Of all the people songsters from the Sixties, Mitchell has confirmed to have the strongest affect on jazz singers. Joni’s Jazz options her collaborations with stars like Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock.
TONYA MOSLEY, HOST:
That is FRESH AIR. A brand new anthology of recordings by composer, singer, guitarist, pianist and painter Joni Mitchell is named “Joni’s Jazz.” She’s pictured on the duvet alongside pals and star collaborators Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock. FRESH AIR’s jazz historian Kevin Whitehead says, of all of the songsters who handed by the Sixties folks scene, Mitchell has been the most important affect on jazz singers, and he or she has the deepest jazz connections.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “THE TEA LEAF PROPHECY (LAY DOWN YOUR ARMS)”)
JONI MITCHELL: (Singing) She crops her backyard within the spring. He does the winter shoveling. Now, there’s three of them laughing across the radio. She says, I am leaving right here, however she do not go.
KEVIN WHITEHEAD, BYLINE: Joni Mitchell and saxophonist Wayne Shorter with pianist Herbie Hancock in 2007 on “The Tea Leaf Prophecy,” a track about her mother and father. It is from the 61-track Mitchell-curated, chronologically scrambled anthology “Joni’s Jazz,” exploring her interactions with jazz musicians and influences. Mitchell and Hancock contribute quick essays, however the set may use extra in depth notes, contemplating just a few tracks don’t have any evident jazz connection. You would possibly marvel why the set kicks off with “Blue” for Mitchell’s solo for those who did not know her quick vocal intro was impressed by Miles Davis’ muted trumpet.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “BLUE”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) Blue.
WHITEHEAD: Joni Mitchell says that as a singer, she discovered extra from Miles than anyone. Rising up on the Canadian prairies, she heard his LPs “Sketches Of Spain” and “Type Of Blue,” which knowledgeable her expansive sense of concord. She additionally heard the vocal trio Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, with their tongue-twisting settings of bebop horn solos, gymnastics that’d depart a mark on her personal timing. Mitchell lined Annie Ross’ function “Twisted” on the album “Courtroom And Spark.”
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “TWISTED”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) All of them giggle at indignant younger males. All of them giggle at Edison and in addition at Einstein. So why ought to I really feel sorry if they simply could not perceive the idiomatic logic that went on in my head? I had a mind. It was insane. Oh, they used to giggle at me after I refused to trip on all these double-decker buses all as a result of there was no driver on the highest.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL ARTIST: What? No driver on the highest?
WHITEHEAD: Younger Joni Mitchell sang and wrote poetry, so she began out in folks music ‘trigger that is the place poets like Dylan and Leonard Cohen have been. Songwriters edit phrases to suit the tune, however as Mitchell’s verse acquired extra complicated, her melodies and rhythms started to comply with the phrases as in a classical artwork track. She had already been tuning her guitar in varied methods to facilitate the unstable chords she heard in her head. So to comply with her edgy strikes, she began utilizing jazz musicians, studio gamers who moonlighted in pop jazz bands, The Crusaders and L.A. Categorical. Issues actually acquired rolling in 1976, when she employed the fretless bass guitar whiz from the jazz rock band Climate Report. Jaco Pastorius, together with his burping tone and sliding pitches, was as slippery as she was.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “OFF NIGHT BACKSTREET”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) You give me such pleasure. You convey me such ache. Who left her lengthy black hair in our bathtub drain?
WHITEHEAD: Then in 1978 got here Joni Mitchell’s most well-known jazz encounter, placing lyrics to new and outdated melodies by the dying bassist Charles Mingus. Jaco Pastorius’ electrical bass was all mistaken for that undertaking, however Joni and Jaco had their very own mojo going, and in the long run, she needed to do it her method, simply as Mingus would have. Her album “Mingus” was uneven. Solely three tracks seem on “Joni’s Jazz.” One of the best quantity, “Dry Cleaner From Des Moines,” is the least Mingusy-sounding, with horns organized by Jaco. Mitchell’s virtuoso vocal is wide-ranging and rhythmically exact, even for those who do not catch each phrase, her lyrics a couple of vacationer in Vegas on a fortunate streak.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “DRY CLEANER FROM DES MOINES”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) Des Moines was stacking the chips, raking off the tables, ringing the bandit’s bells. It is a story that is a drag to inform, in some methods, since I misplaced each dime I laid on the road. However the cleaner from Des Moines may put a coin within the door of a John and get twenty for one. It is simply luck.
