After the expanded instrumental scale and sonic experimentation of Court & Spark and The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Joni Mitchell reverses that flow for the more intimate, interior music on Hejira, which retracts the arranging style to focus on Mitchell's distinctive acoustic guitar and piano, and the brilliant, lyrical bass fantasias of fretless bass innovator Jaco Pastorius. Known for his furious, sometimes rococo figures beneath the music of Weather Report, Pastorius is tamed by Mitchell's cooler, more deliberate ballads: these meditations coax a far gentler, subdued lyricism from Pastorius, whose intricate bass counterpoints Mitchell's coolly elegant singing, especially on the sublime "Amelia," which transforms the mystery of Amelia Earheart into a parable of both feminism and romantic self-discovery. This isn't Mitchell at her most obviously ambitious, yet the depth of feeling, poetic reach, and musical confidence make this among the finest works in a very fine canon.

Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 1: The Early Years 1963-1967 fills in an important chapter that heretofore has gone undocumented through in her official discography: her formative years as a folkie, playing intimate venues and radio stations while recording the occasional demo or gift tape at home…

4CD box set features newly remastered versions of Joni Mitchell’s first four studio albums - Song To A Seagull (1968), Clouds (1969), Ladies Of The Canyon (1970), and Blue (1971). In the case of Song To A Seagull, the original mix has been recently updated by Mitchell and mixer Matt Lee. The cover art for THE REPRISE YEARS (1968-1971) features a previously unseen self-portrait Mitchell painted during the time period that was recently rediscovered in one of her old sketchbooks and includes an essay by Grammy winning singer-songwriter Brandi Carlile.

Dreamland is the second volume in Joni Mitchell's self-compiled series of "theme" retrospectives. The first, issued on the Geffen label, was entitled The Beginning of Survival. It focused on songs that dug deep into social, cultural, political, and environmental themes, as "commentaries on the world in which we live." Dreamland was compiled from her Asylum, Reprise, and Nonesuch years and focuses, for lack of a better term, on the jazzier side of her catalog musically, including songs with lyrics are all highly imagistic in their makeup. Most are dealing with love and life in the process of moving through it. From "Free Man in Paris" and the title track, to "In France They Kiss on Main Street," "Come in From the Cold," "Help Me," and of course, "You Turn Me on I'm a Radio," these songs turn the tide for the listener from the place of observing love to the terrain of being caught up in it…

Sara Colman, the acclaimed UK singer, songwriter and composer, releases Ink On A Pin, her new album celebrating the music of Joni Mitchell, with striking new arrangements and poignant re-workings of seven songs from one of her most significant influences. Following her much-admired 2018 release, What We're Made Of, noted by American critic Ted Gioia as 'worthy of your attention', Colman's latest project amplifles her inventiveness and versatility, as she weaves elements of folk, Americana and jazz into expressive new arrangements of iconic songs drawn from Mitchell's celebrated catalogue. Inspired by her love of classic songwriting and instinctive improvisational energy, Mitchell's work has long had a profound impact on Colman. "My awareness of Joni's unfailing ability to write songs that are uniquely personal and yet universal has deepened as I discover more about what inspired her to write them, as they have inspired countless jazz musicians before me. Often with Joni, in writing about something in her life, she seems to encapsulate the very thing that you yourself are experiencing. Genius."

The Beginning of Survival is a whopping 16-track collection from Joni Mitchell's Geffen period, recorded between 1985-1998, and carefully chosen by the artist as "commentaries on the world in which we live."
The sequencing here is so meticulous and effective that The Beginning of Survival feels like a topical song cycle rather than a compilation. Tracks trace meaning and impression onto other tracks; they inform and elucidate themes of resistance in the face of the dark deluge that began the culture war in earnest during the 1980s, and which has come to signify the nature of American society in the 21st century with no signs of anything but further fragmentation. The opening words of "The Reoccurring Dream" that begin this cycle state: "This is a reoccurring dream/Born in the dreary gap between/What we have now/And what we wish we could have"…

This 1998 disc from Joni Mitchell harks back to the days when she heard the hissing of summer lawns and the jazzier essays of her Hejira days. The only difference between then and now is her use of a guitar synthesizer for her aural textures and melody templates. Always employing the best of musicians to help her out, Mitchell takes off on a trip through "Harlem in Havana" and ending up with "Tiger Bones" to show for it. Along the way, she puts forth "No Apologies" and rocks things up with "Lead Balloon" (which will remind one of "Big Yellow Taxi"), and contains one of her best opening one-liners ever. With "Taming the Tiger" dedicated to her newfound daughter and grandson, "Stay in Touch" could be about them, or almost anyone Mitchell's been close to…

Prior to this moment, only in our wildest and sauciest dreams could we picture Sufjan Stevens, Björk, Brad Mehldau, Prince and James Taylor rolling around together. Nonesuch Records, however, has made our dreams a reality.
Joni Mitchell covers dot the musical landscape the way Tim Hortons doughnut shacks line the highways of Ontario. It's a little surprising, then, that the first Mitchell tribute album to be released on a major U.S. label didn't emerge until 2007, which was coincidentally the same year Mitchell was scheduled to release Shine, her first studio effort to appear in some ten years. And as far as tribute albums go, A Tribute to Joni Mitchell isn't half bad. The compilation is split up between songs that were recorded specifically for the tribute album, such as Sufjan Stevens' "A Free Man in Paris," and those that were recorded and released previously, such as James Taylor's "River"…

Joni Mitchell reached her commercial high point with Court and Spark, a remarkably deft fusion of folk, pop, and jazz which stands as her best-selling work to date. While as unified and insightful as Blue, the album – a concept record exploring the roles of honesty and trust in relationships, romantic and otherwise – moves away from confessional songwriting into evocative character studies: the hit "Free Man in Paris," written about David Geffen, is a not-so-subtle dig at the machinations of the music industry, while "Raised on Robbery" offers an acutely funny look at the predatory environment of the singles bar scene. Much of Court and Spark is devoted to wary love songs: both the title cut and "Help Me," the record's most successful single, carefully measure the risks of romance, while "People's Parties" and "The Same Situation" are fraught with worry and self-doubt (standing in direct opposition to the music, which is smart, smooth, and assured from the first note to the last).

For about a year after the Woodstock Music and Art Fair in 1969, it seemed as though everyone wanted to stage a rock festival. However, The Rolling Stones' disastrous Altamont free concert (documented in the film Gimme Shelter) forever tarnished the image of the rock festival in the U.S., while in Europe, the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival was fortunately less deadly than Altamont, but nearly as controversial. Staged by two men with greater ambitions than practical experience (not unlike Woodstock), the festival was held on a small island off the British coast, where some of the finest rock talent of the day – Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, The Who, Miles Davis, Joni Mitchell, Donovan, Jethro Tull, Joan Baez, Leonard Cohen, and Kris Kristofferson, among many others – were scheduled to play over the course of five days.

Today, five previously unreleased demos and outtakes from the album are available as part of a digital EP called Blue 50 (Demos & Outtakes). These songs will also be included on Joni Mitchell Archives Vol. 2: The Reprise Years (1968-1971), a compilation coming out in October that will document the period leading up to Blue. Blue 50 (Demos & Outtakes) includes early demos of “A Case Of You” and “California,” an alternate version of “River” that features French horns, an early take of “Urge For Going,” a song that was intended for Blue but didn’t see a proper release until a 1996 greatest hits compilation, and a studio recording of “Hunter,” which Mitchell played live but never officially put out.