Worktapes and Demos, 2024
Scope and Contents
The audio-visual materials series evidences Janis Ian’s recorded published output, live performances or public / media appearances, in addition to her licensed or sampled songs appearing in compilation albums and covered by other performers.
The first subseries includes the bulk of her published recordings [1967-2022]: albums, singles, compilations, and covers featuring or concerning Janis Ian’s work. Held on vinyl, cassette tapes and CD format, these materials collectively represent her physical discography and the commercial release of her music.
The bulk of production and reference master materials held in subseries two pertain to the creation or remastering, production and release of albums under the Rude Girl Records label [1992 to present]. Record types range from DV tapes, CD units and cassette tapes, the extent of true master material is limited.
The third subseries groups records documenting Janis Ian’s appearances in broadcast media, including radio and television interviews, plus a selection live performances, primarily these have been documented by third-party sources or captured directly from broadcast. The fourth subseries brings together a range of recordings of Janis Ian’s live concerts and festival appearances, also largely sourced from third-party documentation.
Dates
- Creation: 2024
Creator
- From the Collection: Ian, Janis (Person)
Conditions Governing Access
This collection is open for research use in the Special Collections and Archives reading room.
Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state laws and regulations. Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications for which Hutchins Library assumes no responsibility.
Biographical / Historical
From Janis: Once I lost the ability to perform as a vocalist, Jeff and I began talking about long-delayed projects we still wanted to do. Realizing that my archives contain hundreds of work tapes, live shows, demos, rough mixes and the like, we began putting together a series of potential “albums” that would feature the original versions of songs that later made it to albums. We also wanted to include some songs that were originally slated for those albums but never made it. A “worktape” is just that – a tape of a recent work, sometimes recorded for copyright purposes, sometimes so I could listen back and find out what was bothering me (that extra section in “Lover’s Lullabye” for instance), sometimes for the arranger and producer to hear. All of these are from the very first time I sang them into a microphone. Minimal “fixing” was done in order to preserve the integrity of the originals. Enjoy!
* These recordings were culled from “best available”, which included DATs, minidiscs, old cassettes, reel-to-reel, and other formats. Our goal was to present them as close to the original sound as possible; you may hear small glitches in some, including one drop-out. Any further attempts to manipulate the audio and remove more hiss, or clean up external sounds, resulted in a loss of fidelity Janis was not willing to entertain. Thank you for understanding!
Full Extent
1 folder
Language of Materials
From the Collection: English
From the Collection: Japanese
From the Collection: Dutch; Flemish
Repository Details
Part of the Berea College Special Collections and Archives Repository
Hutchins Library
100 Campus Drive
Berea Kentucky 40404 US
859.985.3262
special_collections@berea.edu