Joni Mitchell: What a Wonderful Surprise at Newport

Joni Mitchell at Newport

What a wonderful surprise that Joni Mitchell gave us at the Newport Folk Festival Sunday evening. 

For the first time since 1969, the revered Canadian singer/songwriter returned to Rhode Island with her voice and electric guitar at the ready and played a historic set to close this year’s festival. It was her first full-length public concert in about two decades.

Credit goes to singer Brandi Carlisle for bringing Mitchell and her popular music back to the performance stage. The Fort Adams crowd was filled with elation as the 78-year-old legend gave new meaning to many of her iconic songs such as “Both Sides Now,” “Help Me,” “Big Yellow Taxi,” “A Case of You,” and “Both Sides Now.”

As Mitchell sat in a Louis XIV-style chair on the festival stage – likened by many as a throne – wearing a beret, a grey-toned satin pants ensemble and decked with glittering beads and sunglasses, she began her set with a group sing-a-long to “Carey,” one of the chestnuts from her 1971 album Blue, regarded as one of the greatest albums of all time. The group included Carlisle and Wynonna Judd. 

Later, Mitchell’s set included “Amelia,” about Amelia Earhart, which she penned for her jazz-inspired 1976 album Hejira as well as a long, electric guitar solo interlude on the 1974 tune “Just Like This Train” from Court and Spark that reminded everyone of her keen sense of jazz phrasing. Despite having gone through health struggles in recent years, recovering from a 2015 brain aneurysm that required her to re-learn how to talk and walk, the elder Mitchell looked in good spirits on this evening – surrounded by friends – and her 13-song set showed her strength of will is second to none.

Looking back, one of my set favorites was Mitchell’s lower-register interpretation of the Gershwin classic “Summertime,” from the 1935 opera Porgy & Bess. The husky sound of Mitchell’s voice brought to mind that of Nina Simone, another wonderful interpreter of the Gershwin aria. Listening with great interest, there was a determination that couldn’t be denied in the sound of Mitchell’s voice in this classic tune.

Mitchell’s set ended with “The Circle Game,” which she performed more than half a century ago in Newport.

“After all she’s been through, she returned to the Newport Folk Fest stage after 53 years and I will never forget sitting next to her while she stopped this old world for a while,” Carlisle, who sang backup for Mitchell, wrote on Twitter.

Indeed, Mitchell has looked at life from both sides and, now, she’s come full circle in this one memorable evening.

Mitchell’s memorable set list included: “Carey,” “Come In From the Cold,” “Help Me,” “Case of You,” “Big Yellow Taxi,” “Just Like This Train,” “Why Do Fools Fall in Love,” “Amelia,” “Love Potion #9,” “Shine,” “Summertime,” “Both Sides Now,” and “The Circle Game.”

On Sunday, Mitchell’s eternal songs echoed with a sense pride and joy spread that transcended across generations. Long may she live – and may her songs continue to shine brightly among the music canon.

Cover photo: Courtesy of Newport Folk Festival YouTube video.

Videos: Courtesy of YouTube.

Clouds: Appreciating the theater of the sky

"I've looked at clouds from both sides now / 
From up and down, and still somehow"

Bows and flows of angel hair,
And ice cream castles in the air,
And feather canyons everywhere,
I've looked at clouds that way.

But now they only block the sun,
They rain and snow on everyone.
So many things I would have done,
But clouds got in my way.

I've looked at clouds from both sides now.
From up and down, and still somehow,
It's clouds illusions I recall.
I really don't know clouds at all.
~ From "Both Sides, Now" by Joni Mitchell, Clouds (1969).

Clouds / thinking Joni Mitchell

March has been a rainy month throughout the San Francisco Bay Area. Good news for the trees, plants and flowers, of course. Not so great for getting outside to work in the garden. But, it doesn't come as any great surprise since the winter months are when it rains most in northern California.  When it hasn't been wet, often, the skies above me have been filled with clouds.  Even a partly-sunny day is bound to have clouds.  When I think of clouds suspended in the Earth's atmosphere above me, I am reminded of the classic 1969 Joni Mitchell album, Clouds.

Clouds and their formations are fascinating to observe. They are grouped into three physical categories: cirri form, cumuli form or convective, and strati form.  However, I'm not here to give a science lecture.  Instead, to me, clouds are democratic ~ they come in all shapes and sizes ~ and while some appear puffy like huge expansive cotton balls, others look pretty darn threatening and ready to burst at any moment.

Clouds / puffy, democratic

During daylight hours, I can stand on our deck, face east and, simply, look up in the sky.  Oh, and be rewarded, too, with a theater in the sky. Sometimes, I can see an airplane in the distant flying into the clouds, wondering what its destination might be.

Like an artist applying a paintbrush to a canvas, the clouds overhead create an atmospheric illusion, a chimera in the sky. Never content with staying in one place too long, they glide effortlessly across the Bay Area sky, usually from my left to right ~ north to south ~ as I look up at them while facing eastward.  Of course, it's best when the clouds overhead don't appear too threatening.

There's a simple reward in observing clouds.  For me, it's found in making the time ~ and having the patience ~ to appreciate their beauty.  And, if I have my camera at the ready, all the better.

"It's clouds illusions I recall / I really don't know clouds at all."

Photographs by Michael Dickens, copyright 2010. All rights reserved.
Video of Joni Mitchell singing "Both Sides, Now" courtesy of YouTube.