Speaker 1: What do you do when life doesn't go according to
Speaker 1: plan that moment you lose a job, or a loved one,
Speaker 1: or even a piece of yourself. I'm Brookshields and this
Speaker 1: is now What, a podcast about pivotal moments as told
Speaker 1: by people who lived them. Each week, I sit down
Speaker 1: with a guest to talk about the times they were
Speaker 1: knocked off course and what they did to move forward.
Speaker 1: Some stories are funny, others are gut wrenching, but all
Speaker 1: are unapologetically human and remind us that every success and
Speaker 1: every setback is accompanied by a choice, and that choice
Speaker 1: answers one question, Now, what are there any other risks
Speaker 1: that you sit there and look back at and go, God,
Speaker 1: oh my god, I can't believe I did that.
Speaker 2: I think probably Saria comes out on top of that,
Speaker 2: because I was just in snipe rally, you know. But
Speaker 2: there again, I'm protected by my own denial, just blocking out,
Speaker 2: blocking out my mortality, and my mortality I hadn't really
Speaker 2: run into until nineteen seventy two. In her noise, I thought,
Speaker 2: oh god, yeah, I could die here, and kind of
Speaker 2: don't really believe until it's in your face. And by
Speaker 2: the way, every atheist there says Oh God, say, oh God.
Speaker 2: They're praying like thunder at the end of the day.
Speaker 1: My guest today is one of the leading voices of
Speaker 1: her generation. Joan Biaz is a singer, songwriter, political activist,
Speaker 1: and more. Her legendary soprano made her famous, but it
Speaker 1: was her role in the counterculture of the nineteen sixties
Speaker 1: that made her an icon. She stood with doctor Martin
Speaker 1: Luther King Junior at the March on Washington, performed at Woodstock,
Speaker 1: fought to integrate schools. The list goes on. I was
Speaker 1: admittedly starstruck during our interview, especially when she said we
Speaker 1: should go get a cup of coffee, but mostly because
Speaker 1: I had just watched I Am Noise, an incredible new
Speaker 1: documentary about Joan's life. It chronicles her incredible career, her
Speaker 1: efforts to uncover and heal from childhood trauma, her relationships,
Speaker 1: and her activism. I'm blown away by her life's story
Speaker 1: and honored that she took the time to share a
Speaker 1: little of her wisdom with me. Here is Joan Bias.
Speaker 1: Joan Bias. I can't believe I'm actually talking to you.
Speaker 1: This is such a huge honor, and I just want
Speaker 1: to say thank you for your time, and just for
Speaker 1: deciding to spend any time with me.
Speaker 2: I'm delighted to be here, are you, beautiful woman?
Speaker 1: I was watching your documentary I am Noise. I recently
Speaker 1: was part of a documentary about my own life, and
Speaker 1: watching it and being in it was a very surreal
Speaker 1: sort of revisitation of a lot of things in my life.
Speaker 1: And I was so impressed by you and your career
Speaker 1: and your messaging and your voice and your history. Why
Speaker 1: did you decide that this was the appropriate time to
Speaker 1: re examine all of that and share it with the public.
Speaker 2: Well, a question goes for the whole film, and the
Speaker 2: singing and the family, sisters and growing up and all
Speaker 2: of it. Why did I decide? And it was about
Speaker 2: wanting to leave an honest legacy, wanting to just go ahead.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've got nothing left to lose. I'm eighty two,
Speaker 2: my family's gone, so for a lot of the sensitive
Speaker 2: material that this was the time to do it. It
Speaker 2: came out as I would have hoped. It stays understated,
Speaker 2: but you get the general idea of what my entire
Speaker 2: life was, and also things like the tapes from Birmingham,
Speaker 2: you know, Hi Mummy and Popsy I'm going to meet
Speaker 2: Martin Luther kingdomarw. I mean, how crazy is that? So
Speaker 2: I don't have to tell the story. It tells itself
Speaker 2: from tapes I made when I was twenty two, things
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: And you kept it all. I mean you kept it.
