From: les@jmdl.com (JMDL Digest) To: joni-digest@smoe.org Subject: JMDL Digest V2000 #287 Reply-To: joni@smoe.org Sender: les@jmdl.com Errors-To: les@jmdl.com Precedence: bulk Archives: http://www.smoe.org/lists/joni Websites: http://www.jmdl.com http://www.jonimitchell.com Unsubscribe: mailto:joni-digest-request@smoe.org?body=unsubscribe JMDL Digest Saturday, May 27 2000 Volume 2000 : Number 287 The 'Official' Joni Mitchell Homepage, created by Wally Breese, can be found at http://www.jonimitchell.com. It contains the latest news, a detailed bio, Original Interviews, essays, lyrics and much much more. --- The JMDL website can be found at http://www.jmdl.com and contains interviews, articles, the member gallery, archives, and much more. --- Ashara has set up a "Wally Breese Memorial Fund" with all donations going directly towards the upkeep of the website. Wally kept the website going with his own funds. it is now up to US to help Jim continue. If you would like to donate to this fund, please make all checks payable to: Jim Johanson and send them to: Ashara Stansfield P.O. Box 215 Topsfield, MA. 01983 USA ========== TOPICS and authors in this Digest: -------- Joni in the Detroit News ["cassy" ] Re: Pigeon-holing Joni ["Mark or Travis" ] Re: JMDL Digest V2000 #286 [NoeysMaMa@aol.com] Re: Joni Millionaire ["Susan L.A." ] (no subject) [NoeysMaMa@aol.com] JMDL Digest V2000 #286 [NoeysMaMa@aol.com] Re: Colin's Fascist Statement [RickieLee1@aol.com] Re: Least Favorite Joni Songs ["mjf 2001" ] Re: Pat Metheny (NJC now) [Joseph Palis ] RE: more on Metheny and Joni, or One Man's Mortal is Another Man's Di (VLJC) ["mjf 2001" ] Memorial day - Remember the Veterans (NJC) ["cassy" ] Re: The devil's chord NJC [RandyRemote ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:06:03 -0400 From: "cassy" Subject: Joni in the Detroit News Today's Detroit News Weekend Guide had the following: Page 1 teaser: Folk: Joni Mitchell plays Pine Knob It's been 35 years since Joni Mitchell started playing coffee-houses in the Cass Corridor, but not the Canadian singer/songwriter is returning to Detroit -- accompanied by a full orchestra. She plays Clarkston's Pink Knob on Wednesday. See story page 6D. Page 6D story: Joni Mitchell brings folk back to Detroit Ben Edmonds special to the Detroit News As the Pink Knob audience listens to the smoky vocals of Joni Mitchell under the stars next Wednesday night, few will be aware of the crucial role Detroit played in first exposing that voice to the world. The singer/songwriter icon will be bringing a full orchestra and a program that mixes classic torch songs with selections from her own 30-year catalogue of exquisite compositions. But were it not for the time she spent as a resident of the Cass Corridor, those songs might have remained locked in her imagination. She was Joni Anderson, an art student and fledgling folk performer from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, when she met Michigan folk singer Chuck Mitchell at a Toronto coffeehouse in 1965. By June of that year she was Joni Mitchell, having gotten hitched in the Mitchell back yard in Rochester, and was living with her husband in an apartment building called the Verona at the corner of Cass and Ferry. "We used to call it 'the castle' because the building was big and fortress-like," Landra Rosenthal says. Now an attorney in Berkeley, CA, the former Landra Epstein still remembers meeting Chuck's wife-to-be. "Chuck came back from a trip to Canada and told us he had met this really great girl and couldn't wait for us to meet her. He was going back up to play a festival outside Toronto, and invited me and a friend named Ron Levine to come. "After the festival - Joni said she'd written a new song and wanted to play it for us to see what we thought. So we went into their hotel room, and she sat on the bed and played us 'The Circle Game.' I was one of the first people on the planet to hear that song. She absolutely transported us with this amazing piece of writing." Chuck and Joni Mitchell began performing as a duo. "They played together," Rosenthall recalls, "but you were always aware of the two individuals. Chuck had his repertoire of Brecht art songs and traditional folk, and Joni had the things she was writing - I thought they were both incredibly talented, though in different ways." Those differences would ultimately prove to be the duo's professional, and then personal, undoing. At the time, all people knew was that Joni's