|
Donald's Encyclopedia of Popular MusicA B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y ZIAN, Janis(b Janis Eddy Fink, 7 April 1951, NYC) Singer, songwriter. Father was a music teacher; she studied piano at three, guitar at eleven, began writing and performing at twelve. Made 'Society's Child (Baby I've Been Thinking)', about an interracial love affair; at first no one would play it, but then she was featured on a Leonard Bernstein TV special and it was a no. 14 hit '67. An eponymous debut LP was followed by For All The Seasons Of Your Mind and The Secret Life Of J. Eddy Fink '68, one more on Verve and an LP on Capitol, then quit at 19. She published Who Really Cares: Childhood Poems '69 (and read it for an audiobook 2016). She could not stop writing: her comeback Stars '74 on Columbia saw her in the LP chart again, but Between The Lines '75 was a no. 1 LP in the USA, helped by Grammy-winning no. 3 single 'At Seventeen', anthem of teenage angst by the now mature 24-year-old. Aftertones '76, Miracle Row '77, Janis Ian '78 all charted; Night Rain '79, an experiment with disco producer Giorgio Moroder, did not; Restless Eyes '81 again reached top 200 LPs. There was a Best-of on CBS/UK. In the '80s she was married to a Portuguese-born film-maker who left her with a black eye, and the authorities bankrupted her because her manager had not been paying her taxes; her mother came down with MS and she herself nearly died from a ruptured intestine. She collaborated with Nashville writer Rhonda Kye Fleming '86; she had been 'outed' as a lesbian (and disapproves of 'outing': 'I think it sucks'), and moved to Nashville '88 for the company of songwriters, returning to the studio with Breaking Silence '93 on Morgan Creek (controversial as ever, with songs about incest), Present Company '94 on One Way, Revenge '95 and Hunger '97 on Grapevine. She published Society's Child: My Autobiography c.2013, and recorded it for an audiobook which won a Grammy. People who love her songs also love to hear her voice, and there were other audiobooks; she contributed to Stars: Original Stories Based On the Songs of Janis Ian 2003 and she recorded Catherine M. Wilson's When Women Were Warriors Book I in 2008. At age 70 in 2022, tired of being her own manager and publisher as well as a touring musician, she announced her retirement and released what she said would be her last album, The Light At The End Of The Line. But we bet she doesn't stop writing. |