Speaker 1: Was amazing seeing your doodles and your your handwriting and
Speaker 1: your love for your family is evident.
Speaker 2: It is. First of all, my mother kept everything. I
Speaker 2: didn't keep a thing, and I had no idea it
Speaker 2: was in that storeroom, nothing And when I walk in
Speaker 2: and the film, it's the first time I've ever been
Speaker 2: in there, so surprise, surprise, I've learned a lot. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I've learned a lot from watching the film.
Speaker 1: What did you learn the most? What struck you the
Speaker 1: most from watching it?
Speaker 2: I think things like my son, it's just the depth
Speaker 2: of what he was dealing with. I knew he was
Speaker 2: dealing with, you know, my not being present for so
Speaker 2: many years. I didn't know how deep, how deeply it
Speaker 2: affected him, and how marginal he felt, you know, And
Speaker 2: I get it about feeling marginal. Hearing my sisters say
Speaker 2: what they really felt about me. You know, you kind
Speaker 2: of guess, but it's hard for you it's hard for
Speaker 2: them to really say what they said face to face
Speaker 2: with one of the directors, and they love My older
Speaker 2: sister never talked to anybody anybody, wouldn't let anybody take
Speaker 2: a photograph. But Karen O'Connor, one of the directors, they
Speaker 2: were friends, and she just put the camera there and
Speaker 2: Pauline started to talk. So I learned from that and
Speaker 2: from my son, and then some of the some of
Speaker 2: the therapy tapes I had, you know, I mean, I
Speaker 2: want to get rid of all the rest of them.
Speaker 2: I don't even know what they say. I just know
Speaker 2: they were a lot of them, and that I turning
Speaker 2: the keys over to the directors. That was part of it.
Speaker 1: The opening up of that storage, like the just it
Speaker 1: was such a I don't know if the director intended that,
Speaker 1: but that's sort of that roll up and then being
Speaker 1: confronted with all of this in the film. The film
Speaker 1: examines your whole life up to the current day, from
Speaker 1: the beginning, through your diaries through home videos. It's quite
Speaker 1: extraordinary the amount of material that exists and that has
Speaker 1: been documented, and it really it's very moving to watch.
Speaker 1: And there's one journal entry when you were I think
Speaker 1: you were about thirteen, and you say, I think of
Speaker 1: myself hardly a spec Then I see there is no
Speaker 1: use for this small dot to spend its entire life
Speaker 1: doing things for itself. It might as well spend its
Speaker 1: time making the less fortunate specs enjoy themselves. Where did
Speaker 1: you develop that? Where did that come from? At thirteen?
Speaker 2: You know, probably well it had to have come from
Speaker 2: whatever in my life had been so far. And my
Speaker 2: family at that point weren't officially Quakers but pretty much
Speaker 2: as close to. No, actually they actually were. And I'd
Speaker 2: been subjected to quicker meeting, which kids are not crazy about.
Speaker 2: You should have to sit there and be quiet, but
Speaker 2: it does affect you anyway. No, And I think going
Speaker 2: to bag Dad, which is in there a little bit,
Speaker 2: and seeing the poverty and people who had absolutely nothing,
Speaker 2: sick and all of that. People respond in different ways.
Speaker 2: I mean, my sister will all respond slightly differently, but
Speaker 2: whatever my makeup is, it was devastating to me. And
Speaker 2: I remember one day I was on a train and
Speaker 2: I couldn't have been more than ten or twelve, and
Speaker 2: in my mind I saw train going parallel to us.
Speaker 2: I mean it wasn't for real, but I saw and
Speaker 2: I saw a little girl basically another little me, and
Speaker 2: I was thinking I didn't want anybody to hurt that
Speaker 2: little girl, that if she didn't want to be hurt,
Speaker 2: then I didn't want, you know. I looked at her
Speaker 2: and thought, oh, this represents kids, and none of us
Speaker 2: wants to be hurt. And we you know, we all
Speaker 2: want to be loved. And you know, I would have
Speaker 2: these little epiphanies when I was pretty young. They saved
Speaker 2: my life also, but.
