Songs with the name Jean

Oliver's "Jean" (1969) is a soft, swelling ballad written by Rod McKuen for the film The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, and Oliver's warm baritone carries it like a fond letter to a woman he can't stop thinking about. It's lush late-sixties easy listening — strings, brushed drums, a croon — and the name sits right at the center, repeated like a sigh.

David Bowie reached for the name twice, to very different effect. "The Jean Genie" (1972) is a stomping glam-rock shuffle from the Ziggy Stardust era, its title a pun on Jean Genet, all crunching guitar and sneering swagger. A decade later, "Blue Jean" (1984) came from Tonight: a punchy, sax-flecked rocker with a vintage rock-and-roll bounce, and the video, a short film starring Bowie twice over, became one of its signatures. Here Jean is a girl the narrator brags about and gripes about in the same breath.

Bruce Springsteen's "Bobby Jean" (1984) closes the heart of Born in the U.S.A. in classic Boss style — big drums, glistening synths, a Clarence Clemons-style sax solo — but underneath the arena sound it's a raw farewell to a friend who left town without a goodbye, widely read as Springsteen's tip of the hat to an old bandmate. In all three songs, the name belongs to someone the singer is aching after or celebrating, never casually.