Joan Baez

Still an iconic figure in her later years, Joan Baez was key to the folk music boom of the early 1960s when she and Bob Dylan ignited the era of protest song and she gained the nickname the queen of folk. The daughter of a Mexican physician raised in a Quaker family who lived all over the world (and spent part of her childhood in Iraq), Joan Baez developed a keen interest in civil rights. Her first instrument was a ukulele but a Pete Seeger concert triggered her interest in folk music and she started singing in clubs and coffee houses on the college circuit in the Boston/Cambridge area of Massachusetts. Her big break came with an unbilled performance at the 1959 Newport Folk Festival which resulted in her self-titled debut album of traditional songs. Baez's distinctive vibrato voice made her a big star as she developed a high-profile relationship with the emergent Dylan, covering many of his songs and playing a crucial role in his rise. She had a hit in 1965 with Phil Ochs's 'There But for Fortune' and enjoyed further hits with 'The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down' and her own signature song 'Diamonds & Rust' which she wrote about her relationship with Dylan. Although she became equally known for her energetic work in peace and civil rights campaigns, Baez continued to be a popular singer and performer through the 2000s with re-releases of her first 13 albums through the Vanguard label and performances at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass festival, at Golden Gate Park in San Francisco and at the funeral of singer-songwriter Lou Rawls who died in 2006. She released her first new material in five years under the title of 'Day After Tomorrow' in 2008. Over the next few years she made appearances at Glastonbury Festival, Montreux Jazz Festival and Newport Folk Festival and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She announced a tour for 2018 along with a brand new album titled 'Whistle Down the Wind'.

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