Shine On
I’d planned to file a report here soon after Joni Mitchell’s October 19th and 20th Hollywood Bowl appearances. Then I had to go to a funeral. My Dad’s passing last year reorganized my priorities in favor of family. It felt right to drop everything and sit in a church pew beside my sisters and Mom, saying goodbye to her brother and our uncle. He was buried in a Yankees jersey—thankfully before he saw them three games down in the World Series.
By now, we’ve moved on to another weekend’s news, like Trump’s Madison Square Garden rally inflaming his base—a rally attended by 18,000 believers, about the same number of people at Joni’s two sold-out Hollywood Bowl shows the previous weekend. By now, any Joni fans who couldn’t make it to L.A. have read plenty of concert reviews and watched performances on YouTube.
If there’s no longer any point in reporting what happened at the concert, there’s still relevance in sharing its meaning, both personal and collective. For you, dear readers, I’ve crafted a lyric essay in the spirit of Joni’s 2007 song “Shine,” which I’ve always heard as an example of Buddhist right view. Right view is a practice of seeing what’s in front of us, even the things we’d rather not see. Let’s go. I’m just making it all up as I go along here at Call & Response.
Shine On
Shine on all the Joni pilgrims on my Denver-Burbank flight, especially the two I overheard discussing their votes for every single amendment and proposition on the lengthy Colorado ballot. Joni fans are an earnest bunch.
Shine on everyone in the crowd who said, “I just had to be here.” Shine on my Dad’s death, teaching me to seize these moments because we don’t have forever. Shine on all my nonchalant next times to friends I missed there because I still like to pretend our days are infinite.
Shine on the Bowl’s orange-vested Black attendants doubling as hype men when we arrived: “You’re gonna see Joni Mitchell! Get excited now.” Shine on Joni loving to cite a Black woman hugging her and exclaiming, “Joni Mitchell, you make me see pictures in my head!” whenever an eggheaded fan got too long-winded with praise.
Shine on Los Angeles and the many people inspired to move there by Joni’s music and alluring lifestyle in her very very very fine house. Shine on the inflated costs of that good city, like $40 for car service to my friend’s home only two miles from the Bowl. Shine on a half moon over that blue-lit bandshell among those hills, like some surrealist invented it. L.A. always feels worth it at the Hollywood Bowl.
Shine on deeper cuts in the 27-song setlist such as “The Sire of Sorrow” and “God Must Be A Boogie Man.” Shine on Joni re-learning her longer and more complex songs, even the eight verses of “Come In From The Cold.” Shine on a mood shift from Newport and the Gorge’s folky singalongs to the Bowl’s sophisticated outdoor nightclub vibe—and still with singalongs. Shine on Joni now leading the music and Brandi Carlile sticking to the background, sometimes faintly tracing a song’s melody up high behind Joni’s low phrases, like starter jazz where the head or theme is always played pianissimo behind a solo.
Shine on fans’ personal associations with Joni’s music. Shine on me as a teenager buying her album Night Ride Home on its February 1991 release date, dropping acid with a boyfriend, and listening to it in his bedroom nine or ten times in a row, absorbing the music and each other so completely that sex seemed a small part of a much larger communion as if there were no edges to true art or true passion. Shine on everyone who’s ever had transcendent sex to Joni’s music. Shine on me at 50 hearing Joni’s Bowl performances of “Night Ride Home” and “Cherokee Louise” and realizing that 1991 LSD album release day sparked a transformation in which I began to gain the confidence to locate my heart and mind in the broader world. Shine on how much music can mean to our lives.
Shine on my inner critic, rising like a king cobra to observe that the jazz artists onstage were the star-seeking Jon Batiste and Jacob Collier, whose grinning charisma didn’t always translate to meaningful improv for me. Shine on the futility of me wishing the two dozen performers wouldn’t fill any available space around Joni’s well-crafted phrases with busy accompaniment (because the concert was billed as a jam, after all). Shine on your witness, still listening from an antiquated world where Joni preferred vivid minimalists who made a few notes count for so much. Shine on me missing Joni’s deep listening soulmates of yore.
