Jump to content

Joni Mitchell

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 138.251.234.142 (talk) at 22:05, 12 February 2006 (→‎Early life). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Joni Mitchell
Self portrait of Joni Mitchell, on the cover of her album Both Sides Now (2000)
Self portrait of Joni Mitchell, on the cover of her album Both Sides Now (2000).
Background information
OriginFort Macleod, Alberta
Years active1967–present

Joni Mitchell, CC (born Roberta Joan Anderson on November 7, 1943, in Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada), is a musician and painter. Initially working in Toronto and western Canada, she was associated with the burgeoning folk music scene of the mid-1960s in New York City. Through the 1970s she expanded her horizons, predominantly to Pop music and jazz, to become one of the most highly respected singer-songwriters of the late 20th century. Mitchell is also an accomplished artist; she has, through photography or painting, created the artwork for each of her albums, and has described herself as a "painter derailed by circumstance."

Early life

A painter who had also dabbled in piano, guitar and ukulele since childhood, Mitchell took her surname from a brief marriage to folksinger Chuck Mitchell in 1965. She performed frequently in coffee houses and folk clubs and became well known for her unique style of songwriting and her innovative guitar style. Personal and often self-consciously poetic, her songs were strengthened by her extraordinarily wide-ranging voice (with a range in pitch at one time covering over four octaves) and her unique style of guitar playing, which makes extensive use of alternative tunings. She has been a cigarette smoker since the age of nine, which may explain the unique texture to her voice. This has been especially prominent in her later albums. She claims to have fallen in love with smoking directly upon taking her first puffs, stating that other children in her proximity who were also smoking broke out in fits of coughing. She says it felt right to her from the very beginning.

Around the time when she left her home in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan she lost her virginity and became pregnant. Seeing no other alternatives, she gave her daughter up for adoption. This remained a private part of her life during the bulk of her early/progressing career. While playing one night in a New York establishment, a young David Crosby witnessed her perform and was immediately struck by her ability and her draw as an artist. He took her under his wing and, as cited by Crosby himself, when making someone aware who had previously been unaware of Mitchell's allure, he would simply "roll them a joint", and ask that they enjoy the experience.

Much of her initial acclaim was as a result of other artists covering her songs; her first songwriting credit to hit the charts, "Urge for Going", was a success for country singer George Hamilton IV and for folk singer Tom Rush then many years later featured as a b-side by the Scottish band Travis. Irish singer Luka Bloom has also since recorded the song to great effect. Mitchell's own 1967 recording of the song was released on the flip side of the 1972 single "You Turn Me On I'm A Radio", but was not released on an album until the Hits compilation in 1996. Judy Collins had a top-ten hit in early 1968 with "Both Sides Now", and British folk rock group Fairport Convention included "Chelsea Morning" and "I Don't Know Where I Stand" on their debut album, recorded in late 1967, and the otherwise unreleased "Eastern Rain" on their second album the following year. The songs on her first two solo albums Joni Mitchell (Song to a Seagull) (1968) and Clouds (1969) were archetypes of the nascent singer-songwriter movement of the time.

By her third album, Ladies of the Canyon (1970), maturity brought a record infused with the spirit of California life (the canyon of the title is perhaps both Topanga Canyon and Laurel Canyon, Los Angeles) as well as containing her first major hit single, the environmental "Big Yellow Taxi" (about paving paradise to put up a parking lot), and her song "Woodstock", about the music festival, which was later a hit for both Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and Matthews Southern Comfort. Mitchell wrote the song after missing and then hearing glorified tales about Woodstock. She had cancelled her appearance at the festival on the advice of her manager for fear that she would miss a scheduled appearance on The Dick Cavett Show. She has since said the decision to miss the concert was one of the biggest regrets of her life. "For Free" is the first of Mitchell's many songs that underscore the dichotomy between the benefits of her stardom and its costs, both in terms of its pressure and of the loss of privacy and freedom it entails.

1970s success

Mitchell's confessional approach deepened on Blue (1971), widely considered the best of this period. Exploring the various facets of relationships, from infatuation on "A Case of You" to insecurity on "This Flight Tonight", the songs featured an increasing use of piano and Appalachian dulcimer on "Carey" , "California" and "All I Want." Others were piano led, some exhibiting the rhythms associated with rock music.

The more straightforward "rock" influence was still strong on her next two albums, recorded for new label Asylum. For the Roses (1972), whose title track continued her exploration of the themes of "For Free," sold well, supported by the country-influenced hit single "You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio". But it was Court and Spark (1974), a hybrid of pop, rock, and folk with a jazzy sheen, that proved to be a huge success, producing such classic songs as "Free Man in Paris" (inspired by stories told by her producer and then-friend David Geffen), "Car On A Hill" and, most notably, "Help Me", which, to this day, remains her best selling single (it reached the Top Ten).

