From a new episode of "A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs" — "Episode 169: 'Piece of My Heart' by Big Brother and the Holding Company."
Lots of great stuff in that episode, including how intelligent Janis Joplin was and how much her singing was based on imitation:
Joplin would always claim to journalists that her stage persona was just her being herself and natural, but she worked hard on every aspect of her performance, and far from the untrained emotional outpouring she always suggested, her vocal performances were carefully calculated pastiches of her influences — mostly Bessie Smith, but also Big Mama Thornton, Odetta, Etta James, Tina Turner, and Otis Redding....
[Producer John Simon thought Joplin] was soulless because she was giving calculated performances. To him, a great blues or jazz singer sang a song differently every time, putting feeling into it. Janis *sounded* like she was putting feeling into the performances, but in truth she had worked out every nuance of her performance, every scream or moan or gasp, pulling in bits of phrasing from Tina Turner or Etta James or Otis Redding, and would perform it exactly the same way every time.
As [producer Elliot] Mazer later said “Janis would sing a song basically the same way every damn time. The guys working on the 1993 boxed set at Columbia would call me up and say, ‘It’s amazing! Seventeen takes and she sounds the same on every one!’… She was really smart, about the smartest artist I ever worked with. She had a vanity about her singing and she sang the words, the meaning, and orchestrated a way of doing it that was very moving. It was this incredibly powerful combination of intellect and spontaneous feeling. There’s a magic to it that few people can get.”
Listen to the whole thing, which is full of musical clips, including one of what might be the most authentic version of her voice, "So Sad to Be Alone," where she sounds like Joan Baez.
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66 comments:
Obama killed any chance of a "post racial utopia."
Judgment in color blocs. Diversity precludes history of creativity.
I am under the impression that these terms [ blue note, blue chord] were contemporary with, if they did not precede and foreshadow, the period of our innumerable musical 'Blues.' What the uninitiated tried to define by that homely appellation was, perhaps, an indistinct association of the minor mode and dyspeptic intonation with poor digestion; in reality, it is the advent in popular music of something which the textbooks call ambiguous chords, altered notes, extraneous modulation, and deceptive cadence. [Carl Engel, "Jazz: A Musical Discussion," The Atlantic Monthly, August 1922]
- etymonline.com
None of this suprising. In fact, it goes all the way back to Jazz and the big bands, where black musicians thought whites were "Ripping off" their music and getting paid for it.
Supposedly, one reason for Bebop was guys like Parker and Gillespe wanted something commercial white boys like Goodman or Artie shaw couldn't copy - fast, improvised, amd creative.
I doubt Joplin was deliberately "stealing" from black singers anymore than Elvis did. They listened to black music on TV or radio, liked it, and did their version. The beatles were the same. They listened to all kinds of music, and then Incorporated it into their music.
The whole history of popular music in the 20th century was black musicians inventing ragtime, then jazz, then big bands, then rock n'roll, and then disco and rap or whatever.
The whites then pick it up, and give it their own twist. One reason pop music has reached a such a dead zone, is black musicans aren't leading the way to new kind of music.
I listen to a lot (and I mean A Lot) of music related podcasts, and am a well read music snob. Andrew’s podcast is absolutely the best music podcast around. I strongly recommend his interview with Rick Rubin on Rubin’s podcast.
It's true, IMO. Joplin was a one-trick pony. Vastly overrated.
I'll get to listening to it as soon as I catch up with the last few episodes of Sasquatch Chronicles podcast.
the more i listen to his podcasts, the less i think he knows.
Is it supposed to be The History of Black Soul Music in 500 songs? or the History of Rock Music?
Of course, what it Really is; is the history of english pop music
Keep in mind, he didn't just belittle Muddy Waters, he belittled Chuck Berry
I highly recommend Episode 165. it's a full history of the Grateful Dead, not just the song
Is it kosher to say that I couldn't stand her voice or her looks? Odetta, Tina, Otis, OTOH--amazing.
My wife and I were renting a little house when we got married, next door to another little house that had belonged to Estelle Axton (of STAX of blessed memory). When STAX started making money, she just landscaped her tiny yard and had a lot of brick features built for it.
