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Now in her fifth decade of writing songs and performing, Janis Ian has won three Grammy Awards, with 10 nominations in 8 different categories.

She began her professional life at 12, writing her first song which was published by Broadside Magazine. At 14, she wrote “Society’s Child,” banned throughout the United States for its controversial subject matter, a black boy dating a white girl. On discovering the ban, the famed American composer and conductor Leonard Bernstein featured Janis in one of his first prime-time television specials. The next day, radio stations all over the country apologized, and a career was born.

In 1975 “At Seventeen,” along with the album “Between the Lines,” earned five Grammy nominations and two wins. The song has since joined “Society’s Child” in the Grammy Hall of Fame. “Love Is Blind” then went double-platinum in Japan, where Janis still holds the record for most consecutive weeks in the top ten (over 60 weeks at #1!). Shortly afterwards, the Giorgio Morder-produced “Fly Too High” gave her platinum records all over Europe, Australia, even Africa and then after more than a decade of constant touring, she took a hiatus. “I studied theater with Stella Adler, which put me back on track as a writer, and a human being. Got divorced, moved to Nashville with three guitars, my 10-year-old car, and five pieces of furniture, and started again. It was the making of me.” Holding her head high despite an abusive and broken marriage, devastating financial crisis (her accountant of twenty years “went rogue”), and near fatal health issues, she returned to recording in 1993 with “Breaking Silence” and received her eighth Grammy nomination.

I have several of her albums on vinyl, a medium that remains synonymous with her period of greatest commercial success. An interesting songwriter, she has humility in spades, perennially refusing to perform one of her best songs “In The Winter” after – in her own words – Dusty Springfield had nailed the definitive version with her recorded cover in 1974.

In recent times, she has published several science fiction short stories and launched her Pearl Foundation, a public charity which supports continuing education students. By 2016, it had contributed more than $900,000 in scholarship funds.

This year, she headlined the Cambridge Folk Festival in August and Sony music legacy curated CD and vinyl remasters of five of her best albums. I cannot vouch for their audio quality having opted instead to hunt down near pristine original pressings for a song. They’re out there for little more than £1-£2; you just have to know where to look…………..