Perhaps a bit more conscious of contemporary soul trends than her previous Philips albums, this is still very characteristic of her mid-'60s work in its eclectic mix of jazz, pop, soul, and some blues and gospel. Hal Mooney directs some large band arrangements for the material on this LP without submerging Simone's essential strengths. The more serious and introspective material is more memorable than the good-natured pop selections here. The highlights are her energetic vocal rendition of the Oscar Brown/Nat Adderley composition "Work Song" and her spiritual composition "Come Ye," on which Simone's inspirational vocals are backed by nothing other than minimal percussion.© Richie Unterberger /TiVo

If this is blues, it's blues in the Billie Holiday sense, not the Muddy Waters one. This is one of Nina Simone's more subdued mid-'60s LPs, putting the emphasis on her piano rather than band arrangements. It's rather slanted toward torch-blues ballads like "Strange Fruit," "Trouble in Mind," Billie Holiday's own composition "Tell Me More and More and Then Some," and "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out." Simone's then-husband, Andy Stroud, wrote "Be My Husband," an effective adaptation of a traditional blues chant. By far the most impressive track is her frantic ten-minute rendition of the traditional "Sinnerman," an explosive tour de force that dwarfs everything else on the album.© Richie Unterberger /TiVo

When Wild Is The Wind was released in 1966, Nina Simone’s name was already closely associated with engagement and struggle. It is therefore only logical that this album, which regroups several sessions recorded for Philips in 1964 and 1965, is marked with dissent and revolt. In her own specific style. Because the 33-year-old singer knew how to do everything, she blended various styles, from bombastic to more intimate, from jazz ballads to more up-tempo titles. Moreover she always approached her art form with a true sense of dramaturgy, driving it through her singular voice or her streamlined piano. She reached a climax with her song Four Women that pieced together the portraits of four Afro-American women. Four stereotypes to expose endemic racism and injustice. Wild Is The Wind is also proof that Nina Simone was above all genres. Not fully jazz, not really blues, not entirely folk, or soul, she created her own language that many have copied but never equalled… © MZ/Qobuz

Both jazz and classical music are often better on stage than in the studio, and Nina Simone bridged the gap between both of these art forms. One of Nina Simone's best albums, It Is Finished, is a live recording. And Montreux, here, a compilation of her previously-unpublished performances at the famous jazz festival, ranks alongside that earlier work in terms of quality. In it we hear segments from five concerts given on the shores of Lake Geneva, in 1968, 1976, 1981, 1987 and 1990, all of which enjoy excellent sound quality. 1968 saw the second outing of the festival and the beginning of a long relationship between Nina Simone and Montreux. This concert was previously only available on rare and expensive pressings, and this release allows us to hear Simone's great works from those days (from I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free to Backlash Blues or See-Line Woman plus her cover of Ne me quitte pas) performed in a workmanlike but relaxed style. It was later, and most notably in 1976, that her music reached extremes, moving between a fresh breeze and a cathartic rampage. High priestess of soul, Nina Simone became a shaman, an enchantress who did what she wanted with music and audiences. From intimate ballads to trancelike Afro-Jazz, Simone reigns supreme, totally in command of her material. The tracks from 1990 show an artist tested by life's trials, with quite a different voice. She had lost confidence and power, but this fragility made her even more affecting. © Stéphane Deschamps / Qobuz

Nina Simone Sings the Blues, issued in 1967, was her RCA label debut, and was a brave departure from the material she had been recording for Phillips. Indeed, her final album for that label, High Priestess of Soul, featured the singer, pianist, and songwriter fronting a virtual orchestra. Here, Simone is backed by a pair of guitarists (Eric Gale and Rudy Stevenson), bassist (Bob Bushnell), drummer (Bernard "Pretty" Purdie), organist (Ernie Hayes), and harmonica player who doubled on saxophone (Buddy Lucas). Simone handled the piano chores. The song selection is key here. Because for all intents and purposes this is perhaps the rawest record Simone ever cut. It opens with the sultry, nocturnal, slow-burning original "Do I Move You," which doesn't beg the question but demands an answer: "Do I move you?/Are you willin'?/Do I groove you?/Is it thrillin'?/Do I soothe you?/Tell the truth now?/Do I move you?/Are you loose now?/The answer better be yeah...It pleases me...." As the guitarists slip and slide around her husky vocal, a harmonica wails in the space between, and Simone's piano is the authority, hard and purposely slow. The other tune in that vein, "In the Dark," is equally tense and unnerving; the band sounds as if it's literally sitting around as she plays and sings. There are a number of Simone signature tunes on this set, including "I Want a Little Sugar in My Bowl," "Backlash Blues," and her singular, hallmark, definitive reading of "My Man's Gone Now" from Porgy and Bess. Other notable tracks are the raucous, sexual roadhouse blues of "Buck," written by Simone's then husband Andy Stroud, and the woolly gospel blues of "Real Real," with the Hammond B-3 soaring around her vocal. The cover of Buddy Johnson's "Since I Fell for You" literally drips with ache and want. Simone also reprised her earlier performance of "House of the Rising Sun" (released on a 1962 Colpix live platter called At the Village Gate). It has more authority in this setting as a barrelhouse blues; it's fast, loud, proud, and wailing with harmonica and B-3 leading the charge. The original set closes with the slow yet sassy "Blues for Mama," ending with the same sexy strut the album began with, giving it the feel of a Möbius strip. Nina Simone Sings the Blues is a hallmark recording that endures; it deserves to be called a classic.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

