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Joni Mitchell si è palesata nel mondo della musica come un'autentica ed affascinante mosca bianca: non solo per essere una delle poche cantautrici pure di quegli anni ma soprattutto per il suo stile unico, un folk artistico, raffinato e particolarissimo. Questa ragazza canadese, musicista, pittrice e poetessa per vocazione, tenace, forte e temprata dalla vita è veramente un'artista per cui si possono usare a ragion veduta e senza il rischio di sproloquiare termini come influente, seminale, sperimentatrice: sempre tesa in una continua ricerca musicale, mai statica, mai inquadrabile in un preciso genere. Il suo viaggio comincia con i primi album, "Song To A Seagull" del 1968 e "Clouds" dell'anno successivo, ed il mondo della musica si accorge fin da subito di lei: l'affermata Judy Collins interpreta "Both Sides Now" con grande successo, una giovanissima ed esordiente Jennifer Warnes fa propria "Chelsea Morning". Lo stile di queste primi album è forse ancora un po' immaturo ed a tratti ostico, ma Joni dimostra fin da subito la capacità di scrivere melodie affascinanti ed ipnotiche, con un gusto del tutto personale, su tutte "The Pirate Of Penance" e "Roses Blue".
Arriviamo così al 1970: "Blue" è ormai alle porte, e l'album che lo anticipa, che ne definisce in linea di massima le coordinate è "Ladies Of The Canyon", che è anche l'album della piena maturazione per la cantautrice. Nonostante ci siano parecchi punti di contatto tra questi due dischi, notevoli sono anche le differenze: "Blue" è un album semplice, diretto, istintivo, brillante, che entra subito in circolo; "Ladies Of The Canyon" no; necessità più tempo, pazienza ed attenzione: è un intimo, riflessivo, le emozioni sono più rarefatte e "centellinate" rispetto al suo celebratissimo successore, a cui tuttavia non ha assolutamente nulla da invidiare dal punto di vista della qualità complessiva: non che a "Ladies Of The Canyon" manchino episodi leggeri e divertenti, basti pensare alla ritmatissima "Big Yellow Taxi", densa di brio ed ironia ma anche di importanti messaggi ambientalisti, oppure ad una vera, meravigliosa perla come "Morning Morgantown", quasi una trasposizione musicale dell'arte pittorica tanto cara all'artista canadese, in cui il pennello è la voce dolcissima e suadente di Joni, i due strumenti principi del disco, pianoforte e chitarra acustica si intrecciano formando la tela ed il risultato finale è un affresco delicato e sognante; una canzone come l'energica ed incalzante "Conversation" ad un primo ascolto sembra quasi un abbozzo di quello che saranno "Carey" e "California", ma prestando più attenzione ci si accorge che, per il suo songwriting istintivo, spontaneo e torrenziale, per lo stile colloquiale è molto più vicina a "The Last Time I Saw Richard", di cui costituisce quasi un alter ego vivace e ritmato. Tuttavia il nocciolo dell'album è costituito da ballate riflessive, autunnali, splendidamente disegnate dal pianoforte, intrise a volte di dolcezza, come ad esempio "Willy" e "For Free" oppure più cupe ed inquiete, "Rainy Night House", "Blue Boy" e "The Priest", ipnotica, ambigua ed umbratile.
Molti episodi dell'album sono vere e proprie dimostrazioni di quanto Joni Mitchell sia capace di fare con la sua voce: una voce che io definisco come quanto di più umano e terreno ci possa essere: è straordinaria, mutevole, capace di incarnare infiniti stati d'animo, quindi tutt'altro che una banale, stucchevole e stereotipata voce d'angelo; le voci d'angelo nel 90% dei casi sono tutte gran fregature e specchietti per le allodole: Joni Mitchell non è un angelo: è una Donna vera, in carne ed ossa, una Donna nata con il dono di saper trasformare i propri sentimenti in arte, usando tanto il pennello per dipingere, tanto la stilografica per scrivere i suoi testi quanto la voce per cantare. Il suo timbro ipnotico e i suoi eleganti vocalizzi conferiscono alla titletrack "Ladies Of The Canyon" un'atmosfera indefinibile, leggiadra, sottile, quasi misteriosa: una trasposizione in musica dell'essenza femminile più intima e profonda; in "The Arrangement", una sorta di invettiva contro la superficialità diventa tagliente come un coltello, raggiunge tonalità quasi liriche in un climax amaro e tormentato, ben sostenuto dal pianoforte e nella misteriosa, allegorica e conturbante "Woodstock", in cui fa capolino il piano elettrico i suoi cori sono fondamentali per creare una cadenza quasi imperiosa, indefinibile ed affascinante come il canto delle sirene.