artistry was growing by leaps and bounds. It was the old story of the expatriate divesting herself of the baggage of her history. "Once I crossed the border," Mitchell says, "I began to write and I began to find my real voice." Detroit has never been known as a folk Mecca, but Joni stayed here for a spell after the marriage dissolved, renting another apartment in the Wayne State (University) area and devoting herself to her music. Tom Rush came to town to play the Chessmate folk club in early 1966 and "was blown away by the quality of her songs." "Joni has reinvented herself repeatedly throughout her career, so what we had then was the first iteration. But she was already writing songs that were timeless. As soon as I heard 'Urge For Going' I asked her to teach it to me. As long as winter comes, that song will always be relevant." Rush proved an important proselytizer for Mitchell's work. For example, his playing of her songs for Judy Collins resulted in the recording of "Both Sides Now." By the time the Collins version of "Both Sides Now" hit the Top 10 late in '68, Mitchell had already transplanted herself to New York. She was now well down the road that would take her to Crosby Stills and Nash, country, jazz outings with Charles Mingus, and the extravaganza she brings Wednesday to Pine Knob. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 20:16:42 -0700 From: "Mark or Travis" Subject: Re: Pigeon-holing Joni Does it belong to a genre? Or is Joni > Mitchell her own genre? > I came to conclusion some time ago that, yes, she is. Mark in Seattle ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:35:25 EDT From: NoeysMaMa@aol.com Subject: Re: JMDL Digest V2000 #286 > Yesterday a bunch of us were cutting up and > Brian Gross wrote: > > > > NO NO > > Not the *BLUE* pill !! > > Don't you know what that will do?????? > > and in response, Colin wrote: > yes-it will kill off the inner circle. > > > This is the first fascist statement I have ever read on JMDL. To understand > that this is hateful garbage and not humor, let me substitute the word > "Jews" for "inner circle". If you make that substitution, yesterday's > exchange becomes: > > Brian Gross wrote: > > > > NO NO > > Not the *BLUE* pill !! > > Don't you know what that will do?????? > > yes-it will kill off the Jews. > > > Now Jim again. > I ask you JMDLers. As reasonable people, is that funny? You have GOT to be kidding... Min ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 20:39:49 -0700 From: "Susan L.A." Subject: Re: Joni Millionaire Don/Larry wrote; > So let's play, "Who Wants to be a Joni Millionaire!" Okay ;~) > For $100: > > Joni Mitchell was born in which country? In which lifetime man? ;~) > For $200: > > What line follows the title of Joni Mitchell's hit > song "Help Me"? Lovers saying: "Turn that womb off!" But I like her ;~) I love my lovin' but not like I love my freedom :~D > For $300: > > Joni Mitchell has NOT been romantically linked to > which of the following men? That's easy: Larry Klein > For $500: > > Joni says which kind of animal gives the home a > heartbeat? Ocelets > For $1000 > > SIQUOMB is an acronym for what? > > a. She Is Queasy Unless Others Make Bread I like this one ;~D > When we get back ... they'll be shooting for $2000 ... Yeah, but shooting what? When are you gonna run away with me Don? - -- Susan L.A. "...a defector from the petty wars until love sucks me back that way..."-that Joni :~) ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:40:13 EDT From: NoeysMaMa@aol.com Subject: (no subject) <<>> ahem. cough cough Me too. (ducking behind a corner) Love, Min ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:44:47 EDT From: NoeysMaMa@aol.com Subject: JMDL Digest V2000 #286 <<>> Thank you for the huge laughs on that one. :) Love, Min ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 00:10:25 EDT From: RickieLee1@aol.com Subject: Re: Colin's Fascist Statement well, i have my nerve...i barely read list mail anymore, and almost never post. but i do log on a few times a week, mostly to delete stuff before my computer explodes, and every now and then, i click on the posts written by list members i know, and whose insights i often find compelling. kakki would certainly fall into that category. which is how i had the misfortune of stumbling across "our lady of duality" and commenced to follow it, with an increasing sense of wonder and dismay. so it may nervy of me to insert myself into this absurd nonsense, but