Court and Spark was also notable for the first echoes of the influence of jazz on Mitchell's work, and despite the commercial success of that album and the subsequent live record "Miles of Aisles," backed by the 70s pop-jazz outfit LA Express, she would spend the rest of the decade following that muse and creating more free-form, jazz-inflected music.

Jazz period

The first such album, The Hissing of Summer Lawns (1975), was also a lyrical departure, with the confessional style replaced by a series of vignettes, from nightclub dancers ("Edith and the Kingpin") to the bored wives of the wealthy ("The Hissing of Summer Lawns" and "Harry's House/Centerpiece"). The album was stylistically diverse, with complex vocal harmonies set with African drumming (the Warrior Drums of Burundi making up the foundation of "The Jungle Line"). Although many fans and other artists often cite Hissing as their favorite Mitchell work, it was not well received at the time of its release. A common legend holds it that Rolling Stone magazine accorded it the "Worst Album of The Year"; in actuality it was called only the worst album title [1]. (Mitchell and Rolling Stone have had a contentious relationship, initiated years earlier when RS featured a "tree" illustrating all of Mitchell's alleged romantic partners, primarily other musicians.)

During 1975 Mitchell also participated in several concerts in the Rolling Thunder Revue tours headlined by Bob Dylan, and in 1976, she performed as part of "The Last Waltz" by The Band.

Hejira (1976) continued Mitchell's trend toward jazz, with many of the tracks led by (jazz musician) Jaco Pastorius's fretless bass guitar. The songs themselves, however, featured densely metaphorical lyrics and swooping vocal melodies providing contrast and counterpoint to the jazz rhythms of the arrangements. This album also highlighted as never before the unusual "open" guitar tunings that Mitchell used.

Don Juan's Reckless Daughter (1977) was a further move away from pop toward the freedom and abstraction of jazz, a wordy double album dominated by the lengthy part-improvised "Paprika Plains". The album received mixed reviews: some enjoyed its experimentation and originality, which at the time was not expected of such a celebrated music star. Some argue this style of music was ahead of its time, citing the fact that numerous "jam bands" play today to the delight of college students both in similar style and often times with similar conviction. The cover of the album created its own controversy; Mitchell was featured in several photographs on the cover, including one where she was disguised as a black man.

Mitchell's next work was to be a collaboration with legendary bassist Charles Mingus, who died before the project was completed in 1979. Mitchell finished the tracks with a band featuring Pastorius, Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock and the resulting free-form, sometimes arrhythmic music was daring and eclectic. Mingus was poorly received; rock audiences were not receptive, and jazz purists were unimpressed. However, appreciation for this work has grown considerably over the years.

Geffen era

The 1980s saw Mitchell's lowest recorded output since the beginning of her career. Only three albums of new material appeared, and none of them made an impression. 1982's Wild Things Run Fast was an attempt to return to pop songwriting, including a song "Chinese Cafe/Unchained Melody" that incorporated the chorus and parts of the melody the famous Righteous Brothers hit, and "(You're So Square) Baby I Don't Care". It was influenced largely by Mitchell's marriage to producer Larry Klein - Mitchell herself referred to the songs in several interviews as "I love Larry" songs. Although the songwriting was solid, the set was released at a time where multi-layered, darker music in the New Wave and New Romantic genres prevailed.

British synth-pop performer and producer Thomas Dolby was brought on board for Dog Eat Dog (1985), but the synthesizer and drum machine-led arrangements, coupled with some of Mitchell's most strident and angry lyrics, have dated far quicker than Mitchell's earlier work.

Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm (1988) saw Mitchell collaborating with a wealth of talent, including Willie Nelson, Billy Idol, Wendy and Lisa, Tom Petty and Don Henley. The songs spanned several genres, including a duet with Peter Gabriel on "My Secret Place" that harkened back to "classic" Mitchell material. Although there are some jarring transitions in genre ("Dancing Clown" and "Cool Water"), the multi-layered synthesized sounds on "My Secret Place", "Beat of Black Wings" and "Tea Leaf Prophecy" were a better marriage of Mitchell's voice to electronica.

After the release of Chalk Mark in a Rainstorm, Mitchell participated in Roger Waters' massive performance of The Wall in Berlin.

Turbulent 1990s

1991's Night Ride Home, an album Mitchell described as "middle-aged love songs," was better received and signaled another move closer to her acoustic beginnings. But to many, the real return to form came with the Grammy winning Turbulent Indigo (1994). "Indigo" was Mitchell's most solid set of songs in years. Mitchell released her last set of 'original' new work with Taming the Tiger (1998).

