Disbelief and euphoria engulfed music lovers a week ago when they awoke to reports of Joni Mitchell performing at the acclaimed Newport Folk Festival. Did they get it right? The singer hadn’t given concerts in more than twenty years, and was still recovering from a brain aneurysm that had struck her seven years ago.
Yes, the messages were correct. Mitchell had traveled to the festival in Rhode Island for the first time in 53 years. Together with much acclaimed singer Brandi Carlile in the US, who was programmed on Sunday evening as Brandi Carlile & Friends. So Joni Mitchell was one of those friends, although her arrival had remained secret until she was announced by Carlile and Mitchell was led to a large Louis XIV armchair in a blue alpinopet on her head.
Poor Paul Simon. His surprise performance the day before had already generated a lot of enthusiasm because he too had said goodbye to the concert stage a few years ago. But Joni Mitchell, that was really different.
The last hope that had lived since the beginning of this century among new generations of lovers of her work that she would return to her decision never to perform again, was finally crushed on March 31, 2015 when Mitchell passed out in her unconscious for three days. house in Los Angeles.
Strong own will
The music world held its breath, but she survived what turned out to be a brain aneurysm. Only she had to relearn everything: talking, walking, singing and playing guitar. Well, she would later put her wonderfully fast recovery into perspective: ‘When I was 9 I got polio and then I had to learn to walk again.’
We’ve known since she made her entrance into pop history some 55 years ago that Mitchell is a powerful personality with a strong will of her own. She had come to the United States from Canada. In 1967 she had already been taken to the Newport Folk Festival by Judy Collins where she saw her compatriot Leonard Cohen, who became one of her biggest inspirations.
In addition to the ability to meet and win over the right people at the right time (record executive David Geffen, manager Elliot Roberts, musicians David Crosby and Graham Nash), she had an extraordinary creative talent. At the time she called herself a ‘painter who writes songs’, but it was really her breathtakingly beautiful, completely original music with which she would become perhaps the greatest musician/composer of her generation in the 1970s.
Always musically innovate
Albums like blue (1971), Court & Spark (1974), The Hissing of Summer Lawns and Hejira (1976) became classic and whoever plays her later albums chronologically (unfortunately, following Neil Young, Mitchell got everything from Spotify last year) can only conclude that Mitchell never repeated himself. She always kept on renewing herself musically.
Although somewhat more unstable in level and especially often limping in production (Mitchell preferred to do everything herself, but her record company didn’t allow that), her later work is also definitely worth it.
But when she sometime after her last studio album Shine (2007) Heard someone on the radio saying that record companies are no longer after talented artists, but mainly want malleable musicians.
She hadn’t performed for years, and she no longer had to make records. Painting, that was her thing now. Until that 31st March 2015. She may never have started singing again if she hadn’t met Brandi Carlile (now 41) after that. This Americana singer with a sublime, warm voice had become addicted to Mitchell’s repertoire and wanted permission to play Mitchell’s blue to be interpreted in its entirety. She meets the creator of this masterpiece several times and there seems to be a click. In fact, Mitchell encourages Carlile in her plans, and is in the audience when the October 2019 performance takes place in Los Angeles.
Emotion and bewilderment
In the months leading up to this, thanks to Carlile, Mitchell also finds something of her musical passion. She regularly invites musicians to her home, says Carlile in her autobiography published last year broken horses, first of all to listen to them. Chaka Khan, Herbie Hancock, Elton John and also Harry Styles participate in the so-called Joni Jams. During the first it is already hit. Hancock plays some jazzy chords on the piano and suddenly Joni Mitchell starts singing:
Summertime, and the living is easy……‘
All the guests feel the emotion and bewilderment: Joni is singing again. Not only that, she can also play guitar again. By watching old videos on YouTube she learns the right grips again. And she uses the same her signature open guitar tunings with which she rocked the pop world fifty years ago.
Many Joni Jams later, it is Carlile who finally persuades Mitchell to come to the same Newport that inspired her in 1967. At first, Mitchell mostly belongs. But who recorded the thirteen songs on YouTube looking back and putting them in the correct order, Mitchell sees that with each song, Mitchell becomes a little more confident.
If she’s against it end in Both Sides Now the rule ‘well something’s lost, but something’s gained in living every day‘ Adding extra force is emotion. Joni Mitchell is singing again and having fun.
Is this the beginning of something beautiful or the end?
Three highlights Joni Mitchell at Newport 2022
Just Like This Train
After carefully singing along for 5 songs, Mitchell stands up, buckles her guitar and starts the guitar part from Just Like This Train (1974) to play after. Brave, that’s what hostess Brandi Carlile thinks, and especially wonderful because Mitchell’s guitar shows exactly that sound from back then.
Summertime
Summertime is the first song Mitchell herself sang during the first Joni Jam spring 2019 at her home. Herbie Hancock was reportedly moved to tears at the time. on Newport the audience is silent. Three songs before the end we really hear how good her voice still is.
Both Sides Now
One of her first and still most famous songs. Wonderful how she works towards the last lines and concludes. ‘It’s life’s illusions that I recall, I really don’t know life at all.’