In which city did Nina Simone play small clubs during her exile?
After walking offstage in 1970 to protest segregated seating, Nina Simone fled to Barbados, then Liberia, before settling in Paris. There she played tiny Left Bank clubs for cash while teaching voice at the American School. To avoid French taxes, she carried her fee in a cigarette tin and slept on friends’ couches. The rough years birthed her rawest record, Baltimore (1978), produced reluctantly under Creed Taylor; Simone hated its reggae sheen but conceded it kept her lights on.