Verve's Finest Hour collection of Nina Simone's work compiles 60 minutes of career highlights, including "Wild Is the Wind," "I Put a Spell on You," "Four Women," "I Loves You, Porgy," and "My Baby Just Cares for Me." Though it's by no means a definitive compilation of Simone's music, it does provide a welcome overview of her Verve years.© Heather Phares /TiVo

Epic's The Essential Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble gathers two discs' worth of the late blues guitarist's work, including many live performances and a few tracks with the Vaughan Brothers. The collection presents Vaughan's material in roughly chronological order, from the 1980 live recording "Shake for Me" to 1989's "Life by the Drop." It also touches on most of Vaughan's definitive songs and performances, including "Tightrope," "Wall of Denial," "Couldn't Stand the Weather," and "Cold Shot," and live versions of "The Sky Is Crying," "Superstition," and "Rude Mood/Hide Away." Though this album doesn't offer anything that hasn't already been released in some form or another, it does go into slightly more depth than several of the other Stevie Ray Vaughan retrospectives by presenting both his greatest studio hits and some of his best live work.© Heather Phares /TiVo

When Wild Is The Wind was released in 1966, Nina Simone’s name was already closely associated with engagement and struggle. It is therefore only logical that this album, which regroups several sessions recorded for Philips in 1964 and 1965, is marked with dissent and revolt. In her own specific style. Because the 33-year-old singer knew how to do everything, she blended various styles, from bombastic to more intimate, from jazz ballads to more up-tempo titles. Moreover she always approached her art form with a true sense of dramaturgy, driving it through her singular voice or her streamlined piano. She reached a climax with her song Four Women that pieced together the portraits of four Afro-American women. Four stereotypes to expose endemic racism and injustice. Wild Is The Wind is also proof that Nina Simone was above all genres. Not fully jazz, not really blues, not entirely folk, or soul, she created her own language that many have copied but never equalled… © MZ/Qobuz

After moving from the blues to soul for her second RCA album, Nina Simone's extroverted, confident delivery proved a natural match with the ranks of soul shouters working the crowds during the late '60s. A plane ticket to Memphis or Muscle Shoals could've resulted in one of Simone's best works; unfortunately, this set was recorded in New York, and it shows. Simone does well taking on Dusty Springfield for "The Look of Love," though the sedate supper-club backing doesn't quite jive with her smooth, studied performance. Better are the less familiar tunes, like the highlight "It Be's That Way Sometimes" (written by Simone's brother Sam Waymon), "Go to Hell," and "I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free," a trio of songs Nina Simone has no trouble making her own.© John Bush /TiVo

There's a lot more Broadway and a lot more ballads than blues on this, which ranks as one of Simone's weaker mid-'60s albums. Almost half the record features Broadway tunes on the order of Cole Porter and Rodgers & Hammerstein; most of the rest was composed by Bennie Benjamin, author of her first-rate "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," which the Animals covered for a hit shortly afterwards (and which leads off this record). The other Benjamin tunes are modified uptown soul with string arrangements and backup vocals in the vein of "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," but aren't in the same league, although "How Can I?" is an engaging cha-cha. Besides "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood," the album is most notable for the great "SeeLine Woman," a percolating call-and-response number that ranks as one of her best tracks.© Richie Unterberger /TiVo

After an uncharacteristic (for her) four-year hiatus from recording, Nina Simone returned to the fringes of the pop world with Baltimore, the only album she recorded for the CTI label. While it bears some of the musical stylings of the period -- light reggae inflections that hint of Steely Dan's "Haitian Divorce" -- the vocals are unmistakably Simone's. Like many of her albums, the content is wildly uneven; Simone simply covers too much ground and there's too little attention paid to how songs flow together. As a result, a robust torch piano ballad like "Music for Lovers" is followed immediately by one of Simone's more awkward moments, an attempt to keep up with a jaunty rhythm track on a cover of Hall & Oates' "Rich Girl." Still, one must give her credit for always being provocative in her cover song choices, as she clearly scores on the Randy Newman-penned title track and a dramatic reading of Judy Collins' "My Father." Her voice throughout is in fine form, even when she phones it in on the album-closing traditional gospel tunes, but arranger David Matthews is a mismatch for her: He blows the arrangements with excessive string overlays and needlessly blaring background vocals. Simone herself all but disavowed the album shortly after its release, testament to her eternally contrarian, iconic nature. Despite her misgivings, though, Baltimore is an occasionally spellbinding if erratic album, a challenging and worthwhile listen for people ready to dip into the lesser-known entries in Nina Simone's vast catalog.© Joseph McCombs /TiVo

Let It All Out is one of Nina Simone's more adult pop-oriented mid-'60s albums, with renditions of tunes by Duke Ellington ("Mood Indigo"), Billie Holiday ("Don't Explain"), Irving Berlin ("This Year's Kisses"), and Rodgers & Hart ("Little Girl Blue"). As ever, Simone ranges wide in her selection: Bob Dylan's "The Ballad of Hollis Brown," a swaggering adaptation of "Chauffeur Blues" (credited to her husband of the time, Andy Stroud), the gospel hymn "Nearer Blessed Lord," and Van McCoy's "For Myself." "Images" is an a cappella adaptation of a poem about the beauty of blackness by Waring Cuney. All of Simone's Philips albums are solid, and this is no exception, although it isn't the best of them.© Richie Unterberger /TiVo