One of America’s best-known folksingers was around 13 the first time somebody called her “a dumb Mexican.”

Joan Baez says in a new film that a teacher told her that she “was the highest breed of Spanish.” But “Joanie” Baez, as she was then called, was not having it. “I told her no, I’m not. I’m a Mexican. I was defending the Mexican race.”

Now a new documentary takes a look at the life and legacy of the iconic singer, songwriter and activist. In “Joan Baez: I Am a Noise,” filmmakers follow her on her final concert tour in 2018-19 and delve into her archive of home movies, artwork and diaries. In addition to highlighting Baez’s lifelong commitment to social justice, the film explores issues of fame, identity, aging and forgiveness.

Baez, 82, was raised in the San Francisco Bay area. Her father was a Mexican-born physicist, and her mother was of Scottish descent. Converts to Quakerism, Baez’s parents instilled a social consciousness in her from a young age. Baez recalls in the film that, as a child, “I was aware that there were sorrows way greater than mine.”

Growing up, Baez often felt like an outsider. “I thought I was inferior, especially to the white kids, and the rich kids,” Baez says in the film. “Most of the time at school, I felt ‘less than.’”

“I Am a Noise” Miri Navasky, one of the film’s three directors, said that Baez’s Mexican American heritage was “foundational” for the singer. “It was huge for her, both as an insecurity, and as a source of empathy. … I think that followed her through her whole life, and to some degree, still does.”

A meteoric rise to fame

Singing was Baez’s escape, her source of joy — and it led to what became an extraordinary career. A college dropout, Baez was singing barefoot in small coffeehouses around Boston when she was invited to perform at the 1959 Newport Folk Festival. There she was “discovered” and began a meteoric rise to fame. She sang at Carnegie Hall before she was 18 and landed on the cover of Time magazine at 21. “For whatever reason,” Baez says in the film, “I think I was the right voice at the right time.”

Baez’s crystal-clear soprano and her activism placed her at the center of several musical and political movements. She sparked a resurgence of American folk music, sang at both the landmark 1963 March on Washington and at Woodstock, and helped bring Bob Dylan to prominence. She was in the fields with Cesar Chavez when he was organizing farmworkers and was visited in jail by Martin Luther King Jr. after being arrested for protesting the Vietnam War. 

“She has always believed in the fight for the underdog, in social change, in nonviolence. She’s never wavered from these areas of political activity,” said “I Am a Noise” co-director Maeve O’Boyle. “She’s fought for what she believes in, her entire life. And running parallel to this is an incredible musicality, a love of creativity across the board.”

In the post-war years, there were many young people excited about the possibilities of new forms of self-expression and new ways of thinking, said New York University arts professor Richard Litvin. “Then this brilliant young woman comes on the scene; she has obvious musical gifts and is charismatic, courageous and willing to be present for causes she believed in.”