Sign-In
Cart
Traveling: On the Path of Joni Mitchell
Hardcover
Biographies GeneralMusiciansCountry & Folk
Publisher Price: $35.00
ISBN13: 9780062463722
Publisher: Dey Street Books
Published: Jun 11 2024
Pages: 448
Weight: 1.25
Height: 1.40 Width: 6.40 Depth: 9.10
Language: English
*An Observer Best New Biographies of 2024*
Celebrated NPR music critic Ann Powers explores the life and career of Joni Mitchell in a lyrical style as fascinating and ethereal as the songs of the artist herself.
What you are about to read is not a standard account of the life and work of Joni Mitchell. Instead, it's a tale of long journeying through a life that changed popular music: of a homesick wanderer forging ahead on routes of her own invention, and of me on her trail, heading toward the ringing of her voice.
--From the introduction
For decades, Joni Mitchell's life and music have enraptured listeners. One of the most celebrated artists of her generation, Mitchell has inspired countless musicians--from peers like James Taylor, to inheritors like Prince and Brandi Carlile--and authors, who have dissected her music and her life in their writing. At the same time, Mitchell has always been a force beckoning us still closer, as--with the other arm--she pushes us away. Given this, music critic Ann Powers wondered if there was another way to draw insights from the life of this singular musician who never stops moving, never stops experimenting.
In Traveling, Powers seeks to understand Mitchell through her myriad journeys. Through extensive interviews with Mitchell's peers and deep archival research, she takes readers to rural Canada, mapping the singer's childhood battle with polio. She charts the course of Mitchell's musical evolution, ranging from early folk to jazz fusion to experimentation with pop synthetics. She follows the winding road of Mitchell's collaborations with other greats, and the loves that emerged along the way, all the way through to the remarkable return of Mitchell to music-making after the 2015 aneurysm that nearly took her life.
Along this journey, Powers' wide-ranging musings on the artist's life and career reconsider the biographer's role and the way it twines against the reality of a fan. In doing so, Traveling illustrates the shifting nature of biography, and the ultimate contradiction of celebrity: that an icon cannot truly, completely be known to a fan.
Kaleidoscopic in scope, and intimate in its detail, Traveling is a fresh and fascinating addition to the Joni Mitchell canon, written by a biographer in full command of her gifts who asks as much of herself as of her subject.
Also from
Powers, Ann
Also in
Musicians
A Screaming Life: Into the Superunknown with Soundgarden and Beyond
Tepedelen, Adem
Thayil, Kim
Hardcover
Dolly Parton Songteller: My Life in Lyrics: My Life in Lyrics
Oermann, Robert K.
Parton, Dolly
Hardcover
Where the Music Had to Go: How Bob Dylan and the Beatles Changed Each Other--And the World
Windolf, Jim
Hardcover
The Little Guide to Dolly Parton: It's Hard to Be a Diamond in a Rhinestone World
Hippo! Orange
Hardcover
A Life in Lyrics: The Official Creative Legacy of Freddie Mercury
Austin, Mary
Mercury, Freddie
Hardcover
Mahalia Jackson, Moving on Up a Little Higher: The Story of an American Civil Rights Pioneer
Williams, Mary D.
Tyson, Timothy B.
Hardcover
Is This It: The Never-Ending Rise and Fall of the Strokes (and Rock 'n' Roll)
Hyden, Steven
Hardcover
Remember the Time: Protecting Michael Jackson in His Final Days
Whitfield, Bill
Beard, Javon
Hardcover
P Fkn R: Bad Bunny Y La Música Como Un Acto de Resistencia / P Fkn R: How Bad Bunny Became the Global Voice of Puerto Rican Resistance
Rivera-Rideau, Petra R.
Díaz, Vanessa
Paperback
David Bowie and the Search for Life, Death and God: A Spiritual Meditation on His Music and Creativity
Ormerod, Peter
Hardcover
What Do You Do When You're Lonesome: The Authorized Biography of Justin Townes Earle
Bernstein, Jonathan
Hardcover
With a Little Help from Their Friends: The Beatles and the People Who Made Them
Maconie, Stuart
Hardcover
Little Book of Elvis Presley: Inspirational Quotes from the King of Rock 'n' Roll
Croft, Rod
Hardcover
Ain't Nobody's Fool: The Life and Times of Dolly Parton (Large Print Edition)
Ackmann, Martha
Hardcover
Bust a Move: Matt Dike, Delicious Vinyl, and the Hip-Hop Hits That First Conquered Pop
Relic, Peter
Hardcover
Dilla Time: The Life and Afterlife of J Dilla, the Hip-Hop Producer Who Reinvented Rhythm
Charnas, Dan
Paperback
Here, There and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of the Beatles
Emerick, Geoff
Massey, Howard
Paperback
It's No Wonder: The Life and Times of Motown's Legendary Songwriter Sylvia Moy
Christian, Margena A.
Hardcover
3 Shades of Blue: Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Bill Evans, and the Lost Empire of Cool
Kaplan, James
Paperback
Dolly Parton: The Stories Behind the Songs: The Very Best Tracks, Explored and Explained
Zaleski, Annie
Hardcover
Beyoncé-One of One: History Lessons, Love Letters, and Affirmations from a Cultural Icon
King, Antonia Jade
Hardcover
Where Are Your Boys Tonight?: The Oral History of Emo's Mainstream Explosion 1999-2008
Payne, Chris
Paperback
Keep It Beautiful: Inside the Funkyverse of Shock G and Digital Underground
Jacobs, Gregory E.
Mbassa, Alexis Wolfe
Hardcover
The Silver Snarling Trumpet: The Birth of the Grateful Dead--The Lost Manuscript of Robert Hunter
Hunter, Robert
Paperback
Lessons & Lace: Everything I Know about Dreams, Heartbreak, and Magic I Learned from Stevie Nicks
Brodsky, Rachel
Hardcover
What Happened to Your Hair?: How We Played Loud... Loved Proud... and Never Backed Down... Together
Nelson, Matthew
Nelson, Gunnar
Hardcover
Jazz, TX: A Love Letter to Live Music, Community, and the Little Club That Could
Watkins, Doc
Hardcover
The Colonel and the King: Tom Parker, Elvis Presley, and the Partnership That Rocked the World
Guralnick, Peter
Hardcover
Elvis and Me: The True Story of the Love Between Priscilla Presley and the King of Rock N' Roll
Presley, Priscilla
Harmon, Sandra
Paperback
Burning Down the House: Talking Heads and the New York Scene That Transformed Rock
Gould, Jonathan
Hardcover
Puccini Without Excuses: A Refreshing Reassessment of the World's Most Popular Composer
Berger, William
Paperback
Michael Jackson:: The Magic, the Madness, the Whole Story, 1958-2009
Taraborrelli, J. Randy
Paperback