The long-running PBS series American Masters turns its lens on singer-songwriter Janis Ian, an artist who has spent a career challenging convention with little more than a guitar and an unflinching point of view. Titled Breaking Silence, the biography chronicles Ian’s ascent from a teenage folk prodigy to a Grammy-winning musician and staunch advocate for gay rights.
The program traces her early disruption of the music scene with the 1966 song “Society’s Child,” a direct look at an interracial relationship that got her blacklisted from radio stations and subjected to hate mail. Nearly a decade later, she struck a different cultural chord with “At Seventeen,” a song that became an anthem for anyone who ever felt like an outsider. The documentary connects these two career pillars, showing a consistent throughline of an artist willing to tackle difficult subjects head-on, regardless of commercial risk.
Using a blend of archival footage, new interviews, and performance clips, the episode paints a picture of a musician who consistently used her platform to push for social change long before it was fashionable. As American Masters has done for over three decades, the film positions Ian not just as a musician, but as a significant figure in American culture whose work continues to find relevance.
American Masters: Janis Ian: Breaking Silence airs Friday, June 20 at 9:00 PM ET on PBS.
