Never too late to talk about Janis

I was lucky enough to grow up in a household where everybody loved music. From my grandpa I learned to enjoy opera, from my grandma, the music from the 1920’s and 1930’s in the US and Latin America. My mother listened to ballads and boleros, mambo and cha-cha-cha, but my uncle introduced me to Janis Joplin. I can still remember where I was sitting at my uncle’s lap, looking for endless hours at the cover of “Pearl,” a Janis Joplin LP that he treasured (and still does). While I looked at the pictures of Janis Joplin and admired the colors of her clothes and jewelry, I listened to her voice. Even though I was four years old, I could enjoy the beauty of her voice and her passionate singing. Now that I live in Austin, I have been to Threadgill’s on North Lamar many times, a restaurant that opened the doors to Janis and where she started to shine. Who would have thought, eh?

On January 19th, Janis Joplin’s birthday was celebrated not only in her home town, Port Arthur, Texas, but in many places around the world, including Austin. She is still considered one of the greatest artists of all time by Rolling Stone Magazine and she was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995.

Austin Public Library has all kinds of materials for you to check out about Janis Joplin:

Some books are:

Love, Janis

Scars of sweet paradise: life and times of Janis Joplin

Buried alive: the biography of Janis Joplin

Pearl : the obsessions and passions of Janis Joplin : a biography

And if you want to listen to her, these are some of the cd's we have:

Janis Joplin's greatest hits

Pearl

Cheap thrills

In case you want to travel around Texas, the Museum of the Gulf Coast has a permanent exhibit on the life of Janis Joplin.