#Don Juan's Reckless Daughter

[bobdylan-n-jonimitchell]

Joni Mitchell "Black Crow" featuring Chaka Khan—Hejira demo, March 1976.

Chaka Khan, 1977 © Norman Seeff.

I love the song "Dreamland" that you sing on, in her 1977 jazz-heavy album Don Juan's Reckless Daughter. Chaka: "Oh please! You know what? She called me at 4 o'clock in the morning and said [in a deep, Canadian accent imitating Mitchell], "Chaka...come down to the studio right now! You have to come down here!" So I said, finally! Joni and I are going to get to work together I was so happy! Until I got down to the studio and it changed. It was me singing no words at all (referring to the tones and textures she warbles on the world music influenced track). Not a word! Just "Aye aye aye.." and all that shit." —An interview with Chaka Khan: Life, career, and her ongoing love affair with music

[jt1674]

[danbot3000]

alternate playlist covers for joni albums, either edited or gathered on my internet berry forages. will probably do a new batch when the Geffen albums come out.

[mclennonlgbt]

Posłuchaj albumu Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 4: The Asylum Years (1976-1980)

Big day for annoying people <3

[krispyweiss]

Album Review: Joni Mitchell - The Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 4: The Asylum Years (1976-1980)

Deciding too much is better than not enough, Joni Mitchell took the former tack on Vol. 4 of her ongoing Archives series.

Covering the 1976-1980 period spanning Mitchell’s Asylum Records releases Hejira, Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter, Mingus and Shadows and Light, this seven-hour, six-disc box set bogs down with some poorly recorded solo performances culled from Bob Dylan’s Rolling Thunder Revue (“Jericho,” “Edith and the Kingpin”) and the 1979 Coalition Rally Against Nuclear Power (“Big Yellow Taxi”) alongside some awkward full-band arrangements (“Don’t Interrupt the Sorrow”) of brilliant numbers. These moments are historically significant to be sure; however, do not merit repeated spins.

Fortunately, such examples are scattered throughout what is otherwise gold as Mitchell, under the influence of Charles Mingus and others, dived deeply into her jazz phase and shared studios and stages with the likes of Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, Don Alias, Pat Metheny and Jaco Pastorious. Alias, Metheny and Pastorious are each featured on live solo pieces, with Pastorious’ “Third Stone from the Sun” from Aug. 25, 1979, being particularly stunning in its virtuosity and musicality.

Mitchell still had some folkie in her during this period, though, as she revisits such earlier compositions as “For Free” and “A Case of You,” among many others on concert recordings spanning the Asylum Years. But when she pairs the soundalike “Coyote” and “Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter,” Mitchell suggests she really did her most-enthralling work as a jazzer.

For those who don’t have what amounts to nearly a full workday to devote to Vol. 4, Sound Bites recommends diving into discs 3, 4 and 5 first to experience the glory of Mitchell’s respective Hejira demos and Don Juan’s and Mingus sessions. Each disc also includes on-stage and in-studio recordings; branch out from here.

Grade card: Joni Mitchell - The Joni Mitchell Archives, Vol. 4: The Asylum Years (1976-1980) - B+

12/4/24

[rebelsandreverb]

Joni Mitchell around the time of Court and Spark

photo by henry diltz

[reckonslepoisson]

Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter, Joni Mitchell (1977)

Just to be contrary, I’d love to argue against consensus here; to pitch that Joni Mitchell’s Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter simply didn’t deserve such a mixed critical response – and that it should stand as one of her peak period classics. But I can’t. Not seriously, anyway. Not only was Don Juan bad; it was the record Mitchell lost her touch – and from which, in hindsight, she never came back from. 

So what went so wrong with Don Juan? A few things, I suppose. Instrumentally, Mitchell urged towards whatever she believed was jazz, growing increasingly indulgent but near-totally lacking in reward. Even without the lyrics and vocals, Don Juan was lengthy and dull in particularly uninspiring ways.

But it was in the lyrical realm that Don Juan suffered most. Having apparently lost her poetic touch – but, judging from references to her own esteemed poeticism, unaware of it – Mitchell gave off shoddy parody. The stories weren’t there, but neither were the one-liners, the deft poignance, the vivid metaphors. In short, pretty much everything I loved about her previous records was amiss, replaced by tired scenes and silly references.

Add all that together (plus the blackface cover, a dash of Islamophobia and several instances of cultural appropriation and awkward white ignorance) and one is left with a severely unflattering portrait of an artist. Unflattering enough to retroactively dismantle the air of genius of earlier Mitchell works? Perhaps not. But the very idea that this record could dare to call into question Mitchell’s prior untouchability gives you an idea of just how poor it is and remains.

Pick: ‘Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter’

[mclennonlgbt]

One of her best!

