"River" is a song by 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...

, from her 1971 album Blue

Blue (Joni Mitchell album)

Blue is the fourth album of Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Exploring the various facets of relationships from infatuation on "A Case of You" to insecurity on "This Flight Tonight", the songs feature simple accompaniments on piano, guitar, and Appalachian dulcimer...

. Although never released as a single, it has become one of Mitchell's most famous songs.

Overview

In the song, Mitchell ruminates on the recent breakup of a romantic relationship. Christmas

Christmas

Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...

 is nearing, and Mitchell longs to escape her emotional bonds, openly wishing "I wish I had a river / I could skate away on", a river so long she "would teach my feet to fly." Furthermore, Mitchell's Canadian past is reflected upon, as her current warm (presumably California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

n) climate does not offer her that ice or that chance. It is used in the 2000 film Almost Famous

Almost Famous

Almost Famous is a 2000 musical comedy-drama film written and directed by Cameron Crowe and telling the fictional story of a teenage journalist writing for Rolling Stone magazine while covering the fictitious rock band Stillwater , and his efforts to get his first cover story published...

and in episodes of Alias

Alias (TV series)

Alias is an American action television series created by J. J. Abrams which was broadcast on ABC for five seasons, from September 30, 2001 to May 22, 2006...

, thirtysomething, The Wonder Years

The Wonder Years

The Wonder Years is an American television comedy-drama created by Carol Black and Neal Marlens. It ran for six seasons on ABC from 1988 through 1993. The pilot aired on January 31, 1988 after ABC's coverage of Super Bowl XXII....

, and ER

ER (TV series)

ER is an American medical drama television series created by novelist Michael Crichton that aired on NBC from September 19, 1994 to April 2, 2009. It was produced by Constant c Productions and Amblin Entertainment, in association with Warner Bros. Television...

.

Keeping with the Christmas theme of the lyrics, the arrangement of the song on Blue

Blue (Joni Mitchell album)

Blue is the fourth album of Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell. Exploring the various facets of relationships from infatuation on "A Case of You" to insecurity on "This Flight Tonight", the songs feature simple accompaniments on piano, guitar, and Appalachian dulcimer...

(and on many other covers of the song) starts with a theme reminiscent of "Jingle Bells

Jingle Bells

"Jingle Bells" is one of the best-known and commonly sung winter songs in the world. It was written by James Lord Pierpont and published under the title "One Horse Open Sleigh" in the autumn of 1857...

", and this theme figures several times throughout the accompaniment.

Cover versions

Although merely set near Christmas time rather than being about Christmas as such, the song has become something of a modern Christmas standard. "River" is the third-most widely covered

Cover version

In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...

 of songs in Mitchell's oeuvre (227 recordings, behind only "Both Sides Now" and "Big Yellow Taxi"), frequently appearing on albums of Christmas music by pop

Pop music

Pop music is usually understood to be commercially recorded music, often oriented toward a youth market, usually consisting of relatively short, simple songs utilizing technological innovations to produce new variations on existing themes.- Definitions :David Hatch and Stephen Millward define pop...

, folk

Folk music

Folk music is an English term encompassing both traditional folk music and contemporary folk music. The term originated in the 19th century. Traditional folk music has been defined in several ways: as music transmitted by mouth, as music of the lower classes, and as music with unknown composers....

 and 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...

 artists.

Artists who have performed the song include Lara Fabian

Lara Fabian

Lara Fabian is a Belgian-Italian international singer who also holds Canadian citizenship. Multilingual, she sings in French, Italian and English....

, Amy Kuney

Amy Kuney

Amy Kathryn Kuney is a singer, songwriter, guitarist, and pianist from Tulsa, Oklahoma.-Early life:At the age of 13, Kuney's dad moved the family from their home in Oklahoma to Honduras to live as missionaries after he saw a video highlighting the destruction of Hurricane Mitch.In March 2003,...

, Travis

Travis (band)

Travis are a post-Britpop band from Glasgow, Scotland, comprising Fran Healy , Dougie Payne , Andy Dunlop and Neil Primrose...

, Tori Amos

Tori Amos

Tori Amos is an American pianist, singer-songwriter and composer. She was at the forefront of a number of female singer-songwriters in the early 1990s and was noteworthy early in her career as one of the few alternative rock performers to use a piano as her primary instrument...