after reading this latest entry i felt compelled to take the plunge. colin has been a list member here longer than i have, and i have been loitering around this joint for over 2 years now. and during that time he has ably demonstrated he has no need for ANYone to come to his defense, me here least of all...but to listen to someone try and label him a FASCIST, after sticking the necessary vocabulary into his mouth to make him sound like one, is just so outrageously unfair i cannot sit here in silence. what begs an answer at this point is why these attacks, and these juvenile attempts to rally others to take sides, continue? particularly after there has been such a chorus of polite and reasonable voices asking that it stop. one very valuable lesson, among many, that i have learned from taking part in this community, is that email can be very dangerous. i know i have been perceived, more than once, as viscious, and nasty, and rude, by more than one other list member, for things i said, thinking i was only being funny. i have been shocked at some of the responses my humor has ilicited. but email exists in its own little vaccum. it arrives without any of the usual cues upon which we rely to communicate, and isn't that so easy to forget? it's just words on a screen. no gestures, no eye contact, no intonation - just words. and it is notoriously easy to misinterpret. while a dry sense of humor might get you a bunch of laughs around the water cooler, it usually only results in hurt feelings in an email. so we need to be careful. and if we feel our blood pressure rising at something we THINK the other person is saying, what's so hard about sending an offlist message to that person in which we say "what you wrote upset me. i am wondering if that is what you meant to do, or if i might be misunderstanding you." ? if we all did that, then peace would guide the planets and love would steer the stars... so take a deep cleansing breath. and if that doesn't work, take it off list and duke it out in private. ric ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 04:20:01 GMT From: "mjf 2001" Subject: Re: Least Favorite Joni Songs Hey Joniphiles.... This was a good thread! It really got me thinking and searching through the catalogue for my "finalists" in this category. The challenge is that I find that Joni's work often "opens" to me gradually, and a track I may not be fond of now, or may not have been fond of for YEARS, will suddenly reveal itself to me in a different way, and I find I've made a new friend. So I've considered all of the albums I have (I think everything except CMIARS at this point), and I must say that I still consider "Clouds" a "difficult listen". (Now, see, I used to say the same thing about STAS, and then it "opened"! So who's to say what could happen?) There are a number of gems on "Clouds", but then there are two tracks I do NOT enjoy in the least (at this point!): the aforementioned "Songs to Aging Children Come" and "Roses Blue". Each time they come on, I sort of roll my eyes, but do not program them out..... to me, they're kind of part of the package. Besides, they may just one day "open" and reveal a new gem! Oh, and I'm with you on "Lead Balloon", too. But I must tell you that I LOVE "The Jungle Line", even love its placement on the album... its glaring difference from the tracks that precede and follow it, and its jarring start. Is it just me, or do those first few drumbeats sound louder than anything else in the rest of the song? REALLY gives me a start still, if the stereo's on loud enough! SUNDAY"S THE NIGHT FOR ME!!!!! :) mjf NP: Shades of Scarlett Conquering ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 12:09:10 +0800 (JST) From: Joseph Palis Subject: Re: Pat Metheny (NJC now) Pat told me he'd prefer it if he could > name his tunes #72 or #93 or something. Coming up with song titles is one of > his least favorite activities, he's told me (and others). > k I always thought that Pat Metheny's song titles are kinda . . . unique. In his LETTERS FROM HOME album, he has titles like 557, Beat 70, and other titles that are not really the most evocative. But when one listens to his music, you forget the title, you only remember the dexterity and the high level of virtuosity. Joseph (whose fave Metheny album is MISSOURI SKY) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 04:32:30 GMT From: "mjf 2001" Subject: RE: more on Metheny and Joni, or One Man's Mortal is Another Man's Di (VLJC) >Mere mortals: Stephen Foster, Vivaldi, Billy Joel, Andrew Lloyd Weber, >Cher, File this one under What Makes The World Go 'Round, but I've been a rabid Cher fan for 35 years. She is not in the class of songwriter/poet/artist with Joni, but is in a league of her own... as a performer, actress, vocalist, and all-around entertainer. Not to poke at anyone's pantheon, but I had to put a shout out for my gal! I love her dearly. I had the good fortune of meeting her two years at a booksigning, and she was beyond gracious. She made my lifelong dream come true, and signed three autographs for me! No one is realer, or has more heart. Love her or hate her, Cher is one of a kind. I'm with ya on Celine, though. ;) mjf NP: Harry's House/Centerpiece ________________________________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 21:57:06 -0700 From: Scott Price Subject: Re: Pigeon-holing Joni At 11:09 PM 5/26/00 -0400, Patricia O'Connor wrote: >To what genre does Joni's music belong? As you alluded to, it seems to be its own genre. No doubt her music defies categorization into the accepted worlds: pop, jazz, folk, rock, etc. It is ALL of these. And the sum (Joni's music) is not easily labeled. I like to use the broad term "singer-songwriter." This implies no particular genre, only that she sings her own songs. It's a very general area, but until a better term is found, for me, that's it. Joni has referred to many of her songs as "dramas." Which makes perfect sense to me. These huge and vivid pictures she creates for us with her music are certainly dramatic. Maybe that is the correct name: musical drama. Another might be musical paintings. But somehow I can't yet imagine walking into a record store and seeing the category "singer-songwriter" on a whole section of CDs along with the sections for pop, jazz, folk, etc. Perhaps it's time. With so many recording artists these days "crossing over" it does get hard to put them into *one* pigeonhole. It seems like an artist is sometimes placed into one of these genres based on their first or their "breakout" album. As their careers progress they may drastically change their musical styles but they're still placed into that category they originally came from. I think this is one of the main reasons Joni's music is still to this day referred to as "folk" by those who don't know better. Scott ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 01:17:05 -0400 From: "cassy" Subject: Memorial day - Remember the Veterans (NJC) This was sent to me by a friend and I thought I'd pass it on. . . . . . . What is a veteran? Some veterans bear visible signs of their service: a missing limb, a jagged scar, a certain look in the eye. Others may carry the evidence inside them;a pin holding a bone together, a piece of shrapnel in the leg, or perhaps another sort of inner steel: The soul's ally forged in the refinery of adversity. Except in parades, however, the men and women who have kept America safe wear no badge or emblem. You can't tell a vet just by looking. So, what IS a veteran? He is the cop on the beat who spent six months in Saudi Arabia sweating two gallons a day making sure the armored personnel carriers didn't run out of fuel. He is the barroom loudmouth, dumber than five wooden planks, whose overgrown frat-boy behavior is outweighed a hundred times in the cosmic scales by four hours of exquisite bravery near the 38th parallel. She or he is the nurse who fought against futility and went to sleep sobbing every night for two solid years in Da Nang. He is the POW who went away one person and came back another - or didn't come back AT ALL. He is the Parris Island drill instructor who has never seen combat - but has saved countless lives by turning slouchy, no-account rednecks and gang members into Marines, and teaching them to watch each other's backs. He is the parade-riding Legionnaire who pins on his ribbons and medals with a prosthetic hand. He is the career quartermaster who watches the ribbons and medals pass him by. He is one of the three anonymous heroes in The Tomb Of The Unknowns, whose presence at the Arlington National Cemetery must forever preserve the memory of all the anonymous heroes whose valor dies unrecognized with them on the battlefield or in the ocean's sunless deep. He is the old guy bagging groceries at the supermarket - palsied now and aggravatingly slow - who helped liberate a Nazi death camp and who wishes all day long that his wife were still alive