Passage: Nina Simone, 70

Jazz giant Nina Simone, whose powerful, raspy voice helped define the civil rights movement, died Monday at her home in France. Simone was known for her enormous musical range as well as her ability to switch genres on a dime. She straddled jazz, blues, pop, gospel and folk and was also a brilliant pianist. Simone established jazz credentials in 1959 with her hit interpretation of George Gershwin's "I Loves You Porgy" and by the mid-'60s the enigmatic Simone was playing to diverse audiences. After a period of self-impose exile during the '70s, her re-release of "My Baby Just Cares for Me" in 1987 sold 175,000 copies in the first week. Born Eunice Waymon, she changed her name to Nina Simone in 1954. Nina, Spanish for "little girl," and Simone "because I liked the way it sounded."