"I hate music": the 2000s

Both Sides Now (2000) was an album composed mostly of covers of classic standards, performed with an orchestra. It received rave reviews by critics and remains a strong seller. The album contained reappraisals of "A Case of You" and the title track "Both Sides Now," two early hits transposed down to Mitchell's now-dusky, soulful alto range. Its success led to 2002's Travelogue, a collection of re-workings of her previous songs with lush orchestral accompaniments. Mitchell has stated that this would be her final album.

Recently, Joni Mitchell has voiced her discontent with the current state of the music industry, describing it as a "cesspool", and stating that she "hates music" and "would like to remember what [she] ever liked about it". She has expressed her dislike of the record industry's dominance, and her desire to control her own destiny, possibly through releasing her own music over the Internet.

A series of themed compilations of songs from earlier albums were also released: "The Beginning of Survival" (2004), "Dreamland" (2004) and "Songs of a Prairie Girl" (2005) which she released after accepting an invitation to be a featured performer at a Saskatchewan Centennial concert in Saskatoon before the Queen. In the liner notes to the last of these, she writes that the collection is "my contribution to Saskatchewan's Centennial celebrations".

Her album "Both Sides Now" was featured in the film "Love Actually", in which several of the characters listen to the album.

Guitar style

Almost every song she composed on the guitar uses an open, or non-standard tuning; she has written songs in some 50 different tunings. The use of alternative tunings allows more varied and complex harmonies to be produced on the guitar, without the need for difficult chord shapes. Indeed, many of Joni's guitar songs use very simple chord shapes, but her use of alternative tunings and a highly rhythmic picking/strumming style creates a rich and unique guitar sound. Her right-hand picking/strumming technique has evolved over the years from an initially intricate picking style, typified by the guitar songs on her first album, to a looser and more rhythmic style, sometimes incorporating percussive "slaps", that have been featured on later albums.

Influence

Mitchell could be labeled a "musician's musician"; her work has had an enormous influence on a number of artists; she has influenced not only "similar" singer-songwriters, such as Sheryl Crow and Shawn Colvin, but a number of artists in diverse genres, such as k.d. lang, Elvis Costello, PM Dawn, Janet Jackson, Agnes Chan, and Prince.

For instance, Prince's song "The Ballad of Dorothy Parker" off the album Sign 'O' the Times, pays tribute to Mitchell, both through his evocative Mitchell-like harmonies and through the use of one of Mitchell's own techniques: as in Mitchell's song "This Flight Tonight", Prince references a song in his lyrics (Joni's own "Help Me") as the music begins to emulate the chords and melody of that song. The result is a beautiful and subtle tribute.

Other artists are a little more literal in their use of Joni Mitchell. Janet Jackson, used a sample of "Big Yellow Taxi" as the centerpiece of her 1998 single "Got 'Til It's Gone". (Mitchell appears to have enjoyed Jackson's sampling of "Taxi"; she made a rare appearance on MTV/VH1 to appear in a brief clip and give the creation a thumbs up.) Counting Crows scored a hit in 2002 with a cover of "Big Yellow Taxi". Although Mitchell usually refrains from commenting on other artists, particularly ones that she influences, she has been impressed with two jazz-based artists who have interpreted her work, Cassandra Wilson and Diana Krall. Although most listeners tend to remember Mitchell's earlier, more commercially popular work, many musicians have found inspiration in her more experimental work, particularly The Hissing of Summer Lawns and Hejira. She also praised the New Radicals, bemoaning the band's status as one-hit wonders.

Mitchell was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 1981 and into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997. In 1995, she received Billboard's "Century Award". On May 1, 2002, she was appointed a Companion of the Order of Canada. She received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002, with a citation describing her as "one of the most important female recording artists of the rock era" and "a powerful influence on all artists who embrace diversity, imagination and integrity."

Mitchell received an honorary doctorate from McGill University on October 27, 2004.

Discography

(with U.S. chart positions)

Albums

Compilations

  • The World of Joni Mitchell (1972) (Australia/NZ only)
  • Hits (1996) #161
  • Misses (1996)
  • The Complete Geffen Recordings (4-CD box set of material 1982-91) (2003)
  • The Beginning of Survival (2004)
  • Dreamland (2004) #177
  • Starbucks Artist's Choice (2004)
  • Songs of a Prairie Girl (2005) (Remastered)

Singles

See also

Wikiquote has quotations related to Joni Mitchell.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Joni_Mitchell&oldid=39395578"