Nathan visits Nina Simone’s home town

Noted author and music entrepreneur David Nathan visited Tryon this past weekend from London “to walk in the footsteps of a lifelong friend Nina Simone.”
Nathan presently sits on the Nina Simone Music Festival committee, and NSP director Crys Armbrust acknowledges that Nathans “general background, experience and counsel has been invaluable in the early planning stages for the projected NSP music festival, NinaFest.”
Nathan, who is generally acclaimed as “the British Ambassador of Soul,” was instrumental in building Nina Simones British fan base, beginning in the late 1960s. He, along with his sister Sylvia Hampton, founded the British-based Nina Simone Appreciation Society and coauthored the first Nina Simone biography, Break Down and Let It All Out (Sanctuary Publishing, 2003). His volume Soulful Divas (Crown Publishing, 1999) is the standard volume on preeminent female performers in popular music. Numbered among his earliest protgs are Aretha Franklin, Patti LaBelle and Roberta Flack.
Nathan presently also serves as board secretary to the national Rhythm and Blues Foundation and is past president of the Los Angeles chapter of the Grammys National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences. He is scheduled to return again to Tryon in February for the dedication of the Zenos Frudakis Nina Simone sculpture.