On the hunt for murals of North Carolina musicians - Nina Simone

Nina Simone Mural - Tryon, NCPhoto byKim McKinney

I’m back on the NC Musician Murals trail and this time I took a trip to the beautiful mountain town of Tryon, NC to see the Nina Simone mural.

It took a while to find it, as the address I had found was incorrect. After searching and help from a couple of kind locals, I can now tell you with assurance you will find the mural right outside the Tryon city limits, at the intersection of US 176 and NC 108. It’s on the back wall of the gas station at that intersectiom (once a Sunoco, now a Marathon.) I believe the address of the gas station is 3950 Lynn Rd.

Simone was born “Eunice Kathleen Waymon” in Tryon in 1933, and from an early age picked up the piano - playing by ear beginning at the age of three-years old.

Pianist Muriel Mazzanovich moved to Tryon and Simone began to get formal piano training from her and develop a passion for playing classical music.

Simone attended Julliard for a year. Mazzanovich had started a fund for her musical education, supported by the Tryon community. Simone studied for a year there, but ran out of money.

She applied for a scholarship to attend Curtis Institute of Music, located in Philadelphia where her family had moved . She was devastated when she was not chosen for a scholarship.

Heartbroken she turned away from classical music and started playing the blues and jazz in Atlantic City. Around this time she changed her name to Nina Simone, to keep her Methodist minister-mother from knowing she was playing in bars.

But it was a bar owner that eventually encouraged her to sing as she played. This was a life changing decision.

The depth of her talent and training created the artist who became known as “The High Priestess of Soul”. But Simone, whose music had so many layers, didn’t like the moniker. In her mind, if her music was classified as anything it was closer to folk and the blues, though she never felt the need for labels. She constantly evolved and showed her talent was a multi-faceted prism.

Simone was not without controversy. In the 60s she purposely moved away from love ballads and began writing songs that were a soundtrack to the civil rights movement to which she was dedicated.

Simone released her first album in 1957 and released over 30 albums altogether, the last being “A Single Woman”in 1993.

For an idea of the performance strength of Simone, pause a minute and listen to Simone sing “I Put a Spell On You”.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ua2k52n_Bvw&pp=ygUgTmluYSBTaW1vbmUgSSBwdXQgYSBzcGVsbCBvbiB5b3U%3D

If you visit Simone’s hometown of Tryon, you’ll find not only the mural but a beautiful sculpture of her by Zenos Frudacis.

Photo byKim McKinney

A group is currently working to preserve her childhood home in Tryon, an effort that began after four black New York artists bought the home in 2017. Tennis great Venus Williams and those four artists are among a group holding a New York fund-raising gala in May 2023.

The muralist Scott Nurkin, of Chapel Hill, created a mural that shows Simone’s strength and vulnerability. His gorgeous artwork on the mural trail is a reminder of some of the musical talent that has taken root in North Carolina. Nina Simone and other artists will be better remembered as the result of his artistry.

To read about a couple of the other murals on the trail I have visited, you can go here. There are more to come! Join me on the trail.