Come suggello finale, come ultimo e definitivo colpo di teatro arriva infine la canzone più strettamente definibile come folk di "Ladies Of The Canyon", ovvero "The Circle Game": intrisa di una serenità e di una leggerezza vellutata, accompagnata dalla sola chitarra acustica e da cori di supporto nel ritornello che conferiscono un retrogusto ulteriormente bucolico e contemplativo, questa canzone è una bellissima poesia musicata con garbo e gentilezza; perfetta per chiudere nel migliore dei modi il primo grande capolavoro di questa cantautrice, un'artista che con la sua musica ha sempre adottato un approccio molto "pittorico": figurativo, istintivo, diretto, improvvisato, questo si percepisce sempre in "Ladies Of The Canyon" nonostante l'estrema cura e la raffinatezza dei suoni e dello stile: Joni Mitchell è veramente un'artista in tutto e per tutto, nata con l'arte nel sangue, che la vive e la respira in tutte le sue forme in maniera pura, onesta e personale: secondo me è questa l'essenza del fascino di Joni Mitchell, un'essenza che in album come "Ladies Of The Canyon" si è espressa in tutta la sua pienezza.
Elenco tracce testi samples e video
03 Conversation (04:26)
He comes for conversation
I comfort him sometimes
Comfort and consultation
He knows that's what he'll find
I bring him apples and cheeses
He brings me songs to play
He sees me when he pleases
I see him in cafes
And I only say, hello
And turn away before his lady knows
How much I want to see him
She removes him, like a ring
To wash her hands
She only brings him out to show her friends
I want to free him
Secrets and sharing soda
That's how our time began
Love is a story told to a friend
It's second hand
But I'll listen to his questions
I'll give my answers when they're found
He says she keeps him guessing
But I know she keeps him down
She speaks in sorry sentences
Miraculous repentances
I don't believe her
Tomorrow he will come to me
And he'll speak his sorrow endlessly and he'll ask me why
Why can't I leave her?
He comes for conversation
I comfort him sometimes
Comfort and consultation
He knows that's what he'll find
05 Willy (03:00)
Willy is my child, he is my father
I would be his lady all my life
He says he'd love to live with me
But for an ancient injury
That has not healed
He said I feel once again
Like I gave my heart too soon
He stood there looking through the lace
At the face on the conquered moon
And counting all the cars up the hill
And the stars on my window sill
There are still more reasons why
I love him
Willy is my joy, he is my sorrow
Now he wants to run away and hide
He says our love cannot be real
He cannot hear the chapel's pealing silver bells
But you know its hard to tell
When your in the spell if its wrong or if its real
But you're bound to lose
If you let the blues get you scared too feel
And I feel like I'm just being born
Like a shiny light breaking in a storm
There are some many reasons why I love him
06 The Arrangement (03:34)
You could have been more
Than a name on the door
On the thirty-third floor in the air
More than a credit card
Swimming pool in the backyard
While you still have the time you could get away and find
A better life, you know the grind
Is so ungrateful
Racing cars, Whisky bars
No one cares who you really are
You're the keeper of the cards
Yes I know it gets hard
Keeping the wheels turning
And the wife she keeps the keys
She is so pleased to be
A part of the arrangment
You could have been more than a name on the door
On the thirty-third floor in the air
More than a consumer
Lying in some room trying to die
More than a credit card
Swimming pool in the backyard
You could have been more
You could have been more
You could have been more
07 Rainy Night House (03:24)
It was a rainy night
We took a taxi to your mothers' home
She went to Florida and left you
With you father`s gun, alone
Upon her small white bed
I fell into a dream
You sat up all the night and watched me
To see, who in the world I might be
I am from the Sunday school
I sing soprano in the upstairs choir
You are a holy man
ON the FM radio
I sat up all the night and watched thee
To see, who in the world you might be
You called me beautiful
You called your mother - she was very tanned
So you packed your tent and went
To live out in the Arizona sand
You are a refugee
From a wealthy family
You gave up all the golden factories
To see, who in the world you might be
08 The Priest (03:40)
The priest sat in the airport bar
He was wearing his father's tie
And his eyes looked into my eyes so far
Whenever the words ran dry
Behind the lash and the circles blue
He looked as only a priest can, thru