[earhartsease]

gather round the fire, young friends, and let us tell you a tale of growing up a teenager in the 70s with no record player, so you bought prerecorded cassettes of albums (or friends taped them for you of course)

and after listening to those albums on cassette for 10-15 years it's finally the age of affordable CDs and CD players and you buy those albums on CD (because the tapes have worn out in service) and you discover that

a) the tracks are in a different order on the original album, because the tape producer needed to have an even number of minutes of music on each side of the tape, and

b) sometimes there are suddenly songs you've literally never heard before - and we don't mean bonus tracks like in more modern times, we mean stuff on the original LPs that they just... left off the tapes because they couldn't make them fit, and didn't tell you

and you don't know whether to feel overjoyed at new content or freaked tf out at new content, because you're a fan but you're also autistic and THEY CHANGED IT

ahem anyway, we hope you found this interesting, we realise this is an age where people are less likely to listen to whole albums, so some of you do and some don't and it's all good, we all get to enjoy music the way we want to, and we ourselves are delighted at how easy it is now to make 6 hour long playlists with drag & drop that used to take four cassettes and more than 6 hours to construct

oh yes and while we're on the subject of THEY CHANGED IT, it turns out that even with vinyl you could be surprised because back in the 60s and 70s, there were turntables designed to let you play a stack of albums, by dropping one disc at a time (up to 4) onto the turntable in turn - which led to record companies putting out some double albums on discs set up like side 1/4 and then side 2/3 so you played the two discs in turn, and then flipped them over to drop down for their other two sides next

which meant that our treasured cassette we made of someone else's copy of Don Juan's Reckless Daughter by Joni Mitchell was unbeknownst to us in the side order 1-4-2-3, and again when we got the CD we were ambushed, and it still jolts us hearing it in the right order but we learned to love it

so anyway stay safe out there and love your music any way you like

[lesbianjonimitchell]

i will combine the top results in one poll once these polls end

please also vote on the later years poll!

[bobdylan-n-jonimitchell]

Joni Mitchell "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter" The Music Hall, Boston, MA, February 19, 1976.

[jt1674]

[glennmillerorchestra]

i was saying this on my (radio show) the other day but since you all can't hear me i'll repeat it in text form. i'm one of the biggest joni mitchell fans ever but i find as i've gotten older, or maybe not even that, i gravitate way more towards her weird jazz-folk-rock experimental stuff than i do blue or both sides now. favorite joni album is hejira and that's never changed, but the hissing of summer lawns (full album) has really snuck up on me as another fave as of late-- it's so delightfully out of the box. and mingus! another recent love of mine which i can't believe i was missing out on before, considering i love jazz and i love charles mingus. even don juan's reckless daughter which i didn't really care that much about has hit my top album listens as of late. i think the critics who didn't like her jazz-experimental stuff for 'taking away from her lyrics' completely miss the point. joni is an amazing lyricist, no doubt, but her magic doesn't solely come from her poetry. it's the weird chords, and awkward tunings that ONLY work for her that make her artistry pure joni, and i think her turning to jazz as a vehicle for her poetry was the PERFECT next step.

[mclennonlgbt]

Exactly 50 years ago - the most important album of my life was released: "Court and Spark" by Joni Mitchell.

I wondered for a long time which of Joni's albums from her so-called the golden era (i.e. a series of albums from 1971 to 1976) is my favorite. Currently, "Blue" or "Hejira" are more popular, but today I can definitely say that I choose "Court and Spark".

Everything is perfect here: melodies, lyrics, arrangements, performance, production… And of course Joni's vocal. Someone might say that these exact elements are present in all Joni's albums, or at least in all those released in the 1970s. It's true. However, the thing about "Court and Spark" is that it is also very optimistic. Yes, you can hear melancholy in many places, but the overall tone of the album is positive.

(by the way, my second favorite Mitchell's album is "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter", also more optimistic than most of her discography)

I could go on, but words cannot express how connected I am with "Court and Spark". In 2022, I probably played it 2,137 times (greetings to Polish people). And it always moves me. A fantastic mosaic of sounds. I highly recommend listening to the "Joni Mitchell Archives vol. 3" boxing, the demos and other versions of songs from "Court and Spark" are simply amazing!

[diceriadelluntore]