She probably did some reno inside too, but it remained and is still a small house in a very modest neighborhood.
"white singers like Joplin who were influenced by Black musicians were thought of as not far from minstrelsy."
This racist insanity has got to stop.
So now, just singing the blues is on the same level as putting on blackface and doing a Minstrel show?????
Whenever any human being puts Black in upper case and white in lower case
I can't really pay attention to anything else they say
Their acceptance of racist grammar
and their mindless following of the AP style guide
is just so fucking embarrassing
"Keep in mind, he didn't just belittle Muddy Waters, he belittled Chuck Berry"
Really? Chuck Berry was the Founding father of Rock n' Roll.
So Janis ("every performance was the same") Joplin was a professional performer? That's shocking.
I saw Joe Williams (he used to sing with Count Basie) live a few...decades ago. During one of the songs in the set, I was really impressed by something that he *clearly* made up on the spot just for that performance. One of his live albums, Joe Williams at the Hollywood Bowl or some such, recorded a few years earlier, had exactly the same riff, sounding equally improvised. A craftsman as well as an artist.
What matters more, whether the artist feels something or whether she makes the listener feel something? Ideally, I guess, it would be both, but in the end I think it's better if she makes the listeners feel what she wants them to feel.
Perhaps she sang each song the same each time because she felt the same way about it every time. I don't know why it's better to feel or interpret it differently. She may have analyzed her emotions before she sang the song the first time and then figured out the best way to convey those emotions. Re-feeling it and reinterpreting it doesn't necessarily mean a better performance.
RC Ocean said : "The whole history of popular music in the 20th century was black musicians inventing ragtime, then jazz, then big bands, then rock n'roll, and then disco and rap or whatever.
The whites then pick it up, and give it their own twist. One reason pop music has reached a such a dead zone, is black musicans aren't leading the way to new kind of music.
On instruments the black musicians appropriated from white people. They should acknowledge this appropriation at every performance. And I have long thought that a measure of the success of black people in the USA is the death of their musical creativity. Perhaps they just don't suffer enough anymore.
Chuck Berry was the Founding father of Rock n' Roll.
not according to the 500 songs guy, he COMPLETELY glossed over Chuck's Entire career..
He spend FAR more time talking about "skiffle music" or some such english crap
oh, and he said that Robert Johnson was "overrated".. And he Never even mentions Lightning Hopkins (don't think he knew who BB King even was)
"how intelligent Janis Joplin was"
But not smart enough to stay away from heroin.
First Perry, now Joplin: two semi-wasted lives.
Gee! we are supposed to be shocked, shocked I say, that musicians are influenced (steal) by each other. Black folks aren't the consumers who made millions for Motown. Music is just part of the american culture, black or white just enjoy it.
Michael K said...
"Obama killed any chance of a "post racial utopia."
With DEI the chance of a colorblind society is null and void. Judging one on the content of one's character is somehow become white privilege or something. So when are the morons going to demand tearing down MLK's made in China statue?
"[Producer John Simon thought Joplin] was soulless because she was giving calculated performances,... she had worked out every nuance of her performance, every scream or moan or gasp,...and would perform it exactly the same way every time."
I was thinking something like this a few days ago, as I was watching an old Jay-Z performance. There's absolutely no room for spontaneity of any kind. It's Theater, not Rock 'N Roll. You might as well attend a performance of "Hamilton" instead.
Saint Croix said...
"Whenever any human being puts Black in upper case and white in lower case
I can't really pay attention to anything else they say"
My computer does that, and I deliberately go back and change it to lower case. That's what kind of racist I am.
Janice Joplin was in the Slide Rule Club in Thomas Jefferson High School in 1959, Port Aurthur, TX.
From the 1959 TJHS Yearbook (Slide Rule Club group picture):
https://www.sliderulemuseum.com/Ephemera/Janis_Joplin_with_SlideRule_ISRM.jpg
Full group here, she's in front, right.
https://www.sliderulemuseum.com/Ephemera/JanisLynJoplin_SlideRuleClub_1959_TJHS_Yearbook.jpg
rcocean,
"One reason pop music has reached a such a dead zone, is black musicans aren't leading the way to new kind of music."
