![]() Black crows: learn about the remarkable intelligence and varied learning skills of the American crow ( corvus brachyrhynchos) in a National Geographic feature (“researchers donned masks and, while holding dead, taxidermied crows, laid out food in areas frequented by crows in Washington State.Joni’s creative approach embodies this better than virtually anyone else’s – read more about how she winds the pegs in my article Stringed canvas: Joni Mitchell’s musico-visual imagination (“…after all, what painter would stick to the same six colour pots, when a near-infinite selection lie within arm’s reach?”) Joni’s tunings: As ever, the purpose of all this isn’t really to teach specific tunings – but to remind us that we can take a ‘step back’ in our creative process, making deliberate choices about the natural colours of our tuning patterns as well as the chords and melodies we set to them.Further learnings: sources, readings, lessons, other onward links… Haja’s Bb: superlow island tuning with shuffled tensions.Coyote: more imaginative reconfiguration from Joni.Zigzag Thirds (Min): another ascent-ordered arpeggio.Associated tunings: proximities of shape, concept, context, etc… And to any genuine vibratory scientists reading: please critique my DIY analysis! See my Tunings Megatable for further such nerdery: more numbers, intervallic relations, comparative methods, etc.Insights to share? Comment via YouTube, or get in touch! Black Crow (first performance) – Joni Mitchell (1976):. ![]() I’d been listening to Black Crow…and said to Ben, my songwriting partner: ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could do a song with similar, flowing open chords?'”) Lang “hired a little place in Vancouver to write songs. (Its unique groove also directly inspired the creation of kd lang’s 1992 hit Constant Craving. Giulia Galliani MAG Collective’s continue this tradition into the 21st century with their sultry, jazzy, jungle-laden rendition. Many other artists have covered the track with imagination too – including Cassandra Wilson in 1993, Richard Thompson in 2000, and Diana Krall in 2004 (Krall also lives just across the Georgia Strait, and can “relate entirely to the travel difficulties and the rugged terrain it describes”). There’s also a fantastic acoustic take from the 1976 Rolling Thunder Revue tour (see Coyote tuning) – seemingly the song’s first performance. Joni also recorded the song on other occasions – notably during her 1979 Mingus tour, as captured on the 1980 Shadows & Light live album, featuring an all-star band of Joni, Jaco, Pat Metheny on guitar, Michael Brecker on sax, Lyle Mays on keys, and Don Alias on congas & percussion. Black Crow (album) – Joni Mitchell (1976):.Sounds like they’re all having a divine time… This is a real case of ‘ playing the lyrics, not just the melody’: aside from Joni’s mellifluous vocal evocations, I can’t help but feel the crow’s glide in Jaco’s ‘floating’ bass harmonics – and also in Larry’s long, high bends, which almost seem to ‘ paint’ the bird’s flight through the air. Her poetic wanderlust is balanced by a distinctively choppy, funk-inclined steel-string groove, opening up a world of space for the smoother timbres of the electrified instruments. In a 2006 Ottawa Citizen interview, she recounts how the song is “another lament about travel, but this time about the difficulty of leaving” – with the journey itself being described in near-literal sequence (“I took a ferry to the highway, then I drove to a pontoon plane, I took a plane to a taxi, and a taxi to a train”). Lyrics detail her multi-step trips across British Columbia, required to reach her holiday home on the rugged Sunshine Coast. Joni recounts how the impulse for the song came directly from observing a black crow diving for shiny objects (“a weakness I can understand”). Home | Menu | Random - Support this site!. Try moving a 6-5-4str barre vertically (=up-and-down the neck), in the manner of the track… Pattern: 12>3>4>3>2 Harmony: Bbmin7 | 1-1-b3-5-b7-1 5str) – but actually, just strum hard and embrace the chaos they bring – it worked for Joni. I’d usually say be delicate with the tension differentials (e.g. Similarly, you could view it as a ‘ Bb drone + D bmaj chord’ (laid out on 6-5-1str & 4-3-2str respectively). 7tharpeggio, ordered (ignoring octave jumps) in straightforward ascending sequence: as 1-(1)-b3-5-b7-(1). Much of the percussive spice instead comes from her own low end, which features a ‘ slack thwack‘ adjacent octave (on 6>5str). Deep-sided tuning used by Joni Mitchell for Black Crow, track seven of her 1976 Hejira album – surely among the funkiest drum-less songs of all time (…just the trio of Joni, Jaco Pastorius on bass, and Larry Carlton on electric).
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