At A Glance
Born: November 7, 1943
Where: Fort McLeod, AB
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It's tempting to herald Joni Mitchell as the finest, most influential singer-songwriter in folk music history.
Tempting, but inaccurate; for pigeonholing her within a single music genre is a devaluation of Mitchell's
tremendous stylistic diversity. From the incandescent purity of her 1960s paeans to love and peace to the
smoky world-weariness of her recent collection of classic ballads, Both Sides Now, Mitchell has defied
classification for nearly four decades. Equally at ease, and equally adventurous, in the worlds of rock,
pop, jazz and blues, she has always painted on the broadest of canvases.
Born November 7, 1943, in Fort McLeod, Alberta, Roberta Joan Anderson discovered her musical gifts in a
rather unusual way. Hospitalized with polio at age nine, she filled her long days of convalescence by
singing for the other patients and taught herself to play guitar with the help of an instruction book by
American folksinger and political activist Pete Seeger.
After attending art college in Calgary and becoming a fixture of the local folk music scene, Mitchell
travelled to Toronto, where, in 1965, she wed folk singer Chuck Mitchell. The marriage didn't stick,
but the new last name did. Moving to New York in 1967, Mitchell landed a recording contract with Reprise
Records and an offer from David Crosby to produce her self-titled debut album. Despite a growing cult
following, Mitchell earned her greatest fame during the late '60s as a songwriter, thanks in large part to
Judy Collins' hit version of Both Sides Now and Tom Rush's superb interpretation of The Circle Game.
Mitchell finally earned international recognition as a recording artist with 1970's Ladies Of The Canyon,
and strengthened both her commercial and critical standing with the luminous 1971 follow-up, Blue. The
following year marked the first of Mitchell's many stylistic changes with the release of the pop-oriented
For The Roses and, in 1974, both the classic Court And Spark and the magical Miles Of Aisles, which still
ranks as one of the all-time great "live" albums.
Throughout the 1970s and '80s, Mitchell stayed several steps ahead of music trends by experimenting with
world music, jazz-fusion, and synthesizer-driven electronics. In 1991, she returned to her acoustic roots
with the spare, haunting Night Ride Home, followed in 1994 by the acclaimed Turbulent Indigo. Earlier this
year, at age 56, Mitchell took another new, dynamic tack with Both Sides Now, a project inspired by her
participation in a big-band benefit organized by rock performer Don Henley, former frontman of the Eagles.
Refreshingly outspoken in her criticism of the recording industry's cut-throat tactics, Mitchell has never
allowed commercial success to compromise her exploration of unpaved musical paths. Nor has she ever let
music overshadow her passion for art. As gifted a painter as she is a singer and songwriter, Mitchell's
superb portraits and watercolours are treasured by collectors and have enhanced many of her album covers.
Trying to summarize the iconoclastic allure of Joni Mitchell in a single sentence is a fool's gambit. There
is, however, a moment on the Miles Of Aisles album that comes close to capturing her firefly essence.
Teasing the California audience about fans' strange insistence that every performance of a song sound
precisely like the original recording, she chides, "Nobody ever said to Van Gogh, "Hey, man, paint A Starry
Night again!'" Typically spare and precise, they're the words of a rebel, a fighter, a lover, and a poet
who has enriched our lives by always valuing originality and spontaneity above all else.
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Inductees
