An astonishing performance by 16 year old Janis on the Smothers Brothers show.
Come to my door, baby,
face is clean and shining black as night.
My mother went to answer, you know,
and you looked so fine.
Now I can understand your tears and your shame.
She called you "boy" instead of your name.
When she wouldn't let you inside.
When she turned and said
"But honey, he's not our kind."
She said I can't see you any more, baby.
Can't see you anymore.
Walk me down to school, baby.
Everybody's acting deaf and blind.
Until they turn and say
why don't you stick to your own kind.
(Not sure about the rest of this verse. It sounds to me like)
My teachers all laugh, they smirk and stare.
Cutting deep down in our affair.
Preachers of equality. They say "Believe us"
but why won't they just let us be?
They say I can't see you anymore, baby.
Can't see you anymore.
One of these days I'm gonna stop my listening,
Gonna raise my head up high.
One of these days I'm gonna raise my glistening wings and fly.
But that day will have to wait for awhile.
Baby, I'm only society's child.
When we're older things may change.
But for now this is the way they must remain.
I say I can't see you any more, baby.
Can't see you anymore.
No, I don't wanna see you any more, baby
Janis Ian (born Janis Eddy Fink, April 7, 1951) is an American songwriter, singer, musician, columnist, and science fiction author.[1] Ian first entered the folk music scene while still a teenager in the mid-sixties; most active musically in that decade and the 1970s, she has continued recording into the 21st century. In 1975, Ian won a Grammy Award for her song, "At Seventeen".
Biography
Childhood
Born to a Jewish family in New York City,[2] she was primarily raised in New Jersey, initially on a farm, and attended East Orange High School[3] and the New York City High School of Music & Art. Her parents, Victor (a music teacher) and Pearl, ran a summer camp in upstate New York. In that Cold War era they were frequently under government surveillance because of their left-wing politics. Ian would allude to these years later in her song "God and the FBI". Young Janis admired the work of folk pioneers such as Joan Baez and Odetta. Starting with piano lessons at the age of 6 or 7, by the time she hit her teens, Ian had learned the organ, harpsichord, French horn, flute and guitar.[4] At the age of 12, Ian wrote her first song, "Hair of Spun Gold," which was subsequently published in the folk publication Broadside and was later recorded for her debut album. In 1964, she legally changed her name to Janis Ian, using as her new last name her brother Eric's middle name.[2]Music career
At the age of thirteen, 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 George "Shadow" Morton and released three times between 1965 and 1967, "Society's Child" finally became a national hit upon its third release, after Leonard Bernstein featured it in a TV special titled Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution.[2] The song's lyrical content was taboo for some radio stations, and they withdrew or banned it from their playlists accordingly; in her 2008 autobiography Society's Child, Ian recalls receiving hate mail and death threats as a response to the song, and mentions that a radio station in Atlanta that played it was burned down. In the summer of 1967, "Society's Child" reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100, the single having sold 600,000 copies, and the album 350,000.[5]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 on a double CD entitled Society's Child: The Verve Recordings in 1995.
"Fly Too High" (1979), produced by disco producer Giorgio Moroder, was her contribution to the soundtrack of the Jodie Foster film Foxes, also featured on Ian's 1979 album Night Rains. It earned her a Grammy nomination and became a hit single in many countries, including South Africa, Belgium. Australia, Israel, and the Netherlands.
Another country where Ian has achieved a high 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 topped Oricon's album chart in October 1976. "You Are Love (Toujours Gai Mon Cher)" is the theme song of Kinji Fukasaku's 1980 movie Virus, which was the most expensive Japanese film ever made at the time. Ian has cut several other singles specifically for the Japanese market, including 1998's "The Last Great Place". Even now, she's still regarded as the Godmother of Japanese singer-songwriters, and has a thriving career there and in Europe.
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). She walked away from her CBS contract in 1982, while it still had three albums to go. Ian deliberately spent much of the 1980s and early 1990s without a record deal. During the 1982–1992 period she continued to write songs, often in collaboration with songwriting partner Kye Fleming, which were covered by the likes of Amy Grant, Bette Midler and Marti Jones. She also studied under acting coach Stella Adler and struck up a close friendship with her, which continued until the latter's death in 1992.
Ian finally became one of the first "indie artists," resurfacing in 1993, with the worldwide release of Breaking Silence and its title song about incest.[7] She also came out as a lesbian with that release. She also, in 1993, made her The Howard Stern Show appearance, where she performed a "new" version of "At Seventeen" about Jerry Seinfeld. Since then Ian has released several albums.
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.[8]
She still tours and has a devoted fan base. Her autobiography, "Society's Child," was released by Penguin in mid-2008 to critical acclaim.
Other artists have recorded Ian's compositions, most notably Roberta Flack, who had a hit in 1973 with Ian's song "Jesse",[7][dead link] also recorded by Joan Baez and Dottie West; Ian's own version is featured on her 1974 album Stars (the title song of which has also been oft-covered, including versions by Cher, Nina Simone and Barbara Cook). Other artists who have recorded or performed songs written or co-written by Janis Ian include Amy Grant, Jeanette Dimech, Sheena Easton, Michele Pillar, Mel Torme, Michelle Wright, Bette Midler ("Some People's Lives," a song written by Ian and her then-partner Kye Fleming, became the title song of her 1990 album), Jann Arden, and Japanese singer Shiina Ringo (covered Ian's breakthrough Japanese hit, "Love Is Blind").
Criticism of the RIAA
She is an outspoken critic of the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA),[9] 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.[10] Along with science fiction author Eric Flint, she has argued that their experience provides conclusive evidence that free downloads dramatically increased hard-copy sales, contrary to the claims of RIAA and NARAS.[11] Ian's signature tune "At Seventeen" sold over two million singles in the United States alone yet was never certified."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.'"[12]
Writing and editing
Ian has been a regular columnist for, and still contributes to the LGBT news magazine, The Advocate.[15] She has a selection of her columns available on her website.[16] She also contributed a column to Performing Songwriter magazine from 1995 through 2003.[17]
On July 24, 2008, Janis Ian released her autobiography Society's Child (published by Penguin Tarcher) to much critical acclaim. An accompanying double CD, The Autobiography Collection, has also been released with many of Ian's best loved songs.
Personal life
Ian married Portuguese filmmaker Tino Sargo in 1978; they divorced in 1983. Details of Sargo's physical and emotional abuse were discussed in Ian's autobiography, Society's Child. After moving to Nashville, she met Patricia Snyder in 1989. Ian has a stepdaughter by Snyder, and two grandchildren.[18] Ian came out as a lesbian in 1993 with the worldwide release of her album Breaking Silence.[7] Snyder and Ian were married in Toronto on August 27, 2003.[19]Ian's mother, Pearl, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1975. To deal with her disease, Ian and her brother convinced Pearl to pursue her lifelong dream of going to college. Pearl eventually enrolled in Goddard College's adult education program, ultimately graduating with a Master's degree. After Pearl's death, Ian decided to auction off merchandise and raise money to endow a scholarship at Goddard specifically for older continuing education students. This began what became the Pearl Foundation, which funds scholarships at other colleges including Warren Wilson College.[18]
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