Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell's songs turn private feeling into unusual harmony, from spare folk guitar and piano to jazz-inflected forms. Open tunings and plainspoken lyrics have made her catalogue a lasting source for other singers.
Her writing moved out of the 1960s folk circuit into pop, rock and jazz without losing the confessional centre. Early songs were often heard first in other voices; her own records then fixed them in spare acoustic settings or, later, with denser rhythm sections and improvising players. Blue and Court and Spark show the range: rolling piano, open-tuned guitar, and lines that admit loneliness and desire without disguise. From the mid-1970s the harmony and groove grew more complex as she worked with jazz musicians, yet the songs stay built around voice, chord colour and words that hold their ground. She produced much of this work herself and treated the album as a complete object, music and image together.
Compositions by Joni Mitchell appear on
