The 1960's were an important decade for women in rock and roll music, as they helped to create a niche in the music world for music with a message. Rather than focusing solely on the natural beauty of their voices, many female vocalists began emulating male rock singers by letting their voices come across as jagged and emotive. While singers such as Janis Joplin and Grace Slick were not classically trained, they were able to sing in a powerful style that lent them credibility in their genre.
Janis Joplin
Janis Joplin, a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, passed away at the age of 27 after establishing herself as important rock vocalist in the 1960s. Joplin had a powerful voice with blues leanings that she used to sing with Big Brother and the Holding Company in the mid-to-late 1960s. Joplin also released a solo album in the later part of the decade. She died in 1970 due to a drug overdose.
Grace Slick
Grace Slick was the vocalist for the 1960s rock band Jefferson Airplane. The band formed before Slick was a part of it, though she joined in 1966 after Jefferson Airplane saw her sing with another band. Slick learned the lyrics to existing Jefferson Airplane songs and also incorporated some of her own that the band would put on future albums. Her singing style was less gritty than Joplin's, but she still brought a rough sound to psychedelic rock music.
Cass Elliot
Cass Elliot was known as Mama Cass when she was part of the 1960s folk-rock band The Mamas and the Papas. She sang with the band until they broke up in 1968 and then came out with solo material. Elliot is enshrined in Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as part of The Mamas and the Papas. Her career ended when she died of a heart attack in 1974.
Cher
Cher covered half of the singing duties with the folk-rock duo Sonny and Cher. Cher had a less subversive singing voice than many of her contemporaries, but her band's tongue-in-cheek style and optimistic lyrics helped earn her fame. Cher remains involved in music in the first decades of the 2000s, and in 2011 she was a featured star in the movie "Burlesque." While her style changed to abandon her rock leanings, Cher's career began as a rock vocalist in an important era.
