Joni Mitchell has become an icon in the world of American music. Her career as a musician started when she was only 9 years old. Mitchell was one of the many children in the US who had become victim to the polio plague that hit the city in the 1950s. This unfortunate affliction landed Mitchell in a polio ward in Canada where she sang to the public for her very first time. As she lay on a bed in the ward, she began singing Christmas carols for everyone and consequently ended up discovering her love for music.
This was the point from where Mitchell started developing a love for singing. This love eventually resulted in her becoming a highly prolific musician who released 19 albums. Her first official song, titled “Song to a Seagull” came out in 1968, and ever since then, she has kept on singing. Mitchell is now 75 years old, and if you take a look at her long career in the music industry, you can see how her music has aged with her. Many of her songs are fuelled by the feelings of pain and hardship that she has faced throughout her life, which makes her music all the more captivating.
Mitchell’s early works took the folk genre and did something amazing with it, then she transitioned into mega stardom and did the same to the pop genre as well. She has explored a variety of genres throughout her career, adding a unique Joni Mitchell feel to every genre that she ever touched. This is what makes her music stand out and sound refreshingly different even to this date.
Joni Mitchell’s experimental music, her daring artistic vision, and her disregard of what society thought about her made her a visionary. Many people compare her with the likes of Neil Young, Bob Dylan, and other artistic musicians who produced music not to appeal to the crowd, but to preach the crowd and enlighten it.
While Mitchell’s character can be compared with other prolific musicians, she remains peerless simply because of the fact that she did things entirely in her own way. One of the many interesting things about her is how she tuned her guitar. Her tuning was always random in order to keep her from becoming used to following pre-determined patterns. While this may sound foolish to some, it was a part of her style and one of the many things that made it so distinctive.
Another unforgettable thing about her music is the way she words things. Her poetic lyrics can paint vivid images inside of the listener’s mind. They also evoke all kinds of emotions in you and basically make her songs feel alive. Her last album came out in 2007 and ever since then she has become less social. However, her fans can still connect with her through the songs that she has left behind, songs that will outlive her and make sure that her mark on American music never disappears.