by comparison.
Top track: Wild Is The Wind, by Ms. Lauryn Hill
Listen at NPR here.