Please stop. It seems like I can't come over here without finding you guys saying some crazy shit about black people. I thought black people were "too diverse" as a group for whites to talk about this way?!? You were just saying "one reason for Bebop was guys like Parker and Gillespe wanted something commercial white boys like Goodman or Artie shaw couldn't copy - fast, improvised, amd creative" but then you say "One reason pop music has reached a such a dead zone, is black musicans aren't leading the way to new kind of music." - like something's changed from Bebop to Hip-Hop.
Nothing's changed. The white world just can't keep up anymore. What's your connection to this? Nothing. It's a completely digital 21st century manifestation using sound and rhythm in ways no one's ever done. Eminem is one of the only white kids who can keep up with the new lyrical rhyme schemes. The whole image of the enterprise has left "America" behind. Now, record companies from around the world open their recorded archives for Madlib to remix their beats for today's black audiences. Now it's Kendrick Lamar who wins Grammies, not Aerosmith.
What do you know of Backpack Rap? Lo-Fi? Pig Fuck? Dub Step? Grime? Plagiarhythm? Neo-Soul? Jungle? Detroit Techno? Chicago House? These are all styles and genres invented by (or influenced by) black people since rock 'n' roll petered out. You know most of them, but usually only encounter them in TV commercials and sports programs. If you hear them naturally, then you declare them awful and an affront to civilization. So that's on you.
While I agree we're currently in a cultural desert, I dare say it's not because "black musicans aren't leading the way to new kind of music" but because many whites don't *really* want to go - without a white cultural chaperone to hold your hand.
Introducing me to this podcast is probably the best thing the Professor has done for my life and it is really appreciated.
I count 1 person so far in these comments who actually has listened o Hickey’s podcast. I haven’t heard Hickey “belittle” a single artist, and certainly not Muddy Waters. What is consistent is that music has been a brutal career with very few “nice” people. And nobody read their contracts.
"Mercedes Benz" was written while Janis was drinking margaritas with Geraldine Page and Rip Torn. Because I love him, I've always liked that story.
BTW, if you google for it, put his name in quotes. Otherwise, the search will be about her death. RIP, you know.
So, how does this stack up against Carlos Kleiber's recordings of Beethoven's Fifth and Seventh with the Vienna Philharmonic? Per Wikipedia, "It was as if Homer had come back to recite the Iliad."
Kleiber said, "Every unproduced record is a good record."
My brother says, "There is Sinatra and then everyone else."
Sorry, Janis Joplin never did it for me, and never will."Big Brother", indeed.
Oso Negro said...
"On instruments the black musicians appropriated from white people."
The ghosts of Louis Armstrong, Ray Charles, Jimi Hendrix, and Prince, are shooting you serious eyerolls. Stevie Wonder can't see you while George Clinton farts in your general direction.
"They should acknowledge this appropriation at every performance."
If every band had to do this, the Beatles and Led Zeppelin - alone - would never have been able to play a show because they would've had to spend all of their time listing the black people they cribbed from.
"And I have long thought that a measure of the success of black people in the USA is the death of their musical creativity."
This album is is "The Epic" by Karachi Washington, sax player to the rapper Kendrick Lamar. I dare you to show me something better. By a white man, especially, but just "better". Present something to me that can even just compete with it, artistically.
"Perhaps they just don't suffer enough anymore."
If you were me - reading what you say - you would immediately realize we suffer enough.
Not a huge fan, but she was quite brilliant at what she did, during her short time here. I tend to enjoy the Big Brother recordings more than her later stuff. She was a very good friend of (the Dead's) Pigpen, another white blues singer; it broke his heart when she died. Two years later he was gone also.
Does anybody care that she "stole" "Me and Bobby McGee" from Kris Kristofferson?
Or that the Stones "stole" from just about everybody?
Or that Run DMC "stole" from Aerosmith, who had previously "stolen" from Robert Johnson?