, Michael Ball

Michael Ball (singer)

Michael Ashley Ball, born 27 June 1962) is a British actor, singer, and radio and TV presenter who is best known for the song "Love Changes Everything" and musical theatre roles such as Marius in Les Misérables, Alex in Aspects of Love, Caractacus Potts in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Edna Turnblad...

, Emilie-Claire Barlow

Emilie-Claire Barlow

Emilie-Claire Barlow is a Canadian jazz singer and voice actress. Born to parents who were professional musicians, she was encouraged to sing and study several instruments including piano, cello, clarinet and violin. By age seven she had begun her career, singing television and radio...

, Tom Barman

Tom Barman

Tom Barman is a Belgian musician and film director.Barman studied at the film school of St.-Lucas in Brussels, but didn't finish his studies because of he wished to pursue a career in music. He began by forming the rock band, Deus in Antwerp, in 1989...

, Kathy Brier

Kathy Brier

Kathy Brier is an American actress and singer.-Early life:Brier grew up on Staten Island, where she attended Moore Catholic High School before studying theatre and business at Wagner College, qualifying for a Bachelor of Science in arts administration.-Career:Brier played the role of Marcie Walsh...

, Betty Buckley

Betty Buckley

Betty Lynn Buckley is an American theater, film and television actress and singer. She is a Tony Award winner and Grammy Award nominee.-Early life:...

, Nick Buzz

Nick Buzz

-External links:*...

, Rosanne Cash

Rosanne Cash

Rosanne Cash is an American singer-songwriter and author. She is the eldest daughter of the late country music singer Johnny Cash and his first wife, Vivian Liberto Cash Distin....

, Charlotte Church

Charlotte Church

Charlotte Maria Church is a Welsh singer-songwriter, actress and television presenter. She rose to fame in childhood as a classical singer before branching into pop music in 2005. By 2007, she had sold more than 10 million records worldwide including over 5 million in the United States...

, Holly Cole

Holly Cole

Holly Cole is a Canadian jazz singer, particularly popular in Canada and Japan for both her versatile and distinctive voice, along with her adventurous repertoire, which spans such divergent genres as show tunes, rock, and country music.-Holly Cole Trio:In 1983, Cole travelled to Toronto to seek a...

, Shawn Colvin

Shawn Colvin

Shawn Colvin is an American singer-songwriter and musician.-Childhood and early career:Colvin was born in Vermillion, South Dakota. Her formative years were spent in the town of Carbondale, Illinois, where she attended Southern Illinois University Carbondale. She learned to play guitar at the age...

, Allison Crowe

Allison Crowe

Allison Louise Crowe is a Canadian singer, songwriter, guitarist and pianist from Nanaimo, British Columbia who lives in Corner Brook, Newfoundland and Labrador, communities spanning the breadth of Canada....

, Robert Downey, Jr., Elisa and Terra Naomi

Terra Naomi

Terra Naomi is an alternative, rock, and pop artist, who rose to fame through a performance of her song "Say It's Possible" on the video sharing site YouTube...

, Catherine Feeny

Catherine Feeny

Catherine Feeny is an American singer/songwriter based in Portland, Oregon.She grew up in Norristown, Pennsylvania, studied in Washington, D.C., and finally relocated to Los Angeles, where she started seriously writing her own songs. Her first album Catherine Feeny was produced by fellow...

, Renée Fleming

Renée Fleming

Renée Fleming is an American soprano specializing in opera and lieder. Fleming has a full lyric soprano voice.Fleming has performed coloratura, lyric, and lighter spinto soprano repertoires. She has sung roles in Italian, German, French, Czech, and Russian, aside from her native English. She also...

, Liam Frost, Grace Notes

Grace Notes

Grace Notes is a novel by Bernard MacLaverty, first published in 1997.-Plot summary:The book centers around the postpartum depression of its female protagonist, Catherine McKenna, a Northern Irish music teacher and composer living in Scotland...

,, Heart

Heart (band)

Heart is an American rock band who first found success in Canada. Throughout several lineup changes, the only two members remaining constant are sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson. The group rose to fame in the 1970s with their music being influenced by hard rock as well as folk music...

