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47th out of 149 books
—
39 voters
Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing
by
Ann Angel
Forty years after her death, Janis Joplin remains among the most compelling and influential figures in rock-and-roll history. Her story—told here with depth and sensitivity by author Ann Angel—is one of a girl who struggled against rules and limitations, yet worked diligently to improve as a singer. It’s the story of an outrageous rebel who wanted to be loved, and of a wi
...moreHardcover, 120 pages
Published
October 1st 2010
by Harry N. Abrams
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Bibliography:
Angel, A. (2010). Janis Joplin: Rise up singing. New York: Amulet Books. ISBN 9780810983496. (120 pages).
Summary:
The Summer Texan, a school newspaper in Austin best portrayed the young and vibrant Joplin as - “She goes barefooted when she feels like it, wears Levi’s to class because they’re more comfortable, and carries her Autoharp with her everywhere she goes. She leads a life that is enviously unrestrained” (Angel, 2010).
Texas native Janis Joplin led a remarkable career in music...more
Angel, A. (2010). Janis Joplin: Rise up singing. New York: Amulet Books. ISBN 9780810983496. (120 pages).
Summary:
The Summer Texan, a school newspaper in Austin best portrayed the young and vibrant Joplin as - “She goes barefooted when she feels like it, wears Levi’s to class because they’re more comfortable, and carries her Autoharp with her everywhere she goes. She leads a life that is enviously unrestrained” (Angel, 2010).
Texas native Janis Joplin led a remarkable career in music...more
Summary:
Many people consider Janis Joplin the first queen of rock. Her remarkable career lasted barely three years before she died at age twenty-seven from alcohol and drug abuse, but her fame lives on through her music. This book celebrates her story forty years after her death starting with her teenage years in Port Arthur, Texas. Even though she was a good student, Janis never quite fit in at school. After trying out college with similar results, she drifted into the music scene and discovere...more
Many people consider Janis Joplin the first queen of rock. Her remarkable career lasted barely three years before she died at age twenty-seven from alcohol and drug abuse, but her fame lives on through her music. This book celebrates her story forty years after her death starting with her teenage years in Port Arthur, Texas. Even though she was a good student, Janis never quite fit in at school. After trying out college with similar results, she drifted into the music scene and discovere...more
Generally, biographies written for teens can be boring. They often contain a few black and white photographs with information presented in such a stale way that teens will only want to skim through them to attain information needed for school reports. Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing certainly breaks the mold of humdrum biography. First of all, each page border is beautifully decorated with colorful swirl patterns making it an attractive book to explore. Furthermore, author Angel writes in a conver...more
I chose to read, Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing, written by Ann Angel. I believe that her purpose was to inform the reader about the life of Janis Joplin. The book summarized the various chapters of the life and death of Ms. Joplin, as a musician, a drug user, a daughter, and a human being.
The theme of the book was not so much to discuss the history and accomplishments of Janis Joplin, but to enlighten the public about who she was as an individual. She was very self concious, and craved acceptanc...more
The theme of the book was not so much to discuss the history and accomplishments of Janis Joplin, but to enlighten the public about who she was as an individual. She was very self concious, and craved acceptanc...more
Jul 24, 2011
Kaci
added it
( posted on junior high library blog for my students) this biography on Janis Joplin won the Excellence in Young Adult Nonfiction from the American Library Association. It is a colorful depiction of the rock star's troubled high school years, her life as a young adult figuring out her niche, and as a super star leading the way in psychedelic rock. Behind her bravado, you also get to know the sweet, shy, lovable Janis as well. This book talks about her struggle with many enemies - namely alcohol,...more
I enjoyed this look at Janis Joplin's life and career very much. I hadn't known much about her, so it was interesting to see where she started and what influenced her (like Bessie Smith, for example). The book is thorough and while written for young people, it doesn't shy away from discussing tough issues such as Janis' drug and alcohol use, and mentions her many relationships with both men and women (just glancingly so on the latter). I thought it was very well done; not too detailed but with h...more
Ann Angel's entirely accessible and compelling biography of Janis Joplin is a marvel of a book and well deserving of the 2011 YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction. Joplin's story is interwoven with period details about life and popular culture of the 50s and 60s, including pictures and descriptions for readers to use as they compare Joplin to her contemporaries. This approach is excellently executed, and walks a perfect line-- offering enough information for comprehension while enticing the...more
This well-researched biography of Janis Joplin starts at her high school in Port Arther, Texas and follows her life and career to their untimely end a little over 10 years later. It's full of (awesome) pictures, is not bogged down by the recitation of dates, has a great bibliography for further reading, a chronology, and a brief index. It is a biography that you can give, with confidence, to teens looking for more information on a great artist or someone interesting to write about for an assignm...more
YALSA just gave this book the "excellence in non-fiction" for teens award and named it the best non-fiction book for young adults in 2011. I was pleasantly surprised to read Ann Angels rendition of the "blues mama" of the 1960's, as it didn't shy away from the difficult dimensions that comprised much of Joplin's life; including her struggles with drugs, sexuality, and personal identity. The book begins with Joplin's childhood and early upbringing in Port Arthur, Texas and follows her throughout...more
