Quotes by Joni Mitchell

About Joni Mitchell:

Roberta Joan "Joni" Mitchell is a Canadian singer-songwriter and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto. In 1965, she moved to the United States and began touring. Some of her original songs ("Urge for Going", "Chelsea Morning", "Both Sides, Now", "The Circle Game") were covered by folk singers, allowing her to sign with Reprise Records and record her debut album in 1968.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

The God of the Old Testament is the depiction of evil.

Joni Mitchell

The thing that gave me the most pain in life, psychologically, and it gave me tremendous pain psychologically, is man's disrespect for nature.

Joni Mitchell

My life came down to being a granny and watching a lot of television.

Joni Mitchell

You have this mounting aggressive ignorance with the rabbit's foot of their particular religion. You don't really have any kind of spiritual law, just a kind of a rabid mental illness. The songs are a little slice of life.

Joni Mitchell

You know, Neil Young is singing Rock n' roll will never die, and Neil never rocked and rolled in his life. I mean, he rocked, but he didn't roll. He has got no swing in him.

Joni Mitchell

I had made all these rules for myself: I'm not writing social commentary, I'm not writing love songs.

Joni Mitchell

My first four albums covered the usual youth problems - looking for love in all the wrong places - while the next five are basically about being in your 30s.

Joni Mitchell

I learned a woman is never an old woman.

Joni Mitchell

Buddy Holly and the early rock 'n' roll was no lighter than the way I play. It's very minimal.

Joni Mitchell

There are things to confess that enrich the world, and things that need not be said.

Joni Mitchell

My heart is broken in the face of the stupidity of my species.

Joni Mitchell

White rhythm is waltzes, marches, and the polka. In Africa, rhythm is used for a celebratory groove, but white rhythm doesn't have such an enormous vocabulary of spirits. It's basically militant.

Joni Mitchell

Americans have decided to be stupid and shallow since 1980.

Joni Mitchell

You wake up one day and suddenly realize that your youth is behind you, even though you're still young at heart.

Joni Mitchell

Edith Piaf knocked my socks off when I was 8, but I didn't know what she was singing about.

Joni Mitchell

Augustine, Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath are confessional writers and all three make me sick. I have nothing in common with them.

Joni Mitchell

When I came to California, it was the mecca of the world. Every young person on the planet wanted to be here.

Joni Mitchell

I sing my sorrow, and I paint my joy.

Joni Mitchell

I'm a little young for retirement.

Joni Mitchell

In New York, the street adventures are incredible. There are a thousand stories in a single block. You see the stories in the people's faces. You hear the songs immediately. Here in Los Angeles, there are less characters because they're all inside au...

Joni Mitchell

My parents told me I'd point to a bed of flowers and say 'Pink. Pretty,' before I knew any other words.

Joni Mitchell

Author Bio

  • NameJoni Mitchell
  • DescriptionCanadian musician
  • AliasesRoberta Joan Anderson
  • BornNovember 7, 1943
  • CountryCanada
  • ProfessionSinger; Songwriter; Painter; Singer-songwriter; Artist; Musician
  • WorksBoth Sides; Big Yellow Taxi; Carey; Got 'til It's Gone
  • AwardsPolar Music Prize; Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame; Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award; Canadian Music Hall Of Fame; Canada's Walk Of Fame; Canadian Songwriters Hall Of Fame; Companion Of The Order Of Canada