Speaker 1: They're also there. It's you taking care of that little
Speaker 1: girl in you. Somewhere in there, you knew you wanted
Speaker 1: to feel safer than life maybe made you feel or
Speaker 1: was unfolding around you, maybe didn't feel as safe.
Speaker 2: Self care wasn't a word back then, but yeah, I
Speaker 2: mean that's must have been what the whole thing was about.
Speaker 1: I just was so surprised that the degree that you
Speaker 1: suffered from panic attacks and depression and dissociation. Do you
Speaker 1: remember when that started?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I was fragile as a little girl,
Speaker 2: and I didn't realize it. You know, we didn't have
Speaker 2: any words for panic attacks back then. It's just seeing
Speaker 2: you're crazy people, and the crazy person went to see
Speaker 2: a psychiatrist. It was really not something anybody talked about.
Speaker 2: So but early on, yeah, I was. You know, my
Speaker 2: mom says something about we you know, she but something's
Speaker 2: bothering her and we don't know what that is, and
Speaker 2: you know, and it confounded my lovely mom who wanted
Speaker 2: to take care of her daughter and didn't know quite
Speaker 2: how to deal with it all. So, yeah, I went
Speaker 2: through a life of it until I hit fifty and
Speaker 2: started dealing with it.
Speaker 1: Said you said it one moment, you said I was
Speaker 1: just too crazy at the time, and that is that.
Speaker 1: I don't think you were crazy at all. I think
Speaker 1: you were coping. I think were you know, I used
Speaker 1: to carl into the sink and cry and spurts and
Speaker 1: then get up and have to memorize lines. And you
Speaker 1: know that's not that's not crazy. I mean you, how
Speaker 1: did you like?
Speaker 2: It?
Speaker 1: Broke my heart when I heard you call yourself crazy,
Speaker 1: because I I, that's a trigger for me, because it
Speaker 1: is you are coping, you're sensitive, you're an artist, you're
Speaker 1: a little kid. You're traveling all around in quite a
Speaker 1: bohemian way of life. Was music a tough form of
Speaker 1: escape or yeah? That help?
Speaker 2: I mean since music did both because I was I
Speaker 2: would have crippling stage fright, but I'd go out there,
Speaker 2: and I know that that gave me. I mean, I
Speaker 2: guess in the film it says when I really started
Speaker 2: getting that recognition, I went from thinking of myself as
Speaker 2: a skinny, dumb Mexican. Literally, that's how I saw myself
Speaker 2: as a well the madonna. That's a good why not
Speaker 2: off through that? But I began developing, you know, some self,
Speaker 2: some self worse, and I was proud. I loved my
Speaker 2: I can always consider it a gift, so I can
Speaker 2: talk about it. However, I like my job has been
Speaker 2: maintenance and delivery since I was fifteen. Yeah, so it
Speaker 2: gave me me.
Speaker 1: You were such an active participant in the seminal moments
Speaker 1: in our history, whether it's the March on Washington, or
Speaker 1: helping into great schools, or Woodstock or the list just continues,
Speaker 1: Vietnam War protesting. Do you think that your motivation for
Speaker 1: that stemmed from anything in particular.
Speaker 2: I think that there was great sadness that I didn't
Speaker 2: know about when I was little, and I remember, you know,
Speaker 2: the interviewers would say I was a twenty one or something.
Speaker 2: Why are seeing all those sad songs. I don't know
Speaker 2: why were you saying we shall overcome with me please,
Speaker 2: that there was a diet. You know there was a
Speaker 2: depth of sorrow in me, and that was you asked
Speaker 2: it earlier. That was one way to deal with it,
Speaker 2: with singing those songs that were expressing something I didn't
Speaker 2: really know about yet.
Speaker 1: Well, I encourage everybody to see this documentary because of
Speaker 1: the honesty and because of hearing your voice, and hearing
Speaker 1: your voice at different stages, even when you're taping messages
Speaker 1: to your parents and you're on the train and you're
Speaker 1: talking about the sunrise or the mountains or whatever it is,
Speaker 1: you really do get an understanding of your psyche to
Speaker 1: a certain extent, you and your sweetness juxtaposed with your strength.