to hold him when the nightmares come. He is an ordinary and yet an extraordinary human being - a person who offered some of his life's most vital years in the service of his country, and who sacrificed his ambitions so others would not have to sacrifice theirs. He is a soldier and a savior and a sword against the darkness, and he is nothing more than the finest, greatest testimony on behalf of the finest, greatest nation ever known. So remember, each time you see someone who has served our country, just lean over and say "Thank You." That's all most people need, and in most cases it will mean more than any medals they could have been awarded or were awarded. Two little words that mean a lot, "THANK YOU". Remember May 29th is Memorial Day. ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:10:32 -0700 From: RandyRemote Subject: Re: Guitarists -- need your advice! (NJC) a few ideas 1 change your technique 2 there is a spray (seriously) called Finger Ease (I think) that you can spray on the fretboard which will cut way down on the squeaks. Guitar shops have it. 3 mic the guitar further away with a ribbon mic rather than a condenser. The tradeoff here is more ambient noise from the room, but if done carefully, can yield good results. Try 12". 4 Try not having the mic point directly at your left or fretting hand. 5 Use the eq or a de-esser to cut back the offending frequency CarltonCT@aol.com wrote: > How is everybody? Very sorry not to make it to Jonifest, but I am putting > all my money towards my recording at the moment, and studio time is not > cheap. Still, if you sing loud enough, we should hear you in L.A. We heard > you all the way from Massachusetts last time. > > Anyway, I am wondering if the guitar players on the list can tell me if there > is anything I can do about guitar squeaks. They can be heard on Joni's > albums at times, especially as her style has a lot of slides. Are squeaks > the mark of an amateur or, in the words of a song we all know, "nothing can > be done?" > > Anne recommended silk strings to me as an anti-squeak measure, but others > don't like the softer sound of silk. Would be grateful for any input. > Anyone ever tried violinist's rosin on their callouses? > > thanks, > > Clark > > np: The Clash, London Calling ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 27 May 2000 02:23:59 -0400 (EDT) From: David Wright Subject: Re: Joni in the Detroit News from the article: > By June of that year she was Joni Mitchell, > having gotten hitched in the Mitchell back yard in Rochester, and was living > with her husband in an apartment building called the Verona at the corner of > Cass and Ferry. > > "We used to call it 'the castle' because the building was big and > fortress-like," Landra Rosenthal says. Hmmm....might that be the source of the line "I had a king in a tenement castle"? - --David ------------------------------ Date: Fri, 26 May 2000 23:25:14 -0700 From: RandyRemote Subject: Re: The devil's chord NJC The association of this interval (AKA tritone) with the devil stems from the early church's prohibition of it's use due to it's supposed evil influence. Jazz and blues likewise were considered the devil's music at least in part due to their use of this blue interval, not to mention those animalistic rhythms. RR Dflahm@aol.com wrote: > I have always used the phrase "flatted fifth" to refer to (1) an interval > (the "distance" between two notes) or (2) a scale degree (the relationship > between a particular note in a scale or chord and the tonic--or "root"--of > that scale or chord). I know that's a mouthful and a brainful but my point is > that "flatted fifth" is not a name for a chord... > EXCEPT in the kind of slangy usage where "a flatted fifth chord" means "a > chord which is characterized by its having had the flatted fifth degree > included or added to it." > > (puff) (gasp) So.....if I heard you, Mark, or your teacher or Joni Mitchell > refer to a "flatted fifth chord" I'd have SOME idea of what was meant but, to > me, a very inexact idea. > > That being said, I have heard the "diminished fifth" or "augmented fourth" > called "the Devil's INTERVAL" (my emphasis). > > BTW, I'm quite sure my "flatted" is equivalent to your "diminished." > > DAVID > LAHM ------------------------------ End of JMDL Digest V2000 #287 ***************************** ------- Post messages to the list at Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe joni-digest" to ------- Siquomb, isn't she?