05/29/2026
Janis Joplin
Piece Of My Heart
Joplin would always claim to journalists that her stage persona was just her being herself and natural. But she worked hard on every aspect of her performance, and was influenced mostly by Bessie Smith, but also Big Mama Thornton, Odetta, Etta James, Tina Turner, and Otis Redding.
Joplin would, for the rest of her life, always say that Otis Redding was her all-time favorite singer, and would say “I started singing rhythmically, and now I’m learning from Otis Redding to push a song instead of just sliding over it.”
When Big Brother and the Holding Company played the Monterey Pop Festival, nobody had any great expectations. They were second on the bill on the Saturday, the day that had been put aside for the San Francisco acts, and they were playing in the early afternoon, after a largely unimpressive night before. They had a reputation among the San Francisco crowd, of course, but they weren’t as big as the Grateful Dead, Moby Grape or Country Joe and the Fish, let alone Jefferson Airplane.
Monterey launched four careers to new heights. While Otis Redding, Jimi Hendrix, and the Who already had successful careers ... Big Brother and the Holding Company, on the other hand, were so unimportant that director D.A. Pennebaker didn’t even film their set (their manager at the time had not wanted to sign over the rights to film their performance, something that several of the other acts had also refused).
As Pennebaker later said “She came out and sang, and my hair stood on end. We were told we weren’t allowed to shoot it, but I knew if we didn’t have Janis in the film, the film would be a wash. Afterward, I said to Albert Grossman, ‘Talk to her manager or break his leg or whatever you have to do, because we’ve got to have her in this film. I can’t imagine this film without this woman who I just saw perform.”
Grossman had a talk with the organizers of the festival, and they offered Big Brother a second spot, the next day, if they would allow their performance to be used in the film. The group agreed, after much discussion between Janis and Grossman, and against the wishes of their manager:
