Joni Mitchell Artistfacts

Joni Mitchell song list

Joni Mitchell Artistfacts

November 7, 1943
She was born Roberta Joan Anderson in Fort McLeod, Alberta, Canada. She played a variety of instruments when she was young, but her primary interest was painting. In 1965, she was married for a short time to the folk singer Chuck Mitchell, which is where she got her last name.
Mitchell is a very honored artist: She is a member of the Canadian Music Hall Of Fame and the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame. Billboard gave her their Century Award in 1995; and in 2002 she was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Grammy.
She smoked cigarettes since the age of nine, when she took up the habit with other girls in her church choir. >>
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Mitchell had beef with Rolling Stone, which she claims was over a personal issue with a guy at the magazine. Rolling Stone named her "Old Lady of the Year" of 1971 and ran a diagram of the men whose hearts she supposedly broke, James Taylor, David Crosby and Graham Nash among them.
She is confident in her abilities, and has referred to herself as "an arrogant artist." Mitchell says she detests false humility.
In 1965 she had a daughter, Kelly, with a boyfriend who left when she was three months pregnant. In an attempt to keep the baby, she married a musician named Chuck Mitchell, but not long after their nuptials, Joni gave up Kelly for adoption. Kelly was renamed Kilauren by her new parents. In 1997 Joni reunited with her daughter (now named Kilauren Gibb), but in 2001, they broke off contact.
Mitchell has a very distinctive guitar style and uses a panoply of alternate tunings. This makes it very difficult to replicate her sound or draw up accurate chord charts for her songs.
Joni Mitchell contracted polio in an epidemic when she was nine and was hospitalized for weeks.
She produced most of her songs herself, giving clear direction to the almost exclusively male studio musicians and technicians she worked with at a time when there were very few prominent female producers. Producers can often help artists find new angles and give constructive feedback, but Mitchell was so sure of what she wanted, there was no use for one.
Joni Mitchell is a talented painter whose original self-portraits adorn many of her album sleeves. She once told The Toronto Globe and Mail: "I have always thought of myself as a painter derailed by circumstance."
An aneurysm in March 2015 robbed Joni Mitchell of her voice and the ability to play the guitar. After relearning the instrument, Mitchell returned to the stage on July 24, 2022, when she performed 13 songs at the Newport Folk Festival. Her surprise performance marked the first full set she played since 2000.

Comments: 2

Pm Jude from Manchester CtAlways liked Joni,court and spark was great and her song writing and various collaborations with jazz artist like Jaco and Herbie Hancock lent greater depth to what she had to say.
Phoenix from Denver, CoThere's a longtime smoker, She supposedly smokes like two packs a day.

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More Songfacts:

Brass In PocketPretenders

Chrissie Hynde got the phrase "Brass In Pocket" from a Northern England slang term meaning you had some money, "brass" meaning coins.

TemptedSqueeze

The Squeeze song "Tempted" is one of their few with lead vocals by Paul Carrack, who sang the Ace song "How Long" and was in Mike + The Mechanics.

God Bless AmericaKate Smith

Irving Berlin said "God Bless America" was "not a patriotic song, but rather an expression of gratitude."

Radar LoveGolden Earring

At the end of "Radar Love," the driver dies in a crash but maintains a psychic bond with the woman he was racing to see. The song's lyricist was inspired by stories of extrasensory perception (ESP).