Friday, May 2, 2008

Cities: Morning Morgantown



Joni Mitchell: Morning Morgantown

[purchase]

It's probably too obvious to feature Free Man In Paris for Cities week.  I have avoided the tune myself for just that reason and I'm going to dodge it again today by featuring a different tune by Our Lady of Laurel Canyon.

Wikipedia lists several Morgantowns in the United States, and unfortunately I have no clue which one Joni is singing about here. The song makes me want to visit though, wherever it is.

This was my first favorite Joni Mitchell album, and listening to it today still brings back memories of the year that I discovered her profoundly poetic lyrics, complex melodies, and alternate tunings that frustrate the crap out of amateur guitar players like myself. I remember trying to learn how to play Circle Game when I was in college and an excellent guitar player from down the hall advised me, "No no! First John Denver, THEN Joni Mitchell". Well, it's 15 years later and I still can't play Joni very well.


The featured track is from Ladies Of The Canyon, her 1970 release.

3 comments:

Paul said...

Just click on the word "Joni" in the sidebar for a download of Free Man in Paris.

And, as always, thanks for posting Joni!

Ramone666 said...

I bet you can play Leaving On A Jet Plane pretty well by now though.

boyhowdy said...

Hint for playing Joni well: learn the dulcimer, and stick to her dulcimer songs.

Of the four strings on a dulcimer, three of them are tuned to D. And there's no flats or sharps, just whole notes. Honestly, how can you go wrong?