I Am Nina

I Am Nina tells the story of the jazz legend Nina Simone (1933 - 2003) over several decades, from being rejected by the famed musical academy Curtis Institute of Philadelphia through a turbulent marriage, to her stay in Liberia and time in Switzerland.

At the webpage of Nordic Black Theatre the following, among other things, is written about I am Nina:

"Nina Simone has moved millions of people all over the globe since the 1960es. A pianist, a wholly unique singer, civil rights advocate, mother, woman, icon... Simone means much to many. It is well known that she led a difficult life, with many ups and downs. Through music, dance and theatre, we examine Nina's life and world. How was it to be Nina? How significant was her music in her time, and what does it mean to us today?"

In the printed performance program, director Cliff Moustache writes the following, among other things:

"We leave the perspective of Nina seen from a difference, and still so close, where she plays, sings and shares her history with us, with herself, as she looks into the mirror.

We observe Nina in her own universe, see her emotionally bare and witness how she takes control of her own destiny. We see her fighting to accept the disappointments she has met as a person and an artist.

With I am Nina, I wish to tell the story of Nina Simone from two different angles, and still keep a unique character, like a valuable and rare instrument with thousands of sounds inside."

SOURCES:

Nordic Black Theatre, 27.10.2016, http://nordicblacktheatre.no/2016/10/02/premiere-nordic-black-theatre-presenterer-nina-simone/

Printed performance program, I am Nina, Nordic Black Theatre

Lillian Bikset, theatre critic, Facebook post October 27 2016:
"This production is a great deal more than a musical cabaret of beloved songs. It's a story not just about resilience, but about the necessity of resilience. It's a story of vulnerability and strength - of strength in vulnerability and of vulnerability in strength. It's about a whole person, a full person, and an interesting person. In an era where there's yet again a need to state what should be self-evidently obvious - that black lives matter - it feels topical, yet true to its time, yet timeless." 

 Hilde Halvorsrød, November 2 2016, Scenekunst.no [Oslo]:
"The highlights also include some musical moments with goose bumps, such as when Nosizwe Baqwa sings one of Nina's very greatest hits, I loves you Porgy (from the Gershwin opera Porgy and Bess), with an impressive nerve and involvement, and when both Ninas stand still with Black Panther fists reaching upwards during the whole of the civil rights song Young, Gifted and Black. In a strong musical performance, the two stony bodies symbolise the lynchings of the past, and the contemporary police brutality, still unbelievably common 70 years after Rosa Parks."

Mona Levin, October 14 2017, Aftenposten [Oslo]:
"The choice of I am Nina as anniversary performance is not just a good one, and a well-played one, but also most topical in a time where it keeps being necessary to remind people that 'black lives matter'. The production also shows the professionalisation NBT has gone through. (...) Jazz was – to use the words of Nina Simone – 'a way of thinking for blacks in America'. Soul and blues were more her languages, with some Bach, French chansons, a little bit of folk mixed in - and several of the poetic and revolutionary texts use slavery as a backdrop. [...] A competent selection of them makes up this moving musical biography, superbly performed by two Norwegian Ninas (Nosizwe Baqwa and Mariama Astrid Ndure). The first with blues in all of her rich and warm range, and with increasing temperature in her expression, the other more direct, perhaps more forgiving or dreamier, both of them with scarred souls."