Speaker 1: The juxtaposition of both of those things all the time
Speaker 1: really does come through in the documentary. And I think
Speaker 1: people will feel that I.
Speaker 2: Was just going to say, I think we're allowing them
Speaker 2: to feel in some way, as I'm not telling people
Speaker 2: what to feel. What we've discovered that this is unlocked things.
Speaker 2: For many people come up and say exactly that, whether
Speaker 2: it was communicating with their family or whether it was
Speaker 2: trauma childhood trauma, et cetera. I didn't this is icing
Speaker 2: on the cake for me. It wasn't. I didn't go
Speaker 2: out to make a film and make everybody else feel better.
Speaker 2: But it's given. You know, it's open doors for people,
Speaker 2: which is wonderful.
Speaker 1: The documentary really does dive deeply into your mental health
Speaker 1: and discovering at what at such a young age, how
Speaker 1: you are grappling with that, and discovers that abuse was
Speaker 1: part of the family narrative. We hear tapes in therapy
Speaker 1: and we see you examine the roots of your anxiety.
Speaker 1: I feel like you've sat with this for so many years.
Speaker 1: But the willingness to be to examine it with regards
Speaker 1: to how you can heal I think as generous. I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't think maybe you set out to make other
Speaker 1: people happy, But I do think sharing experiences that are
Speaker 1: less than perfect are important. Yes, But it does. I
Speaker 1: think you examine your memories.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it does, and I that was the healing journey. No.
Speaker 2: I think everybody ought to see a therapist at some
Speaker 2: point because we're all we all get so lost and
Speaker 2: we go turn to friends and they're trying to please us,
Speaker 2: and or turn to a friend who just pisses us off.
Speaker 2: But if you can go somewhere where you're going to
Speaker 2: get a straight answer or you're going to find your
Speaker 2: own straight answer, I think it's really important. And just
Speaker 2: just to make myself crazier then you say, I'm not,
Speaker 2: I do that my way of talking about I talk
Speaker 2: to trees. Now. I remember when Charlie McClain talked about,
Speaker 2: you know, talking to trees. I thought, oh man, what
Speaker 2: a fruitcake, you know, And I come completely around the
Speaker 2: other way. They're a big part of my life that
Speaker 2: I go to. There's one special one and I just
Speaker 2: take my problems there. And if you speak to a
Speaker 2: tree and listen very carefully, you are I get answers.
Speaker 1: Well that's that's great. I mean I've been going to
Speaker 1: the same therapist for almost thirty five or maybe a
Speaker 1: little bit over almost thirty eight years, and I got very,
Speaker 1: very lucky. And you know, hearing your own voice, hearing
Speaker 1: your own belief and feelings about things, is a huge gift.
Speaker 1: The show is called now What because it's about pivotal
Speaker 1: moments in our lives that, really, looking back, good or bad,
Speaker 1: they were you know something in your life that was
Speaker 1: specially specially formative. If you were to look back, are
Speaker 1: there any that come to mind?
Speaker 2: What comes to my mind first is the goodness that
Speaker 2: I got from my parents that comes before worrying about
Speaker 2: the problems. Was that I have to have survived partly
Speaker 2: because they loved me and I love them. And the
Speaker 2: importance of the Quakerism, I mean Quakerism. You really learned
Speaker 2: that human life is more important than the nation state.
Speaker 2: So here we are the nation states pile up, you know,
Speaker 2: one after another, and kids go on dying for that.
Speaker 2: So at a very early age, I was thinking about
Speaker 2: those things and for that I'm grateful. In the in
Speaker 2: the movie, my older sisters has that globe and she's
Speaker 2: pointing to it the place sort of symbolizing all the
Speaker 2: places that we've been, and she said, Pops wanted to
Speaker 2: travel around meet different people to show us that we're
Speaker 2: sort of we're all the same basically, you know. And
Speaker 2: that's probably where that speck came from, that little speck
Speaker 2: of a person that my parents both must have helped
Speaker 2: me form.