This exceptional portrait of Janis Joplin is admiring but also frank in discussing her flaws and self-destructive personality. Angel manages to explore all dimensions of Janis in a relatively brief narrative--the outsider and nonconformist growing up in small-town Port Arthur, Texas, her retreat into painting, finding her voice in music, her influences and sensibilities as a musician, her bisexuality, inability to maintain long-term relationships, insecurity about her appearance and talent, and...more
This book cries out for a soundtrack. While a biography of the short life of Janis Joplin, it is also a chronicle of the development of her singing career, and describes her performances including an attempt to capture the unique sound of her voice with words:
Her long hair flying around her face and sticking to her sweat-soaked cheeks, she stomped her feet, sometimes rising up on her toes to capture a high note, swinging and swaying to the beat to the music. She would scream, “I’m gonna try…, “...more
Her long hair flying around her face and sticking to her sweat-soaked cheeks, she stomped her feet, sometimes rising up on her toes to capture a high note, swinging and swaying to the beat to the music. She would scream, “I’m gonna try…, “...more
"Janis Joplin,Rise Up Singing". Is all about Janis Joplin, from her younger days and to the day she died. In her school years Janis was definitely what you would call an out-cast. When all the other girls wore bright colors and had short curly hair. Janis wore dark colors and had long frizzy hair. She did have friends, but most of her friends were the rebellious boys. When Janis graduated High-School, she went to collage for 8 months, then stopped and got a job. On her free time she would hang o...more
I really enjoyed this book, as I remember my parents listening to Janis Joplin and have always enjoyed some of her songs. I found it to be extremely interesting and informative and think teen would find it so as well. While I have always known she died of a drug overdose, I never knew the history of how unhappy, insecure, and lonely she was. I found it so sad that when she returned to her hometown for her 10 year high school reunion, she was basically snubbed by her classmates just like she had...more
I picked this up when it made YALSA's shortlist for the Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults (what a mouthful!) My sister has been a Janis fan for as long as I can remember, and certain of her songs are completely linked with certain memories for me, so reading the book had me pulling out her music and singing along. I didn't know much about her life, and Angel's biography provides just enough information to give you a sense of both her personality and the time and culture in whic...more
This biography is well written and very detailed, giving much insight on Janis Joplin and her life. This life history of Janis Joplin, told through photographs and letters, helped the reader to understand Janis as a person and also the world and culture, during her time on this earth. There was accuracy in the events of Janis’ life and it was apparent that the author had researched the subject thoroughly. There was strength in the storytelling and use of photography, which explained how Janis wa...more
I LOVED this book!!! Loved it! I've always loved Janis Joplin's music but never knew that much about her. I always pictured her as headstrong and confident just by what little I knew about her/envisioned her as being and this according to the book, was not the case. She had her insecurities as we all do. I felt so bad for her when she was nominated, "Ugliest Man on Campus!" How cruel! I loved the pictures throughout the book and the colored scroll on each page. The book seemed so inviting with t...more
May 03, 2012
Erin
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Shelves:
non-fiction,
alcohol-use,
drug-use,
female-protagonist,
illustrations,
lis-722,
relationships,
sex,
ya-lit
While Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing by Ann Angel provides a very interesting look into the short life of Janis Joplin, I felt it really glossed over a lot of the negative aspects of her lifestyle. It is understandable to want to make the book, and the topics discussed therein, accessible to a younger audience, but I think the book watered down her life too much. Following Janis from her high school days to her death a decade later, the book discusses her family, friends, lovers, etc. It also dis...more
"Fame had nurtured and encouraged Janis's wild, ove-the-top behavior. People loved when she swaggered onto the stage with a bottle of Southern Comfort or waxed lyrical about getting high. And, along the way, she became as hooked on adulation as she was on drugs and alcohol. It was the attention she craved all her life, from her lonely high school days to her spirited college days to her crazy days in San Francisco, speeding around town in her psychedelic Porsche. To feed her voracious need for m...more
Joplin's life is just tragic. As a teenager, she tried so hard to fit in with the rest of the other girls, but she was born to rebel. When kids were listening to Dean Martin and Ol Blue Eyes, she sang along to Motherless Child by Bessie Smith. She tried to go to college, but the call to make music was overwhelming. Unfortunately, with the music, came lots of demons - mostly in the form of alchohol and drugs. She had tried to get clean at one point - going almost 12 mths. without - hoping to sett...more
Rating: 4.5
This is the first book that I have read this year that is nonfiction and I'm so glad I picked it up.
I didn't know that much about Janis Joplin before I picked up this book but after finishing it, I really wished that Janis lived longer because she definitely wasn't able to reach her potential. She was ambitious, driven, funny and very wise for her age. I didn't know she died at the age of 27! That's crazy! She was compared to Judy Garland (who lived longer than Janis) because of the d...more
This is the first book that I have read this year that is nonfiction and I'm so glad I picked it up.
