baezjoan

Of Scottish and Mexican heritage, Baez learned about racism and discrimination at an early age. Music became her vehicle for coping with the injustices of life. During the 1950s she sang folk songs in local coffeehouses, but she achieved national recognition singing in a Chicago nightclub. In 1960 her self-titled album was released, and Baez’s newfound celebrity enabled her to make positive social changes. In 1963 Baez stood beside Martin Luther King Jr. at the March on Washington. She led a crowd of more than 300,000 in singing the black spiritual “We Shall Overcome.” Baez performed for Lyndon Johnson, and petitioned the president to pull U.S. troops out of Vietnam. In 1965 she created the Institute for the Study of Nonviolence in Palo Alto, California, and four years later, performed at Woodstock, a highlight in her musical career. Among the most memorable voices in the peace movement, Baez served on the national advisory board of Amnesty International and helped create the group’s California branch, Amnesty, West Coast. In 1979 Baez founded another organization, Humanitas International, which promotes human rights, disarmament, and nonviolence through seminars and other educational opportunities. In 2003, Universal Music released a special boxed set of Joan Baez’s music from the 1970s.