Hejira (album)
Encyclopedia
Hejira is a 1976 folk/rock
/jazz
album by Canadian
singer-songwriter
Joni Mitchell
. The album title is a transliteration of the Arabic word hijra
, which means "journey", referring specifically to the prophet Muhammad
's and his followers' escape from Mecca
to Medina
in 622
. The songs on the album were largely written by Mitchell on a trip by car from Maine
back to Los Angeles, California
, with prominent imagery including highways, small towns and snow. The photographs on the front and back cover were taken of Mitchell by Norman Seeff
and appear against a backdrop of Lake Mendota
, in Madison, Wisconsin
, after an ice storm.
Dominated by Mitchell's guitar
and Jaco Pastorius
's distinctive fretless bass, it drew on a range of influences but was more cohesive and accessible than some of her later more jazz-oriented work. "Coyote", "Amelia" and "Hejira" all became concert staples shortly after Hejiras release, especially after being featured on the live album Shadows and Light, alongside "Furry Sings the Blues" and "Black Crow".
Though "Coyote" and "Black Crow" are fast-strummed folksy numbers, the rest of Hejira is slow and often languid, notably the epic "Song for Sharon", which deals with the conflict between freedom and marriage faced by a woman and is interspersed with images of New York City
including a trip to Mandolin Brothers
in Staten Island.
"Amelia" interweaves a story of a desert journey (the "hejira within the hejira") with the famous aviator Amelia Earhart
who mysteriously vanished during a flight over the Pacific Ocean
. Mitchell has commented on the origins of the song: "I was thinking of Amelia Earhart and addressing it from one solo pilot to another... sort of reflecting on the cost of being a woman and having something you must do." The song repeatedly shifts between two keys, giving it a constant unsettled feeling.
"Furry Sings the Blues" was inspired by a meeting that occurred between Mitchell and the blues
guitarist and singer Furry Lewis
in Memphis
in 1975. Lewis was displeased with Mitchell's unauthorized use of his name and "hated" the song. He told Rolling Stone in February 1977: "She shouldn't have used my name in no way, shape, form or faction without consultin' me 'bout it first. The woman came over here and I treated her right, just like I does everybody that comes over. She wanted to hear 'bout the old days, said it was for her own personal self, and I told it to her like it was, gave her straight oil from the can."
pop album chart and was certified Gold, but failed to get significant airplay on commercial radio. Critically, the album was generally well received and has since been recognized as one of the high-water marks in Mitchell's career. In 2000, German Spex
magazine critics voted it the 55th greatest album of the 20th century, calling it "a self-confident, coolly elegant design". Furthermore, its cover was chosen as the 11th greatest album cover by Rolling Stone
in 1991.
(both sometimes transliterated as hijira or hejira)
Folk rock
Folk rock is a musical genre combining elements of folk music and rock music. In its earliest and narrowest sense, the term referred to a genre that arose in the United States and the UK around the mid-1960s...
/jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
album by Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
singer-songwriter
Singer-songwriter
Singer-songwriters are musicians who write, compose and sing their own musical material including lyrics and melodies. As opposed to contemporary popular music singers who write their own songs, the term singer-songwriter describes a distinct form of artistry, closely associated with the...
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell
Joni Mitchell, CC is a Canadian musician, singer songwriter, and painter. Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in her native Saskatchewan and Western Canada and then busking in the streets and dives of Toronto...
. The album title is a transliteration of the Arabic word hijra
Hijra (Islam)
The Hijra is the migration or journey of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE. Alternate spellings of this Arabic word are Hijrah, Hijrat or Hegira, the latter following the spelling rules of Latin.- Hijra of Muhammad :In September 622, warned of a plot to...
, which means "journey", referring specifically to the prophet Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
's and his followers' escape from Mecca
Mecca
Mecca is a city in the Hijaz and the capital of Makkah province in Saudi Arabia. The city is located inland from Jeddah in a narrow valley at a height of above sea level...
to Medina
Medina
Medina , or ; also transliterated as Madinah, or madinat al-nabi "the city of the prophet") is a city in the Hejaz region of western Saudi Arabia, and serves as the capital of the Al Madinah Province. It is the second holiest city in Islam, and the burial place of the Islamic Prophet Muhammad, and...
in 622
622
Year 622 was a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 622 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.- Religion :* July 16 – Year one of the Islamic...
