Janis Ian
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| Janis Ian | |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Janis Eddy Fink |
| Born | April 7, 1951 |
| Genre(s) | Folk |
| Occupation(s) | Singer/songwriter, author |
| Years active | 1965 — present |
| Website | http://www.janisian.com/ |
Janis Ian (born April 7, 1951[1]) is a Grammy Award-winning American songwriter, singer, multi-instrumental musician, columnist, and science fiction fan-turned-author. She had a successful singing career in the 1960s and 1970s, recording into the 21st century.
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[edit] Biography
[edit] Childhood
Born Janis Eddy Fink in New York City,[2] she was primarily raised in New Jersey and attended East Orange High School[3] and the New York City High School of Music & Art. At age thirteen, she legally changed her name to Janis Ian, her new last name being her brother's middle name.[2]
[edit] Music career
At the age of fifteen, Ian wrote and sang her first hit single, "Society's Child (Baby I've Been Thinking)," about an interracial romance forbidden by a girl's mother and frowned upon by her peers and teachers; the girl ultimately decides to end the relationship, claiming the societal norms of the day have left her no other choice. Produced by melodrama specialist George "Shadow" Morton and released three times between 1965 and 1967, "Society's Child" finally became a national hit the third time it was released, after Leonard Bernstein featured it in a TV special titled Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution.[2] The song's lyrical content was too taboo for some radio stations, and they withdrew or banned it from their playlists accordingly. In the summer of 1967, "Society's Child" reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100.
Apparently "Society's Child" was too hot for Atlantic Records as well at the time. Ian relates on her website that although the song was originally intended for Atlantic and the label paid for her recording session, the label subsequently returned the master to her and quietly refused to release it. Years later, Ian says, Atlantic's president at the time, Jerry Wexler, publicly apologized to her for this. The single and Ian's 1967 eponymous debut album were finally released on Verve Forecast; her album was also a hit, reaching #12. In 2001, "Society's Child" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, which honors recordings considered timeless and important to music history.
Her early music was compiled onto a double CD entitled Society's Child: The Verve Recordings in 1995. Many of these songs are extremely sad; a common theme is feeling badly treated by one's parents.
Her most successful single was "At Seventeen," released in 1975, a bittersweet commentary on adolescent cruelty and teenage angst, as reflected upon from the maturity of adulthood. "At Seventeen" received acclaim from record buyers — it charted at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 on the Adult Contemporary chart — and critics, as it won the 1975 Grammy for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance, beating out the likes of Linda Ronstadt, Olivia Newton-John and Helen Reddy. Ian performed "At Seventeen" as a musical guest on the very first episode of Saturday Night Live in October 1975. The song's parent album, Between the Lines, also hit #1 and earned a platinum certification for sales of one million copies. Another measure of her success is anecdotal - on Valentine's Day 1977, Ian received 461 Valentine cards, having indicated in the lyrics to "At Seventeen" that she never received any as a teenager.[4] "At Seventeen" can also be heard playing in the background in one scene in the 2004 movie Mean Girls. The movie, like the song, addresses the topic of teenage cruelty and alienation; the film features a character named "Janis Ian" who was not lesbian but was called so nonetheless by some of her classmates to demean her. The character was played by actress Lizzy Caplan. (The song starts at 46:38 on the Mean Girls DVD). "At Seventeen" is also mentioned in Jeffrey Eugenides's 1993 novel The Virgin Suicides, where the song is used by four girls imprisoned in their own home and essentially cut off from normal adolescent experiences to communicate with the narrator and his friends.
"Fly Too High" (1979) was her contribution to the soundtrack of the Jodie Foster film Foxes. It earned her a Grammy nomination and became a hit single in many countries, including South Africa, Belgium and the Netherlands.
Another country where Ian has achieved a surprising level of popularity is Japan. She had two top 10 singles on the Japanese Oricon charts, "Love Is Blind" in 1976, and "You Are Love" in 1980; and her album Aftertones was a #1 best-seller there in October 1976.
By contrast, in the U.S., Ian made the pop charts only once more after "At Seventeen" ("Under the Covers," #71 in 1981), though she had several more songs reach the Adult Contemporary singles chart through 1980 (all failing to make the Top 20, however). Ian spent much of the 1980s and early 1990s without a record deal; her label dropped her in 1981 following the disappointing sales of Miracle Row (1977), Night Rains (1979), and Restless Eyes (1981). "Basically, I didn't do anything from 1982 to 1992."[5]
Ian finally resurfaced in 1993 with the album Breaking Silence, its title song about incest.[6] She came out as a lesbian with that release. Also in 1993 was her infamous Howard Stern Show appearance where she performed a "new" version of "At Seventeen" about Jerry Seinfeld. Ian has released five albums since (including one live album, 2003's Working Without A Net).