Speaker 1: That was there a person that you came into contact with.
Speaker 1: I mean, you've known so many icons like Martin Luther
Speaker 1: King Jr. And James Baldwin and Patti Smith, who is
Speaker 1: a I love her, Bob Dylan, Steve Jobs. Steve Jobs
Speaker 1: gave me my first computer, katies me too. Any is
Speaker 1: there anybody? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I love that.
Speaker 1: Was there anybody in particular that made an impression on you?
Speaker 2: Oh? There have been people, No, I mean the first
Speaker 2: ones that come to mind are Hallville, who was became
Speaker 2: the president of Czech Republic and been a dissident. I
Speaker 2: always go for these dissidents because they've paid the price,
Speaker 2: taken the risk and paid the price, and I just
Speaker 2: admire so much. It's what we don't have, broke, we
Speaker 2: don't have. I mean, we have a lot of people
Speaker 2: doing a lot of good things, and it's really difficult
Speaker 2: in this political atmosphere which is all about bullying, you know,
Speaker 2: and hatred and fear and this people there are people
Speaker 2: who are doing good things and I don't know where
Speaker 2: this rambling I'm doing started. But social change, really serious,
Speaker 2: social change, meaningful, can't happen until people are willing to
Speaker 2: take a risk. And we need to be more tuned
Speaker 2: into that and hopefully more willing to step out of
Speaker 2: our comfort zone.
Speaker 1: And not letting fear, not letting fear, you know, really
Speaker 1: guide us as much as it wants to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I think I think courage is contagious, and
Speaker 2: courage is not that you're fearless, but it is that
Speaker 2: you're afraid and you do it anyway. So most of us,
Speaker 2: to be courageous means to face the demons, whether they're
Speaker 2: personal and internal or whether it is this sick world
Speaker 2: we're living in.
Speaker 1: But I mean I also think you like people have
Speaker 1: said things I've done, written about are courageous, and I've
Speaker 1: never thought about it as courageous. I just thought about
Speaker 1: it as necessity because very rarely, I think, does one
Speaker 1: really feel courageous unless something is simple, and then that's
Speaker 1: not really courage. But you took risks. I mean, are
Speaker 1: there moments that from your youth and your career that
Speaker 1: you still can't believe that you experience?
Speaker 2: Yeah? There are, and I think it's a blessing. I
Speaker 2: think denial is our friend because as I'm walking through
Speaker 2: those threetes, who great Mississippi, I mean you're either in
Speaker 2: denial or dumb to do that, because you're going to
Speaker 2: get hurt. No, I mean denial about say climate change.
Speaker 2: If we didn't stay in denial, maybe ninety percent of
Speaker 2: the day, it wouldn't be worth living.
Speaker 1: You talk about being the right voice at the right time,
Speaker 1: and I'm so moved by the sound of your voice now.
Speaker 1: It resonates differently, but there's something about the richness of
Speaker 1: your voice now. Albeit the younger sound was extraordinary and
Speaker 1: unique and there was a clarity and a timbre to it,
Speaker 1: But hearing your voice now is extremely moving. Do you
Speaker 1: think that there's any metaphor in that psychologically with how
Speaker 1: far you've come and of doing all the work.
Speaker 2: Well, I was busy not liking my voice for the
Speaker 2: last number of years, and it's because I was trying
Speaker 2: to make it in something it can't be anymore. And
Speaker 2: the more I accept it. I mean, I don't sing much,
Speaker 2: but people have asked me recently to do a couple
Speaker 2: of things. I mean, I took the guitar off the wall,
Speaker 2: which is where it's lived since I quit touring, and
Speaker 2: started to see whether I could my fingers are going
Speaker 2: to stay spaghetti, or whether the muscle memory would come back.
Speaker 2: It came back enough, and I actually when I quit
Speaker 2: trying to make notes that I couldn't make. That's where
Speaker 2: all the tension was coming from and that was making
Speaker 2: it not fun. And I would say, although I don't
Speaker 2: spend much time at it, I've found spots where I'm
Speaker 2: really happy with the sound of the voice and accepting
Speaker 2: that sort of like accepting wrinkles. For me, it just is.