WHITEHEAD: Wayne Shorter on soprano saxophone, Joni Mitchell’s ally ever after. She’d convey him in towards the top of the recording course of to dub in commentary on the margins. They focus on what he would possibly play by way of metaphors. For one spot, she advised him, are available such as you’re tremendous unhappy and exit such as you’re actually younger. On “A Fowl That Whistles,” shorter peeps within the background until the ending, when he expands into a complete flock of Waynes.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “A BIRD THAT WHISTLES”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) If I haven’t got you darlin’, birds do not imply nothin’.
WHITEHEAD: In reality, Wayne Shorter may very well be as underused on Joni Mitchell periods as he typically was in Climate Report. However her music’s not concerning the solos. It isn’t, she stated, like I am attempting to do jazz and getting it mistaken. Nonetheless, when she stopped writing for some time, circa 2000, she recorded requirements with a lush orchestra, echoing late-period Billie Vacation, one other singer whose vary narrowed however may nonetheless phrase a lyric. On “Comes Love,” Mitchell lags behind the beat, then races to catch up, an outdated Bob Dylan transfer. However right here she sounds extra like a jazz singer than ever, within the lineage someplace between Hollywood’s Julie London and Joni fan Cassandra Wilson.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “COMES LOVE”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) Do not attempt hidin’ ‘trigger it is not any use. You may simply begin slidin’ when your coronary heart activates the juice. Comes a warmth wave, you may hurry to the shore. Comes a summons, disguise your self behind a door. Comes love, nothing could be accomplished.
WHITEHEAD: For all of the jazzy touches, within the studio, Joni Mitchell assembled her music like a pop artist – layer by layer. She’s additionally a lifelong painter, so she’s occupied with floor and background textures and possibly a wash of sounds streaking one nook. So it’s possible you’ll get, say, Wayne Shorter’s soprano sax overpainting pedal metal guitar. That orchestral “Comes Love” makes indirect reference to Duke Ellington, celebrated for making music past class. That goes for Joni Mitchell too. Jazz, artwork songs, pop and folks traditions all feed her sound, however her fluid, ethereal songs are distinctly hers. And together with her cool-headed outsidery appraisal of so many North American traditions, she’s distinctly Canadian as effectively.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, “THE CRAZY CRIES OF LOVE”)
MITCHELL: (Singing) They have been laughing. They have been dancing within the rain. They knew their love was a robust one. After they heard the far-off whistle of a practice, they have been hoping it was going to be an extended one ‘trigger oh, oh, my, my when that practice comes rolling by no paper-thin partitions, no of us above, nobody else can hear the loopy cries of affection.
MOSLEY: Jazz historian Kevin Whitehead reviewed “Joni’s Jazz” by Joni Mitchell.
Tomorrow on FRESH AIR, some exceptional issues about your physique and methods some malfunctioning physique elements could be changed. We discuss with Mary Roach. Her new e-book, “Replaceable You,” is about analysis into transplanting organs, why a pig organ donor is best than a goat, regenerating cells, prosthetic legs and ft and extra. I hope you may be part of us.
To maintain up with what’s on the present and get highlights of our interviews, comply with us on Instagram at @nprfreshair. FRESH AIR’s government producer is Danny Miller. Our technical director and engineer is Audrey Bentham. Our managing producer is Sam Briger. Our interviews and opinions are produced and edited by Phyllis Myers, Ann Marie Baldonado, Lauren Krenzel, Therese Madden, Monique Nazareth, Thea Chaloner, Susan Nyakundi and Anna Bauman. Our digital media producer is Molly Seavy-Nesper. Our consulting visible producer is Hope Wilson. Roberta Shorrock directs the present. With Terry Gross, I am Tonya Mosley.
(SOUNDBITE OF MILES DAVIS’ “FREDDIE FREELOADER”)
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