About the artist: Janis Ian (1951) is an American singer-songwriter who was most commercially successful in the 1960s and 1970s. She released 22 studio albums, but was never able to repeat her early successes. Janis Ian currently has three songs in my list of about 200 best pop/rock songs of all time.
About the song: Jesse is probably better known in the Roberta Flack version, which was a minor hit in the USA in 1973. This fragile understated ballad is Janis Ian's masterpiece, and one of the best songs ever penned. She recorded her own version a year later for the 1974 Stars album. The lyrics keep you wondering about what is really happening. Has her husband left her? Is he dead? We do not find out, but you get the impression that his absence is slowly driving her mad. The delicate instrumentation is the icing on the cake - those singing saws sounds really get under your spine. Run time 4:09.
