Joan Baez

born 1941 Staten Island, New York; lives Woodside, California

BiographyJoan Baez is a famous American folk singer, musician, and activist. Baez is most well known for her folk songs but also has music in a variety of other genres including pop, country, gospel, and folk rock. Baez began her recording career in 1960 and found immediate success, she was one of the first to start recording with Bob Dylan. Baez became involved in social issues from an early age both due to her experiences with racism as a Mexican-American and as a person devoted to pacifism because of her Quaker faith. She moved around the world as part of her fathers work and thus experienced many types of social activism and became dedicated to it throughout her life. Baez's music reflected this activism as she often used it to speak out against social issues such as the Vietnam War, the civil rights movement, LGBTQ+ rights, and U.S. military campaigns. She participated in the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery for voting rights and she helped to found the Institute for the Study of Non-violence. In 2007 she was awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award and a Kennedy Center Honor in 2020. Baez has received many more awards for both her music and her activism and has made a name for herself as a "mischief maker."

Person TypeIndividual