Ian's most recent album, Folk Is The New Black, was released jointly by the Rude Girl and Cooking Vinyl labels in 2006. It is the first in over twenty years where she did all the songwriting herself.[7]
She still tours and has a devoted fan base.
Other artists have recorded Ian's compositions, most notably Roberta Flack, who had a hit in 1973 with Ian's song "Jesse"[6] (also recorded by Joan Baez; Ian's own version is featured on her 1974 album Stars). Ian also co-wrote "What About The Love?", featured on Amy Grant's 1988 album Lead Me On.
[edit] Criticism of the RIAA
She is an outspoken critic of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)[8], a record industry organization which she sees as acting against the interests of musicians and consumers. As such, she has willingly released several of her songs for free download from her website.[9] She was not only one of the first artists to do this but also was one of the first, along with author Eric Flint, to show conclusive evidence that free downloads dramatically increased hard-copy sales, contrary to the claims of RIAA and NARAS.[10]
"I've been surprised at how few people are willing to get annoyed with me over it," she laughs, "there was a little backlash here and there. I was scheduled to appear on a panel somewhere and somebody from a record company said if I was there they would boycott it. But that's been pretty much it. In general the entire reaction has been favorable. I hear from a lot of people in my industry who don't want to be quoted, but say 'yeah, we're aware of this and we'd like to see a change too'."[11]
[edit] Writing and editing
In addition to being an award-winning singer/songwriter, Ian writes science fiction. A long-time reader of the genre, she got into science fiction fandom in 2001, attending the Millennium Philcon. [12] Her works have been published in an assortment of anthologies, and she co-edited, with Mike Resnick, the anthology Stars: Original Stories Based on the Songs of Janis Ian, published in 2003 (ISBN 978-0756401771). When her schedule permits, she occasionally attends science fiction conventions[13].
Ian has been a regular columnist for, and still contributes to the LGBT news magazine, The Advocate.[14] She has a selection of her columns available on her website.[15]
[edit] Current life
Ian currently lives in Nashville, Tennessee, with attorney Patricia Snyder, whom she married in Toronto, Canada on August 27, 2003.
[edit] Discography
[edit] Albums
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[edit] Compilation albums
[edit] Selected Singles
[edit] DVDs
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[edit] Bibliography
- Who Really Cares: Poems From Childhood and Early Youth 1969 (2002 re-release) ISBN 978-1930709379
- Songbook 1999 ISBN 978-0769201481
- Stars: Original Stories Based on the Songs of Janis Ian 2003 ISBN 978-0756401771 (ed., with Mike Resnick)
- "Prayerville" 2003 (in Women Writing Science Fiction As Men, ed. Mike Resnick and Martin H. Greenberg ISBN 978-0756401481)
[edit] References
- ^ Janis Ian: A Life in Song (PDF). Janis Ian Website (2006). Retrieved on 2007-06-09.
- ^ a b c Ankeny, Jason (2003). in Bogdanov, Vladimir; Woodstra, Chris; and Erlewine, Stephen Thomas: All Music Guide to the Blues: The Definitive Guide to the Blues. Backbeat Books. ISBN 0879307366.
- ^ Nash, Margo. "JERSEY FOOTLIGHTS", The New York Times, March 16, 2003. Accessed December 19, 2007. "Yet when Janis Ian went to East Orange High School, she was kicked out of the chorus."
- ^ Rees, Dafydd; Luke Crampton (1996). Encyclopedia of Rock Stars. Dk Pub. ISBN 0789412632.
- ^ "Ian, Janis - folk singer/songwriter" interview with Dominick A. Miserandino
- ^ a b "At 42: Lesbian Legend Janis Ian Comes Out", interview with Owen Keehnen March 24, 2005
- ^ "Trying The Patience Of: Janis Ian", interview with David Bertrand Wilson
- ^ Ian, Janis (May 2002). The Internet Debacle - An Alternative View. Performing Songwriter Magazine. Retrieved on 2007-06-09.
- ^ Free Music Downloads on Janis Ian's official website
- ^ Prime Palaver #11 - letter by Janis Ian to Baen librarian, Eric Flint, September 16, 2002
- ^ Vanderhorst, Jan (October 2002). Janis Ian: Doing It From The Heart. Retrieved on 2007-06-09.
- ^ Prose and Stories by Janis Ian
- ^ Janis at Worldcon 2001
- ^ "Revenge is sweet for Janis Ian" by Jeff Walsh, March 1, 1996
- ^ Articles from The Advocate
[edit] External links
- Official website
- Works by Janis Ian at Project Gutenberg
- Janis Ian interview on Slashdot
- The Pearl Foundation