And his eyes said me and his eyes said you
And my eyes said, let us try
He said, "You wouldn't like it here
No it's no place you should share
The roof is ripped with hurricanes
And the room is always bare
I need the wind and I seek the cold"
He reached post the wine for my hand to hold
And he saw me young and he saw me old
And he saw me sitting there
Then he took his contradictions out
And he splashed them on my brow
So which words was I then to doubt
When choosing what to vow
Should I choose them all-should I make them mine
The sermons, the hymns and the valentines
And he asked for truth and he asked for time
And he asked for only now
Now the trials are trumpet scored
Oh will we pass the test
Or just as one loves more and more
Will one love less and less
Oh come let's run from this ring we're in
Where the Christians clap and the Germans grin
Saying let them lose, crying let them win
Oh make them both confess
10 Big Yellow Taxi (02:15)
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
With a pink hotel, a boutique
And a swinging hotspot
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
They took all the trees
And put them in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to seem 'em
Don't it always seem to go,
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
Hey farmer, farmer
Put away that DDT now
Give me spots on my apples
But leave me the birds and the bees
Please!
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till its gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
Late last night
I heard the screen door slam
And a big yellow taxi
Took away my old man
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
I said
Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you've got
Till it's gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot
11 Woodstock (05:29)
I came upon a child of God
He was walking along the road
And I asked him, where are you going
And this he told me...
I'm going on down to Yasgur's farm
I'm going to join in a rock 'n' roll band
I'm going to camp out on the land
And try and get my soul free
Chorus*
We are stardust
We are golden
We are billion-year-old carbon
And we've got to get ourselves
Back to the garden
Then can I walk beside you
I have come here to lose the smog
And I feel to be a cog in something turning
Well maybe it is just the time of year
Or maybe it's the time of man
I don't know who l am
But life is for learning
*
We are stardust
We are golden
We are billion-year-old carbon
And we've got to get ourselves
Back to the garden
By the time we got to Woodstock
We were half a million strong
And everywhere there was song and celebration
And I dreamed I saw the bombers
Riding shotgun in the sky
And they were turning into butterflies
Above our nation
*
We are stardust
We are golden
Caught up in the devil's bargain
And we've got to get ourselves
Back to the garden
12 The Circle Game (04:55)
Yesterday, a child came out to wander
Caught a dragonfly inside a jar
Fearful, when the sky was full of thunder
and tearful at the falling of a star
and the season's they go round and round
and the painted ponies go up and down
we're captive on the carousel of time
we can't return, we can only look
behind from where we came
and go round and round and round in the circle game
then the child moved ten times round the seasons
skated over ten clear frozen streams
words like "when you're older" must appease him
and promises of "someday" make up his dreams
and the seasons, they go round and round
and the painted ponies go up and down
we're captive on the carousel of time
we can't return, we can only look
behind from where we came
and go round and round and round in the circle game
sixteen springs and sixteen summers gone now
cartwheels turn to carwheels through the town
and they tell him, "take your time, it won't be long now
'til you drag your feet to slow the circle's down"
and the seasons, they go round and round
and the painted ponies go up and down
we're captive on the carousel of time
we can't return, we can only look
behind from where we came
and go round and round and round in the circle game
so the years spin by and now the boy is twenty
though his dreams have lost some gandeur coming true
they'll be new dreams, maybe better dreams, and plenty
before the last revolving year is through
and the seasons, they go round and round
and the painted ponies go up and down
we're captive on the carousel of time
we can't return we can only look
behind from where we came
and go round and round and round in the circle game
and go round and round and round in the circle game
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