Shine on letting go of expectations and settling into appreciation. Shine on noble pop musicians enabling wider access to Joni’s music in a way improv mystics like Jaco/Wayne/Herbie/Pat/Lyle/Don/Larry never could. Shine on the Joni Jam crew’s genuine love for their hero and warm home jam sessions that eventually brought her back to us as a performer. Shine on their half a year’s work at learning Joni’s deeper cuts for these shows. Brandi: “It took 22 musicians six months to do the job of one Joni Mitchell.” Shine on the reverberations of these artists playing Joni’s stranger chords, the future influence on their music.
Shine on the lovely vulnerability of Joni’s late-period musical performances, nudging us to confront fears and frailties of our own.
Shine on exploring our doubts.
Shine on Joni’s laugh, whose childlike delight at Newport and the Gorge is now complicated by awareness of some great cosmic joke. Shine on that wolf-headed cane she wields as totem, percussion, and scepter.
Shine on the friend who wanted to take me to Joan’s house the day after the shows. Shine on me realizing I’d rather know Joan abstracted through her artistry now because it’s more than enough.
Shine on what you can’t hear in show videos, which is how Joni’s deep, textured voice has room for everything now. Shine on her voice as eternal spring, as dark water holding every beloved thing we’ve lost, as flood washing away our doubts, as rippled lake reflecting the moon.
Shine on what you can’t feel in show videos, which was an audience congregation finding spiritual sustenance in the communal experience of hearing their own private soundtrack live. Shine on our sense of connection resonating in the music, turning its heartwarming swells into a blessing.
Shine on Joni’s musicality flourishing on other people’s songs, particularly “Summertime.”
Shine on Joni’s suggestive giggles and whoop at tall-drink-of-water Marcus Mumford when he sat beside her to sing “California.” “She’d throw him down backstage right now!” someone stage-whispered nearby. Shine on savvy concert programmers knowing Mumford evokes Joni’s musician lovers like Graham Nash and James Taylor from the era when she wrote this song. Shine on Joni’s unapologetic sexual appetites, which may have launched with the free love multitudes but became something else: an essential part of her creative process. Shine on me watching Joni meet my 40-something boyfriend back when she was in her 60s and realizing they’d hook up if I weren’t there—and maybe did later anyway. Shine on the undeniability of sex appeal at any age and on taking pleasure where it’s found.
Shine on the drunk and high Boomer lady from Topanga Canyon in the row ahead who raised her arms and cheered lyrics—“Like holy wine!”—at the show’s most reflective, inopportune moments. Shine on her Boomer friends pretending not to know her when she returned from the bar, tripping up steps and falling on other concertgoers as she looked for her seat. Shine on the young usher who quietly insisted that the Topanga lady’s friends take responsibility for her. Shine on the sober Gen Z women nearby who witnessed this drama with the dull smugness of rejecting bad old Boomer habits. Shine on the pills and powders and abstinence that get us through this passion play.
Shine on two sisters I met, one of whom was losing her memory. The other was realizing the extent of her sister’s memory loss during the show. Shine on me attempting to distract them with stories of interviewing Joni that I don’t usually tell. Shine on me needing to fix situations that don’t need fixing. Shine on live music allowing us to sit with discomfort until we make peace with not knowing all of life’s outcomes.
Shine on Joni’s friend Meryl Streep, who is to acting what Joni is to songwriting, another best of her generation, and who sat onstage behind the performers glowing with good art.
Shine on the power of Joni’s resilience and the unwritten final chapters in us all.
Shine on concertgoers of all ages who lay awake after the show like teenagers, once again wondering who in the world we might be.
Shine on an artist powerful enough to transpose us into the key of here & now.
Shine on a living legend going out in a blazing sunset of glory.
Shine on and on and on.
This is your best yet!
This is beautiful, Michelle.