Did You Know...

Hailing from Seattle, where she was born in 1939, Judy wound up in Denver for her teen years, where her father worked in radio. A childhood classical pianist, Collins settled on folk music as her recording medium and released A Maid of Constant Sorrow in 1961. She included old folk songs from England and Ireland in this album and her next one, The Golden Apples of the Sun, from 1962. The turning point in her material was on 1963's Judy Collins #3, where she recorded material by Bob Dylan, Shel Silverstein and Pete Seeger, whose 'Turn! Turn! Turn!' included guitar work by Roger McGuinn, who later turned the song into a #1 hit for his own group, the Byrds.

Now that she had mastered modern folk and was dabbling in the emerging protest-song movement, Judy Collins turned her sweet soprano to more elevated works as well. Her 1966 album, In My Life, covered the title tune from the Beatles, and she also sang songs by Leonard Cohen and Jacques Brel on this set. By broadening her range of sources for material, Collins set herself up for the next stage of her career, which led to several gold albums.

In 1967 she released Wildflowers, her first gold album (though In My Life eventually reached gold status). Her single from the album, 'Both Sides Now,' helped to cement Joni Mitchell's status as a songwriter and reached the Top Ten at the end of 1968. 'Both Sides Now' won the 1968 Grammy for Best Folk Performance. Now considered a classic of the era, this recording gave Judy Collins iconic status in the musical world outside of the folk artists in her circle. At this point, fans were buying tickets just to hear this song.