"The Help" by Kathryn Stockett
This was a bookclub choice and I enjoyed reading about the 60's civil rights issues in a fictional context of the maids of white women telling their stories. This was an era that meant a lot to me. I still am stirred and moved to tears by Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech which I found on YouTube. I had only heard voice recordings of it before.
I heard Nina Simone sing at the Marco Polo Supper Club in Vancouver in the 60's and she probably didn't sing "Mississippi Goddam" since it was a primarily white audience and they had come to listen to mellow jazz. The record I bought at the time was pretty mellow stuff too. This was my first introduction to her and I became a tremendous fan and was so pleased to hear she eventually went to Europe and escaped all the racist nonsense. She died in the south of France in 2003 when we were there and Jim was doing a teaching gig.
I first heard the song when we bought a CD of hers in the south of France in 2002 when Jim was on his first teaching gig. The rendition on this CD is very powerful and angry quite different from the YouTube. Maybe I'll look at a few other ones on YouTube and see what they're like.
I didn't know she wrote the song in response to the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, where the four little girls were killed.
"She says that after hearing about the bombing she ran home and attempted to build a gun out of her husband’s (an ex-policeman) various parts. However, she decided, “I knew nothing about killing, and I did know about music.” Thus, “Mississippi Goddam” was born. “Mississippi Goddam” was released one month after the March on Washington for jobs and Freedom and was soon banned in many southern states."
Addition:
So I found the rendition she did on the CD I have. It's shows off her piano playing skills too. There are just stills rather than the live performance. Pretty special for me to see that early live performance of the song.
