Janice Joplin born 19 January 1943

Janis Lyn Joplin (January 19, 1943 – October 4, 1970) was an American singer and songwriter. One of the most iconic and successful rock performers of her era, she was noted for her powerful mezzo-soprano vocals, as well as her "electric" stage presence. 

Janice Lyn Joplin was raised in the small town of Port Arthur, Texas, and much of her subsequent personal difficulties and unhappiness have been attributed to her inability to fit in with the expectations of the conservative community. After graduating from Thomas Jefferson High School in 1960, she attended Lamar State College and the University of Texas, where she played auto-harp in Austin bars. She was nominated for the Ugliest Man on Campus in 1963, and she spent two years traveling, performing and becoming drug-addicted. 

In 1963, Joplin was arrested in San Francisco for shoplifting. During the two years that followed, her drug use increased and she acquired a reputation as a "speed freak" and occasional heroin user. She also used other psychoactive drugs and was a heavy drinker throughout her career; her favorite alcoholic beverage was Southern Comfort.  She'd been singing blues and folk music since her teens, playing on occasion with future Jefferson Airplane guitarist Jorma Kaukonen in the '60s. There are a few live pre-Big Brother recordings (not issued until after her death), reflecting the inspiration of early blues singers like Bessie Smith, that demonstrate she was well on her way to developing a personal style before hooking up with the band. 

Back in Port Arthur in the spring of 1965, after Joplin's parents noticed her weight of 40 kg she changed her lifestyle. She avoided drugs and alcohol, adopted a beehive hairdo, and enrolled as an anthropology major at Lamar University in nearby Beaumont, Texas. In 1966 she moved to California permanently, where she joined the struggling San Francisco psychedelic group Big Brother & the Holding Company. Although their loose, occasionally sloppy brand of bluesy psychedelia had some charm, there can be no doubt that Joplin -- who initially didn't even sing lead on all of the material -- was primarily responsible for lifting them out of the ranks of the ordinary. 

She made them a hit at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, where her stunning version of "Ball and Chain" (perhaps her very best performance) was captured on film. After a debut on the Mainstream label, Big Brother signed a management deal with Albert Grossman and moved to Columbia. Their second album, Cheap Thrills, topped the charts in 1968, but Joplin left the band shortly afterward, enticed by the prospects of stardom as a solo act. 

Joplin's first album, I Got Dem Ol' Kozmic Blues Again Mama!, was recorded with the Kozmic Blues Band, a unit that included horns and retained just one of the musicians that had played with her in Big Brother (guitarist Sam Andrew). Although it was a hit, it wasn't her best work; the new group, though more polished musically, weren't the sympathetic accompanists that Big Brother were, purveying a soul-rock groove that could sound forced. That's not to say the album was totally unsuccessful, boasting one of her signature tunes in "Try (Just a Little Bit Harder)." 

For years, Joplin's life had been a roller coaster of drug addiction, alcoholism, and volatile personal relationships, documented in several biographies. Musically, however, things were on the upswing shortly before her death, as she assembled a better, more versatile backing outfit, the Full Tilt Boogie Band, for her final album Pearl (ably produced by Paul Rothchild). Pearl was solid evidence of her growth into a mature, diverse stylist who could handle blues, soul, and folk-rock. "Mercedes Benz," "Get It While You Can," and Kris Kristofferson's "Me and Bobby McGee" are some of her very best tracks. 

Tragically, she died before the album's release, overdosing on heroin in Hollywood's Landmark Motor Hotel (now known as Highland Gardens Hotel) from a heroin-alcohol overdose the previous day. It was reported that after she mainlined the drug, she was able to leave her room, walk to the lobby, ask the desk clerk to change a five-dollar bill so she could spend 50 cents on a pack of cigarettes, return to her room and remove some of her clothes. She then fell suddenly, breaking her nose. The desk clerk later stated that while he was giving her change she talked happily about the new album she was recording, although he believed, based on having interacted with her since her August 24 check in, that she "was not a happy person". Her body was discovered approximately 18 hours later by her road manager, who was the son of Alistair Cooke.

 Her ashes were scattered off the coast of California. "Me and Bobby McGee" became a posthumous number one single in 1971, and thus the song with which she is most frequently identified.

(Edited from AllMusic , IMDb & Wikipedia)