I didn't know that much about Janis Joplin before I picked up this book but after finishing it, I really wished that Janis lived longer because she definitely wasn't able to reach her potential. She was ambitious, driven, funny and very wise for her age. I didn't know she died at the age of 27! That's crazy! She was compared to Judy Garland (who lived longer than Janis) because of the d...more
This is an interesting, if slightly glossy biography on Janis Joplin, one of the great female rock singers of the 60's. It starts with her life in high school and details her rise to fame and subsequent downfall and accidental death. I thought it was a quick, very engaging read. The bright colors and fantastic pictures added much to the book. Some of the more sordid aspects of her life were glossed over a bit, but this is an account of her life, not necessarily written as a cautionary tale. I wo...more
This book was a labor of love. It began as a short piece that Angel was encouraged to expand. She worked on it for years, conducting email interviews with Joplin's friend and bandmate Sam Andrew (who wrote the introduction), Joplin's former road manager John Byrne Cooke and her friend and publicist Myra Friedman. Angel even forged her own friendship with Friedman.
The eye-popping design is a delight. The colors and patterns adroning the pages reflect the psychedelic look of the album art incuded...more
The eye-popping design is a delight. The colors and patterns adroning the pages reflect the psychedelic look of the album art incuded...more
This book from the moment I picked it up was intriguing. The cover art and layout were as unique and creative as the subject matter. The author, Ann Angel, did a wonderful job of not only portraying Janis Joplin the rock star, but also as the quiet middle class girl from Texas who never quite fit in with her peers. There was one photo of Janis, nude in bed with her band mates that could quite possibly be inflammatory in a school library setting. To be honest, I am not quite sure the photo was ne...more
I mostly loved this biography of Joplin that's aimed at young adults, but there's the huge elephant standing in the middle of it that ruined it for me.
The facts given jibe with the rest of the biographies I've read (and I've read 'em all). The author's love and reverence for the subject inform the book without glossing over any of Joplin's shortcomings. The photographs are lovely, of course. The introduction by Sam Andrew is very touching. The digressions about the sixties are fairly well-done....more
The facts given jibe with the rest of the biographies I've read (and I've read 'em all). The author's love and reverence for the subject inform the book without glossing over any of Joplin's shortcomings. The photographs are lovely, of course. The introduction by Sam Andrew is very touching. The digressions about the sixties are fairly well-done....more
This was a difficult read for me. I know the Beaumont/Port Arthur area very well. I lived there off and on during the sixties, and my cousins were drawn to the Haight Ashbury area of San Francisco in the latter sixties. There was also the problem of knowing the end of the story before it even began. I loved Janis...even though I was a little behind her glory. She was like a comet that passed through our sky, and I've always been proud that she was one of us. This is a well written and well resea...more
Winner of the 2011 YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction, Janis Joplin: Rise Up Singing is a heartfelt and well-written account of a wildly talented yet ill-fated singer who is still considered a musical legend. Angel's tidy 120 pages include large and interesting photos, a helpful timeline, and detailed bibliographical information. The real gem, however, is Janis's story itself. Her meteoric rise and heartbreaking demise amidst a turbulent era of American history should resonate with teens w...more
Winner of the 2011 YALSA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults which honors the best nonfiction book published for young adults during a November 1 – October 31 publishing year.
I feel lukewarm about this book because, while it was written nicely and it was quite informative, I don't know why I should care. I've heard of Janis Joplin and I know some of her songs, but not many people in my generation have much of a connection with her. I think if I had trouble connecting to her and h...more
I feel lukewarm about this book because, while it was written nicely and it was quite informative, I don't know why I should care. I've heard of Janis Joplin and I know some of her songs, but not many people in my generation have much of a connection with her. I think if I had trouble connecting to her and h...more
It was fun learning more about Janis Joplin, who also attended my alma mater, the University of Texas at Austin. It was also interesting to contrast her with my parents, who are only 7 years older than she would have been, but who conformed much more readily to 1950s Texas standards of behavior. It's easy to forget sometimes that our elders also consist of people who were wild and crazy in their youth (if not for their whole lives)! Anyway, Janis's story was fascinating and sad, and it makes me...more
This book was written by a friend of someone I've known for years. It was perfectly written in that it gave you enough of Janis to make you believe you know her a bit better but not enough to make you believe you had her defined entirely. Janis was just what you thought: talented, young, cool, assured and lonely with some drugs thrown in and destined to be a superstar. She was magic and, like a magic trick, disappeared far too soon. Was an enjoyable read for a warm, sunny afternoon despite the e...more
It's no surprise that Ann Angel is a super fan of Janis Joplin. Her passion for Janis comes shining through in this book. However, she also writes in such a way as to give us a very full, well rounded picture of this artist explaining Janis' shortcomings and flaws. The book does an exceptional job of creating for the reader the time and place where all this talent intersected. We are still culturally influenced by the "hippie generation". This book is a great historical marker whether you enjoye...more
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When I'm not writing or teaching at a women's college in Milwaukee, I hang with my family which includes my four grown kids, my husband Jeff and a cat named Sparkie. Jeff, who was an only child, loved to be around my siblings when we were dating. Ann Angel was one of nine kids — he once said, "This isn't a family; it's an experience."
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Apr 01, 2012 05:36pm