. The songs on the album were largely written by Mitchell on a trip by car from Maine
Maine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
back to Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, with prominent imagery including highways, small towns and snow. The photographs on the front and back cover were taken of Mitchell by Norman Seeff
Norman Seeff
Norman Seeff was born March 5, 1939 in Johannesburg, South Africa. Since moving to the United States in 1969, his work as a photographer and filmmaker has been focused on the exploration of human creativity and the inner dynamics of the creative process....
and appear against a backdrop of Lake Mendota
Lake Mendota
Lake Mendota is the northernmost and largest of the four lakes near Madison, Wisconsin. The lake borders Madison on the north, east and south, Middleton on the west, Shorewood Hills on the southwest, Maple Bluff on the northeast, and Westport on the northwest....
, in Madison, Wisconsin
Madison, Wisconsin
Madison is the capital of the U.S. state of Wisconsin and the county seat of Dane County. It is also home to the University of Wisconsin–Madison....
, after an ice storm.
Themes
Mitchell said of the album: "the whole 'Hejira' album was really inspired... I wrote the album while traveling cross-country by myself and there is this restless feeling throughout it... The sweet loneliness of solitary travel."Dominated by Mitchell's guitar
Guitar
The guitar is a plucked string instrument, usually played with fingers or a pick. The guitar consists of a body with a rigid neck to which the strings, generally six in number, are attached. Guitars are traditionally constructed of various woods and strung with animal gut or, more recently, with...
and Jaco Pastorius
Jaco Pastorius
John Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....
's distinctive fretless bass, it drew on a range of influences but was more cohesive and accessible than some of her later more jazz-oriented work. "Coyote", "Amelia" and "Hejira" all became concert staples shortly after Hejiras release, especially after being featured on the live album Shadows and Light, alongside "Furry Sings the Blues" and "Black Crow".
Though "Coyote" and "Black Crow" are fast-strummed folksy numbers, the rest of Hejira is slow and often languid, notably the epic "Song for Sharon", which deals with the conflict between freedom and marriage faced by a woman and is interspersed with images of New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
including a trip to Mandolin Brothers
Mandolin Brothers
Mandolin Brothers has been described as a New York City institution; it is a famous shop where vintage and high quality musical instruments are sold. Claire Wilson writing in the NY Times in 2001 described it as "a bustling little shop-cum-museum."...
in Staten Island.
Staten Island
Staten Island is a borough of New York City, New York, United States, located in the southwest part of the city. Staten Island is separated from New Jersey by the Arthur Kill and the Kill Van Kull, and from the rest of New York by New York Bay...
"Amelia" interweaves a story of a desert journey (the "hejira within the hejira") with the famous aviator Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart
Amelia Mary Earhart was a noted American aviation pioneer and author. Earhart was the first woman to receive the U.S. Distinguished Flying Cross, awarded for becoming the first aviatrix to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean...
who mysteriously vanished during a flight over the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
. Mitchell has commented on the origins of the song: "I was thinking of Amelia Earhart and addressing it from one solo pilot to another... sort of reflecting on the cost of being a woman and having something you must do." The song repeatedly shifts between two keys, giving it a constant unsettled feeling.
"Furry Sings the Blues" was inspired by a meeting that occurred between Mitchell and the blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
guitarist and singer Furry Lewis
Furry Lewis
Furry Lewis was an American country blues guitarist and songwriter from Memphis, Tennessee. Lewis was one of the first of the old-time blues musicians of the 1920s to be brought out of retirement, and given a new lease of recording life, by the folk blues revival of the 1960s.-Life and...
in Memphis
Memphis, Tennessee
Memphis is a city in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Tennessee, and the county seat of Shelby County. The city is located on the 4th Chickasaw Bluff, south of the confluence of the Wolf and Mississippi rivers....
in 1975. Lewis was displeased with Mitchell's unauthorized use of his name and "hated" the song. He told Rolling Stone in February 1977: "She shouldn't have used my name in no way, shape, form or faction without consultin' me 'bout it first. The woman came over here and I treated her right, just like I does everybody that comes over. She wanted to hear 'bout the old days, said it was for her own personal self, and I told it to her like it was, gave her straight oil from the can."
Release
Commercially, the album did not do as well as its two predecessors, although it still reached #13 on the Billboard 200Billboard 200
The Billboard 200 is a ranking of the 200 highest-selling music albums and EPs in the United States, published weekly by Billboard magazine. It is frequently used to convey the popularity of an artist or groups of artists...
pop album chart and was certified Gold, but failed to get significant airplay on commercial radio. Critically, the album was generally well received and has since been recognized as one of the high-water marks in Mitchell's career. In 2000, German Spex
Spex (magazine)
Spex is a prominent German rock and pop culture magazine located in Berlin, Germany. Besides music news, Spex also covers literature, cinema, fashion and contemporary social trends...
magazine critics voted it the 55th greatest album of the 20th century, calling it "a self-confident, coolly elegant design". Furthermore, its cover was chosen as the 11th greatest album cover by Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
in 1991.
