Ode to Billie Joe

"Ode to Billie Joe" is a song written and recorded by Bobbie Gentry, a singer-songwriter from Chickasaw County, Mississippi. The single, released in late July 1967, was a number-one hit in the United States and a big international seller. Billboard ranked the record as the No. 3 song for 1967. The recording of "Ode to Billie Joe" generated eight Grammy nominations, resulting in three wins for Gentry and one for arranger Jimmie Haskell. The song made Rolling Stone's list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time", Rolling Stone's "100 Greatest Country Songs of All Time", and Pitchfork's "200 Best Songs of the 1960s".

The song takes the form of a first-person narrative over sparse accompaniment. It relates a rural Mississippi family's passing reaction to the news of the suicide of Billie Joe, a local boy connected to the daughter narrator. The song concludes with the demise of the father and the lingering, singular effects of the two deaths on the family. According to Gentry the song is about indifference and unshared grief.