"Everybody Has the Blues"

I have in my hand right now a letter from my great-grandfather, Nathaniel Moon, to his son (my grandfather, Oscar), dated Sept 22, 1945. I thought it was interesting that he writes, "No news here to write --- everybody has the blues."It's a perpetual human condition, isn't it? And that's okay, as long as we get happy somewhere in between our blues. My great-grandfather went on to write about real estate --- how three different houses were for sale on Birch Street in Huntsville, Alabama, and how he was about to buy one, his brother was going to buy another, and he recommended my grandfather but the remaining one. Guess how much? $3600.00, $250.00 down, $25.50 per month. And that, he notes, "takes care of interest and insurance."I thought you all might find it interesting to take a look back to the mindset of 1945 --- and then reconsider our blues, and Joni's.http://jonimitchell.com/a place to see more about Joni the painter as well as the singer:"I'm a painter first, and a musician second..." - September 8, 1998"I'm really a painter at heart and I can say this now... Music was a hobby for me at art school, and art was serious. Art was always what I was going to do. I was going to be an artist." - August 1998"I have always thought of myself as a painter derailed by circumstance." - June 2000All I Want by Joni MitchellI am on a lonely road and I am travelingTraveling, traveling, travelingLooking for something, what can it beOh I hate you some, I hate you some, I love you someOh I love you when I forget about meI want to be strong I want to laugh alongI want to belong to the livingAlive, alive, I want to get up and jiveI want to wreck my stockings in some juke box diveDo you want - do you want - do you want to dance with me babyDo you want to take a chanceOn maybe finding some sweet romance with me babyWell, come onAll I really really want our love to doIs to bring out the best in me and in you tooAll I really really want our love to doIs to bring out the best in me and in youI want to talk to you, I want to shampoo youI want to renew you again and againApplause, applause - Life is our causeWhen I think of your kisses my mind see-sawsDo you see - do you see - do you see how you hurt me babySo I hurt you tooThen we both get so blue.I am on a lonely road and I am travelingLooking for the key to set me freeOh the jealousy, the greed is the unravelingIt's the unravelingAnd it undoes all the joy that could beI want to have fun, I want to shine like the sunI want to be the one that you want to seeI want to knit you a sweaterWant to write you a love letterI want to make you feel betterI want to make you feel freeI want to make you feel freeCopyright © 1970; Joni Mitchellhttp://www.amazon.com/Hits-Joni-Mitchell/dp/B000002N9ZSong samples at Amazon.And here's the Daily OM review of the album, one of my favorites.May 22, 2007BlueJoni Mitchell1971"Joni Mitchell is one of the 20th-century's most accomplished solo musicians. But her iconic status belies the deeply personal, even idiosyncratic nature of her music. At her best, Mitchell plumbs the furthest reaches of her soul, emerging with pure art-as-feeling, the kind of confessional folk-song fare that many have tried but few have mastered. Blue, from 1971, is arguably the highlight of her long and prolific career. As the title suggests, it finds Mitchell at her most downcast and introspective but also at her most potent and revealing. With friends Stephen Stills and James Taylor helping in the studio, she conjures a spare, acoustic treasure, an album in which her most private emotions are laid bare and somehow made to stand for the troubles of an entire generation.Blue opens with a terrific statement of intent, "All I Want." As acoustic guitar rattles out an opaque melody, Mitchell sings in a jazzy cadence that ebbs aggressively at times and settles at others[AS1]. The title suggests that Mitchell's needs may be rather simple but precisely the opposite is true. Hers is the burning, painful desire of youth to take life head on and never let go. "I want to be strong," she sings. "I want to laugh along / I want to belong to the living." Even the album's catchiest tunes waft with melancholy. "California" features jumping guitar as Joni sings in a fluttering, flying falsetto of travels in Europe and the ever-calling draw of home. But she sets the song in an understated sociopolitical context that seems as relevant today as it ever was: "Oh it gets so lonely / When you're walking / And the streets are full of strangers / All the news of home you read / More about the war / And the bloody changes."Several tracks dispense with the Greenwich Village folk-guitar flavor in favor of warm, full-bodied piano. "River" is perhaps the standout of these, an evocation of pure yearning as beautiful as any in the singer-songwriter canon. She sings, "I wish I had a river / I could skate away on," and the song itself seems to skate and slide with a heavy momentum. Blue is the sound of heartbreak, of hope and perseverance, of resilient humor and deep-seated pain. In short, it's the sound of life."