No.
If it sounds good, steal away.
(Although George Harrison clearly stole "He's So Fine" from the Chiffons--that was an actual theft).
My high school didn't have a "Slide Rule Club." I feel deprived.
Janis Joplin's Wikipedia page is full of odd little details, probably because her life was so short (she died at 27).
"Due to persistent persuading by keyboardist and close friend Stephen Ryder, Joplin avoided drugs for several weeks"
"At some point on Saturday, she learned by telephone, to her dismay, that Seth Morgan had met other women at a Marin County, California, restaurant, invited them to her home, and was shooting pool with them using her pool table."
"Newspaper review of Joplin's 1969 concert at Vets Memorial Auditorium in Columbus, Ohio includes the fact that before it started she walked to the lobby and watched audience members arrive."
They say birds sing to mark their territory or to attract a lover. At its primal level, that's how most singing works on us. I suppose if birds could express their feelings about broken eggs, they would add the blues to their repertoire......I like Ruth Etting. She was big back in the twenties and early thirties. She had an untrained voice, and it shows. I think that lack of professionalism is what gave her voice such authenticity. She has the definitive rendition of "Ten Cents A Dance". Nothing in La Boheme expresses better the utter futility of love.
After 169 episodes I'm finding Andrew very thin skinned, afraid of everyone's shadow (particularly J.K. Rowling) and all to often lost in rabbit holes labyrinths of his own making.
Once he goes past an hour into conjured detours I'm looking for the fast forward to exit button. But that's just me. Others will differ.
Joplin was a heavy drinker and drug user through her whole career. I guess I'm skeptical about the amount of deliberate calculation and technique she put into her performances.
Further reflections: Maybe the pathos of Janis Joplin's voice and life make her more attractive as a woman. It's the female equivalent of the way Elvis, Mick Jagger, James Brown stomp around the stage. Men mark their territory by being strong and assertive. Women attract a mate by being in need of a strong, assertive male. Don't blame me for this observation. Blame our reptilian brain which works so well to subvert our happiness and to further the continuance of the species.
@saint croix: I don't have any problems capitalizing Black. Like Hispanics and Italians they're a discrete ethnic group in America.
"I like Ruth Etting. She was big back in the twenties and early thirties."
Thanks for the recommendation. I love the sound of music from those years. I like the films to -- the pre-code talkies (just watched "Jewel Robbery," for example).
Streaming Etting now. Sweet.
"I guess I'm skeptical about the amount of deliberate calculation and technique she put into her performances."
The very competent men who worked on the recordings observed it. They had to do many, many takes and patch things together to make up for the band -- Big Brother -- being incompetent and what they got from her was multiple recordings of the exact same thing.
I got the impression she was really a musical theater type talent. Give her the role and she learns it and nails it, with the same emotional arc, same places to go loud/soft, etc. etc.
Amy Winehouse was the Janis Joplin of her generation and, unlike Janis, she had the best voice of her generation. It's a damn shame she left such few recordings behind. I suppose the pathos of their situations adds to their attraction, but so far as attraction goes nothing works better than looking like Debbie Harry.....Doris Day had a long career. She may have recorded some blues songs, but that wasn't her appeal. There was something sunny and life affirming in her voice. That might work even better than frailty or sex appeal over the long haul.
Amy Winehouse was the Janis Joplin of her generation and, unlike Janis, she had the best voice of her generation. It's a damn shame she left such few recordings behind. I suppose the pathos of their situations adds to their attraction, but so far as attraction goes nothing works better than looking like Debbie Harry.....Doris Day had a long career. She may have recorded some blues songs, but that wasn't her appeal. There was something sunny and life affirming in her voice. That might work even better than frailty or sex appeal over the long haul.
And now this era's revolutionary crie de couer can be heard frequently in elevators.
It's called homage.
I'll wait for Mark Steyn to weigh in.
boatbuilder said...
"Or that Run DMC "stole" from Aerosmith, who had previously "stolen" from Robert Johnson?"
Run DMC did no such thing. Rick Rubin did that, and the band didn't even want to do it.