Storia Di Musica #280 - Joni Mitchell, Mingus, 1979

Quando nel 1972 George Wein, celebre organizzatore del Festival di Newport, presentò Charles Mingus all’ora governatore della George, Jimmy Carter, futuro presidente degli Stati Uniti d’America, stava già su una sedia a rotelle, in una fase terribile della malattia di Gehring. Ma fu presentato come “il più grande jazzista vivente”. Qualche anno prima, non invitato dallo stesso Wein al Festival di Newport, organizzò un controfestival, con esibizioni notevolissime, girando in macchina con un megafono proprio nella stessa Newport, attirando non poche persone. Mingus negli anni ‘70 era appena tornato sulle scene, dopo il tracollo mentale dello sfratto e le cure psichiatriche. Eppure proprio in questi anni ci fu una riscoperta totale dei suoi dischi, anche perchè come sempre lui ci mise lo zampino: si mise in testa di poter far soldi con la Candid Records, una piccola casa discografica fondata nel 1960 dal critico e produttore Nat Hentoft e da Archie Bleyer, proprietario della casa discografica Cadence. Mingus auto assunse il ruolo di “direttore” e in 6 mesi registrò dischi favolosi, garantendo agli artisti totale libertà concettuale e artistica, ma non pagò musicisti, tecnici, firmò contratti stranissimi, tanto che durò tutto dall’agosto del ‘60 all’aprile del ‘61. Ma dagli anni ‘70 il catalogo completo fu ridistribuito con il marchio Barnaby della CBS, riaccendendo l’interesse su questo geniale quanto stranissimo musicista. Di questo periodo anche le sue ultime grandi composizioni, con il vulcanico quintetto di George Adams e Don Pullen, con cui registrò Changes One e Changes Two, tutti e due del 1975, con uno dei suoi ultimi grandi pezzi, Duke Ellington’s Sound Of Love. La sua quarta moglie, Sue, è il suo angelo custode, e proprio Sue gli porta un album di una cantante canadese,  Don Juan's Reckless Daughter, che in quegli stessi anni, siamo nel 1977, stava sperimentando il canto jazz: Joni Mitchell. Affascinato dalla sua voce, Mingus la contatta e iniziano a parlare di una collaborazione. La prima idea è grandiosa, in pieno stile Mingus, musicare cioè i Quattro Quartetti di T. S. Eliot: Burnt Norton, East Coker, The Dry Salvages, e Little Gidding sono 4 racconti che il grande scrittore americano aveva pensato come sezioni simili ai tempi di un quartetto d’archi, da cui il nome, scritti prima e dopo lo scoppio della Seconda Guerra Mondiale, dal simbolismo ermetico e potentissimo. Joni Mitchell in un primo tempo rifiuta, poi Mingus lascia perdere Eliot e le regala sei composizioni autografe, chiamate Joni I-VI, a cui Mitchell dovrà aggiungere i testi. Siamo nella secondo metà del 1978, e Mingus per via della sua malattia si trasferisce con Sue a Cuernavaca, in Messico. Mitchell prova le canzoni con un gruppo di musicisti, ma non è convinta, così richiama il leggendario bassista e suo collaboratore nei dischi precedenti, Jaco Pastorius, a cui affianca un gruppo fenomenale: Wayne Shorter al sassofono soprano, Peter Erskine alla batteria, Don Alias alle congas, Emil Richards alle percussioni e il grande Herbie Hancock al piano elettrico. Prodotto dalla stessa Mitchell e registrato presso gli Electric Ladyland Studios di New York, Mingus esce nel giugno 1979. Mitchell aggiunge di suo God Must Be A Boogie Man è per voce, chitarra acustica e basso fretless di Pastorius e The Wolf That Lives In Lindsey, più particolare: lungo brano di voce e chitarra più, qua e là, congas (e ululati) e il jazz rock di God Must Be A Boogie Man. Nei brani scelti tra quelli scritti da Mingus, c’è altra magia: A Chair In The Sky è in quartetto con Hancock, Shorter, Pastorius ed Erskine, è uno degli ultimi gioiellini di Mingus, tra armonie complesse e delicate melodie, con Shorter sugli scudi e il lavoro eccellente di Pastorius in tessitura strutturale. Sweet Sucker Dance è quasi swing; The Dry Cleaner From Des Moines è un saltellante blues con tanto di sezione fiati (arrangiata da Pastorius). Il brano decisamente più emozionante è quello che chiude il disco, la magnifica ballata del 1959 che Mingus dedicò a Lester Young, Goodbye Pork Pie Hat: sempre in quartetto, Joni Mitchell fornisce una stupenda esposizione melodica  cantando anche la prima, lunga, parte del bellissimo assolo di sax tenore presente nell’originale del 1959. La Mitchell qui come cantante si è superata, e ci ha donato una preziosa versione di questo immortale brano di Mingus. Tra i brani, si intervallano delle parti di dialoghi buffi e scanzonati, segnati sul libretto come Rap, tra Mingus, amici e vari musicisti. Il disco fu un fiasco commerciale, e anche la critica non seppe capirlo all’epoca. Tuttavia per tutti i musicisti, fu uno dei lavori più cari per vari motivi, non ultimo quello che successe di lì a poco. Appena quasi tutti i brani erano pronti, tranne God Must Be a Boogie Man, furono mandati a Mingus a Cuernavaca, a fine 1978. Mingus fece appena in tempo ad ascoltarli, perchè il 5 gennaio del 1979 muore stroncato da un infarto. Il disco uscirà nel giugno 1979. E nelle note di copertina di Mingus, Joni Mitchell racconta questa storia, che si pensava fosse una leggenda di sua invenzione, ma che alla fine si rivelò vera: nello stesso giorno della sua morte, in una Baia non lontana da Cuernavaca, una mareggiata spiaggiò diversi capodogli. Erano 56, 56 come gli anni di Charles Mingus. Il giorno dopo, come da sua volontà, il suo corpo venne cremato e le sue ceneri verranno poi depositate nel Gange. Nello stesso giorno della cremazione, anche le carcasse dei capodogli vennero bruciate in colossali pire sulla spiaggia. Leggenda vuole che le fiamme facessero nel cielo delle piccole M: l’ultima leggenda di Charles Mingus, genio della musica.

[ursaminorjim]

“Talk to me” - Joni Mitchell, Don Juan’s Reckless Daughter