Joni Mitchell and Neil Young theme

If you are a female musician you were probably inspired by the music of Joni Mitchell, and if you play guitar, you probably have a whole repertoire of Neil Young songs!
Joni Mitchell has been my favourite musician ever since I discovered my brother's cassette of Joni's album "Hejira" in a tape player at home.  I pressed play and from then on was hooked on the music of Joni Mitchell.  She has a song for every mood that you feel, and her lyrics are woven together through the melody in a very original way.  Remember the movie with Hugh Grant called "Love Actually" where the character played by Emma Thompson says, "Joni Mitchell is the woman who taught your cold English wife how to feel".

Neil Young is also an incredible lyricist and musician.  I think we all had the album, "Harvest" at some stage. Life hasn't been that easy for Neil Young.  He has suffered an aneurysm, he has fathered two children with a rare condition and has lost friends to drug addiction.

Is it really necessary to suffer for your art?  In the case of Joni Mitchell and Neil Young, their suffering has certainly brought about some deep-felt emotion through their song writing.  "Little Green" by Joni Mitchell (a personal song about giving her child up for adoption) comes to mind and "The Needle & The Damage Done" by Neil Young is about losing friends to heroine addiction.
I loved playing the music of these two fabulous artists tonight on A Mixed Bag with Chris B on 93.7 Edge FM.  The only problem was I couldn't fit all their songs into the two hours, but here is the playlist:-

Urge for Going - Joni Mitchell
You Turn Me On (I'm a Radio) - Joni Mitchell
The Needle and The Damage Done - Neil Young
Heart of Gold - Neil Young
Out on the Weekend - Neil Young
A Man Needs a Maid - Neil Young
Cool Water - Joni Mitchell & Willy Nelson
Beat of Black Wings - Joni Mitchell
All I Want - Joni Mitchell
My Old Man - Joni Mitchell
A Man Needs a Maid - Neil Young
The Magdalene Laundries - Joni Mitchells song but a cover by Emmylou Harris
Free Man in Paris - Joni Mitchell
Hey, Hey, My, My (Out of the Blue and Into the Black)  - Neil Young's rocky version of that one
Circle Game - Joni Mitchell
Clouds - Joni Mitchell
Coyote - Joni Mitchell

Next week on A Mixed Bag with Chris B on 93.7 Edge FM our theme will be Johnny Cash.  If you live in the Bega Valley, tune in between 6.00 pm and 8.00 pm on Tuesday night.