I prefer Karen Dalton to all of 'em,...
Joplin’s story is a sad one… I remember it well. But sadder still are the strange howls of pain that Crack lets loose.
Get better, man.
I thought the 500 Songs website was great in the early going - he never said black people were "bellyaching" or anything - but, once he started getting narcissistic and answering questions about this process and things like that, I lost interest. Plus, his grasp of the material became less comprehensive and sure. I'll have to check him out again, sometime, but I shudder to think how he'll likely handle people and stories I know personally.
I thought Big Brother was a terrible band, but I thought nearly all of the SF Bay Area bands at that time (dat SF “sound”!) were subpar.
But their drummer was pretty good (e.g., Piece o’My Heart).
The "Janis" episode 169 was a more focused and to the point effort. And short.
"Supposedly, one reason for Bebop was guys like Parker and Gillespe wanted something commercial white boys like Goodman or Artie shaw couldn't copy - fast, improvised, amd creative."
Not saying that's not possible, but I don't think those who created what came to be called bebop--primarily Parker, with Gillespie and a few others--set about to create a new approach to jazz to thwart white imitators from profiting from imitating black jazz musicians. (For one thing, bebop was not as commercially popular as the more "melodic" jazz music forms that preceded it. The ascendance of bebop jazz--superseding swing, which had superseded dixieland--may have been the reason rock n' roll superseded jazz as the predominant commercially popular music. It was simple and you could dance to its insistent beat.)
I think the development of bebog stemmed from "their"--Parker's--natural musical genius, from his personal and unique approach to improvisation. He was a genius of his art, and all those who came after to join him did so because he showed them new possibilities, a new way, (as later happened with the blooming of simple pop and rock n' roll into the multitudinous of more varied and complex approaches to pop music).
"Does anybody care that she 'stole' 'Me and Bobby McGee' from Kris Kristofferson?"
Recording and performing a song written by another person is not stealing in any context. Prior to the Beatles, the idea that artists had to write their own material wasn't even a thing, and few did. It was the norm (and remains part of the norm) for recording artists to perform material written by others. Kristofferson earned royalties on every sale of Joplin's recording of his song, and probably on every broadcast playing of the recording. Joplin provided him with a good amount of income.
"Or that Run DMC "stole" from Aerosmith, who had previously "stolen" from Robert Johnson?"
Run DMC did no such thing. Rick Rubin did that, and the band didn't even want to do it.
The Run DMC/Walk This Way was not "theft," it was done with Aerosmith's permission *and revived Aerosmith's career). A better example of theft would be Diddy copying Sting's "Every Breath You Take" for his hit "I'll Be Missing You." It was done without permission, and in the end Sting got all the royalties - reportedly still more than $700k per year - for the song. (Of course, the other two members of the Police, who played on the sampled recording and who likely contributed to the composition of the sampled song, got nothing, because for some reason music copyright considers only the author of the words and melody to be the "author" and not the rest who contributed to the overall composition).
I’ve realized late in life that I basically was a classical music fan who got my fills listening to 3-minute songs by the Beatles, Elo, and Procal Harem, et al. Never really got into the black music, soul for example. But also loved gospel which definitely has black strain.
In short, Joplin imitating black singers may be why I never really cared for her. But I did like “Bobby McGee.”
M Jordan said...
"I’ve realized late in life that I basically was a classical music fan who got my fills listening to 3-minute songs by the Beatles, Elo, and Procal Harem, et al. Never really got into the black music, soul for example. But also loved gospel which definitely has black strain."
A classical music fan might need a guide to enjoying black American music - or modern music in general. If you'll allow me:
START HERE
Let me know what a "classical music fan" thinks of that as an entry point.
tommyesq said...
"The Run DMC/Walk This Way was not "theft," it was done with Aerosmith's permission *and revived Aerosmith's career)."
I didn't say it was - that was the other guy. But it's true that Run DMC didn't want to do it. And that Rick Rubin forced it on them. He had a habit of doing that stuff. That's why The Beastie Boys left the label. They had gone on tour to promote a single and, when they got back, Rick Rubin had their album all done in the heavy-metal style with Led Zeppelin samples, etc. That's why their next album, Paul's Boutique, was so different: They actually got to make their own record themselves.
rcocean said...