Speaker 2: It is what it is.
Speaker 1: But there's no botox for the vocal cords.
Speaker 2: That's correct.
Speaker 1: Yeah, But I think anytime we try to compare ourselves
Speaker 1: to something that was, I think we come up short.
Speaker 1: I hope you found joy again in your voice, because
Speaker 1: so many of us have and do. But looking back
Speaker 1: at your songs and your activism, did you do it
Speaker 1: for the greater good or was there a part of
Speaker 1: you that just was being defiant or self destructive?
Speaker 2: I don't think self destructive. I think the positive part
Speaker 2: of it is that I am proud of every one
Speaker 2: of those challenges that came along and I did. I
Speaker 2: don't think I went off on the wrong track at
Speaker 2: any point. I think then the film alludes to it.
Speaker 2: I was addicted to it, which show, you know, whatever
Speaker 2: made it impossible to me to be really present with
Speaker 2: my son. Something in there was so difficult for me
Speaker 2: that I would take off you know, and I would
Speaker 2: do something valuable and something good, but I could have
Speaker 2: stayed home.
Speaker 1: When you say that you your son, you were not present,
Speaker 1: do you mean that just because of your schedule or
Speaker 1: do you mean that emotionally both both.
Speaker 2: I mean the schedule physically took me away, but being
Speaker 2: there but not really being present for him, I kind
Speaker 2: of knew. I mean, I know that, and I knew
Speaker 2: it already, but to hear more from him about what
Speaker 2: that actually felt like, and you know, to hear you know,
Speaker 2: my mom surrounded me with really good people, but there's
Speaker 2: nothing can really take the place of a parent. So
Speaker 2: you know, I had a lot of gut punches while
Speaker 2: I was watching and the healthy ones because I learned
Speaker 2: from them.
Speaker 1: And to see your son, you and your son on
Speaker 1: tour for the quote unquote, I don't want to admit it.
Speaker 1: I will not I will not be I will not
Speaker 1: be accepting the farewell tour as a farewell tour. But
Speaker 1: that's not for me to decide. Seeing you know, you're
Speaker 1: his only mom, you know, and seeing the two of
Speaker 1: you to other and seeing you two performed together, there's
Speaker 1: a huge amount of healing in that, and you can
Speaker 1: feel it and I don't think it's ever too late
Speaker 1: in any way. We all have guilt. For I have
Speaker 1: a huge amount of guilt for being so kidnapped by
Speaker 1: postpartum depression with my first daughter. And you know and
Speaker 1: hold that, and I think, what you it's it's a
Speaker 1: very it's a beautiful thing anyway to see you both
Speaker 1: on stage together, and so I'm glad for that.
Speaker 2: When people ask me what is it I'm most proud
Speaker 2: of in my life, it really isn't the accolades and
Speaker 2: the whatever, all that stuff and the praising and the
Speaker 2: and the awards, and that it really is. And I came,
Speaker 2: this came to me really clearly that my son and
Speaker 2: I were able to reach each other. We had to
Speaker 2: work really hard at it. We needed a therapist or
Speaker 2: a referee or a something. But still we go back.
Speaker 2: If there's a hitch, we go back again. Because the
Speaker 2: wounds were deep and it will be processing now from
Speaker 2: here on out. But that's good news for people that
Speaker 2: you can actually do that, but you need help. You
Speaker 2: just can't do that on your own.
Speaker 1: That was Joan Baez. To learn more about her incredible story,
Speaker 1: check out I Am Noise, available everywhere on November twenty First,
Speaker 1: that's it for us today. Talk to you next week. Now.
Speaker 1: What with Burke Shields is a production of iHeartRadio. Our
Speaker 1: lead producer and wonderful showrunner is Julia Weaver. Additional research
Speaker 1: and editing by Darby Masters and Abu Zafar. Our executive
Speaker 1: producer is Christina Everett. The show is mixed by Baheed Fraser.