Side one
- "CoyoteCoyote (song)"Coyote" is the opening song from Joni Mitchell's 1976 album Hejira and also the album's first single.Though the song had been introduced on the tour to support 1975's The Hissing of Summer Lawns, "Coyote" was a significant musical departure: where Hissing was ornate with pianos, layered vocals...
" – 5:01 - "Amelia" – 6:01
- "Furry Sings the Blues" – 5:07
- "A Strange Boy" – 4:15
- "HejiraHejira (song)Hejira is the title track from Joni Mitchell's 1976 album. It is the 5th track on the album , and the 2nd of 4 tracks on Hejira which fretless bassist Jaco Pastorius plays on....
" – 6:42
Side two
- "Song for Sharon" – 8:40
- "Black Crow" – 4:22
- "Blue Motel Room" – 5:04
- "Refuge of the Roads" – 6:42
Personnel
- Joni Mitchell: vocals, acoustic & electric guitars
- Larry CarltonLarry CarltonLarry Carlton is an American jazz, smooth jazz, jazz fusion, pop, and rock guitarist and singer. He has divided his recording time between solo recordings and session appearances with various well-known bands...
: acoustic & electric guitars - Abe Most: clarinet on "Hejira"
- Neil YoungNeil YoungNeil Percival Young, OC, OM is a Canadian singer-songwriter who is widely regarded as one of the most influential musicians of his generation...
: harmonica on "Furry Sings the Blues" - Chuck FindleyChuck FindleyChuck Findley is an American session musician. Most widely-known as a trumpet player, he also plays other brass instruments such as flugelhorn and trombone...
: horns on "Refuge of the Roads" - Tom ScottTom Scott (musician)Tom Scott is an American saxophonist, composer, arranger, conductor and bandleader of the west coast jazz/jazz fusion ensemble The L.A. Express.-Biography:Scott was born in Los Angeles, California...
: horns on "Refuge of the Roads" - Victor FeldmanVictor FeldmanVictor Stanley Feldman was a British jazz musician, best known as a pianist.-Early history:...
: vibraphone on "Amelia" - Jaco PastoriusJaco PastoriusJohn Francis Anthony Pastorius III , known as Jaco Pastorius, was an American jazz musician and composer widely acknowledged as a virtuoso electric bass player....
: bass on "Refuge of the Roads", "Black Crow", "Hejira" and "Coyote" - Max BennettMax Bennett (musician)Max Bennett is an American jazz bassist and session musician.Bennett grew up in Kansas City and Oskaloosa, Iowa, and went to college in Iowa. His first professional gig was with Herbie Fields in 1949, and following this he played with Georgie Auld, Terry Gibbs, and Charlie Ventura...
: bass on "Song for Sharon", "Furry Sings the Blues" - Chuck DomanicoChuck DomanicoCharles Louis Domanico , better known as Chuck Domanico, was an American jazz bassist, playing both acoustic and electric bass on the West Coast jazz scene.Domanico was born in Chicago...
: bass on "Blue Motel Room" - John GuerinJohn GuerinJohn Payne Guerin worked as a drummer, percussionist, and recording artist worldwide.Guerin was born in Hawaii and raised in San Diego. As a young drummer he began performing with Buddy DeFranco in 1960...
: drums - Bobbye HallBobbye HallBobbye Jean Hall Porter is an American percussionist who has recorded with a variety of rock, soul, blues and jazz artists, and has appeared on 22 songs that reached the top ten in the Billboard Hot 100, six of those reaching #1.-Early career:...
: percussion
See also
- Hijra (Islam)Hijra (Islam)The Hijra is the migration or journey of the Islamic prophet Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina in 622 CE. Alternate spellings of this Arabic word are Hijrah, Hijrat or Hegira, the latter following the spelling rules of Latin.- Hijra of Muhammad :In September 622, warned of a plot to...
- Hijra (South Asia)Hijra (South Asia)In the culture of South Asia, hijras or chakka in Kannada, khusra in Punjabi and kojja in Telugu are physiological males who have feminine gender identity, women's clothing and other feminine gender roles. Hijras have a long recorded history in the Indian subcontinent, from the antiquity, as...
(both sometimes transliterated as hijira or hejira)