"Keep in mind, he didn't just belittle Muddy Waters, he belittled Chuck Berry"
"Really? Chuck Berry was the Founding father of Rock n' Roll."
He's right up there, but there is still Little Richard and Fats Domino and some 'rock-a-billy' sorts. Chuck Berry gelled that sound. Put it on the map.
That's a lovely piece, Crack, and as I listened I couldn't help but think of my late friend Malvin Massey, Jr.
Duke Ellington (or someone else--it's a line worth claiming) said that it's all folk music, and that works for me. He liked to describe his own genre as American. That works for me too.
I have a CD of Armstrong and a small band playing WC Handy standards that is just outstanding.
We usually hear the big band arrangements NTTAWWT.
I did not mean that any of those artists literally "stole" the music. (except Harrison). I expressed myself poorly.
Joplin "stole" Bobby McGee because she sang it so well nobody ever thinks about Kristofferson when they hear it. (Kristofferson did record it--it's a very different song with the same words). Run DMC used Aerosmith's riff to make something new and different. (And Tommy you are right--it re-launched Aerosmith so they could get rich making sappy power ballads for movie soundtracks instead of the hard-edged blues-rock that got them started the first time).
The Stones "stole" just about everything they did--they took great stuff and popularized it, and made something new with it.
@saint croix: I don't have any problems capitalizing Black. Like Hispanics and Italians they're a discrete ethnic group in America.
Do you capitalize them in Africa?
At one point in our history journalists and other racial organizers tried to create a sub-class of white people.
WASP
white anglo-saxon protestant
not sure why the hell the Catholics got booted out
I guess they asked some Klansmen.
There was also a time in our history when saying
"colored people" would get you a stink-eye, and maybe fired
but saying "people of color" was totally hip and new wave
you can't make this shit up
@saint croix: I don't have any problems capitalizing Black. Like Hispanics and Italians they're a discrete ethnic group in America.
The most annoying thing is the AP style guide sending out the rules and all the journalist outlets following them mindlessly.
That annoys the fuck out of me more than anything.
At one point, almost nobody on the internet capitalized black. And then they all did.
Facist fuckwits.
See also "fetus" and "anti-abortion."
The AP style guide -- and the NYT -- are sources of word usage and propaganda.
Journalists are mindless copycats and I loathe them as a class, with a few notable exceptions.
Narr said...
"That's a lovely piece, Crack"
I like it. It puts black people in a different light than most people want to see us (You included - are you and I friends now?)
"Duke Ellington (or someone else--it's a line worth claiming) said that it's all folk music, and that works for me."
No one argues with The Duke. Except for my Step-Father, on bass, there.
"He liked to describe his own genre as American. That works for me too."
That's how I see it - we should be proud - so why all the grief from white guys over Rap?
"I have a CD of Armstrong and a small band playing WC Handy standards that is just outstanding."
I'm a fan of his early work with Fletcher Henderson, back when his improvising was a miracle. Check him out, here, inventing the head-noddin' "Duck Walk" style that Chuck Berry would later popularize as cool in his act. It's almost Funky. In 1924 no less.
"We usually hear the big band arrangements NTTAWWT."
I love big bands, but The Duke's was the best.
I was going to present CHRISTO REDENTOR to M Jordan next. Still waiting for his verdict.
I didn't know that about the Beastie Boys, Crack, thanks!
Interesting that they couldn't get along with Rick Rubin but Jay-Z liked him so much he's in the video.
Here's Rick Rubin talking about the process with Joe Rogan
I don't know why we can't have a friendly conversation, Crack, even without being best buds.
I'll let others speak for themselves about Rap, but I don't have a problem with it, per se, any more than I have a problem with country, per se. Every genre has its high and low, and I find enjoyment where I can.
AFAIK I was the first (perhaps only) person here to mark Rudy Isley's passing.
Do you know the work of Jimmy Lunceford?
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