, Herbie Hancock

Herbie Hancock

Herbert Jeffrey "Herbie" Hancock is an American pianist, bandleader and composer. As part of Miles Davis's "second great quintet," Hancock helped to redefine the role of a jazz rhythm section and was one of the primary architects of the "post-bop" sound...

, Indigo Girls

Indigo Girls

The Indigo Girls are an American folk rock music duo, consisting of Amy Ray and Emily Saliers. They met in elementary school and began performing together as high school students in Decatur, Georgia, part of the Atlanta metropolitan area...

, Ben Jelen

Ben Jelen

Ben Jelen is a Scottish-born American singer-songwriter who plays the piano, violin, and guitar. He has lived in Scotland, England, Texas, New Jersey and New York. His career has been characterized by near-stardom, with his debut album, Give It All Away peaking at #113 on the Billboard 200 list...

, k.d. lang

K.D. Lang

Kathryn Dawn Lang, OC , known by her stage name k.d. lang, is a Canadian pop and country singer-songwriter and occasional actress...

, Halie Loren

Halie Loren

Halie Loren is an American singer and songwriter. Her 2008 CD They Oughta Write a Song won the 2009 Just Plain Folks award for Best Vocal Jazz Album and subsequently received international distribution and acclaim.-Early years:...

, Rebecca Luker

Rebecca Luker

Rebecca Luker is an American musical theatre actress and soprano who has appeared in several prominent Broadway productions.-Life and career:...

, Barry Manilow

Barry Manilow

Barry Manilow is an American singer-songwriter, musician, arranger, producer, conductor, and performer, best known for such recordings as "Could It Be Magic", "Mandy", "Can't Smile Without You", and "Copacabana ."...

, Aimee Mann

Aimee Mann

Aimee Mann is an American rock singer-songwriter, guitarist and bassist.-Early life:Aimee Mann grew up in Bon Air, Virginia, graduated from Open High School in 1978 and attended the Berklee College of Music in Boston, but dropped out to sing with her first punk rock band, the Young Snakes...

, Salyu

Salyu

is a Japanese singer, produced by Takeshi Kobayashi. She debuted in 2000 as the fictional singer Lily Chou-Chou for the film All About Lily Chou-Chou, and later debuted as a solo artist in 2004...

, Sarah McLachlan

Sarah McLachlan

Sarah Ann McLachlan, OC, OBC is a Canadian musician, singer and songwriter. Known for her emotional ballads and mezzo-soprano vocal range, as of 2006, she has sold over 40 million albums worldwide. McLachlan's best-selling album to date is Surfacing, for which she won two Grammy Awards and four...

, Sixpence None the Richer

Sixpence None the Richer

Sixpence None the Richer is an American rock/pop band that formed in New Braunfels, Texas, eventually settling in Nashville, Tennessee. They are best known for their songs "Kiss Me" and "Breathe Your Name" and their covers of "Don't Dream It's Over" and "There She Goes". The name of the band is...

, Beth Orton

Beth Orton

Beth Orton is a BRIT Award–winning English singer-songwriter, known for her 'folktronica' sound, which mixes elements of folk and electronica. She was initially recognised for her collaborations with William Orbit and the Chemical Brothers in the mid 1990s. However, these were not Orton's first...

, Overboard

Overboard (a cappella)

Overboard is a male a cappella group based in Boston, MA. The group's repertoire consists of a cappella covers of popular contemporary pop/rock artists, such as Train, The Script, and Rascal Flatts, and of a cappella standards, such as "Blue Moon", "In the Still of the Night" and "Stand by Me".-...

, Madeleine Peyroux

Madeleine Peyroux

Madeleine Peyroux is an American jazz singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Peyroux is noted for her vocal style, which has been compared to that of Billie Holiday....

, Dianne Reeves

Dianne Reeves

Dianne Reeves is an American jazz singer. She currently lives in Denver, Colorado.-Early life:Reeves was born in Detroit, Michigan to a very musical family. Her father, who died when she was two years old, was also a singer. Her mother, Vada Swanson, played trumpet. A cousin, George Duke, is a...

, Sara Bareilles

Sara Bareilles

Sara Beth Bareilles is an American singer-songwriter and pianist. She achieved mainstream success in 2007 with the hit single "Love Song", which brought her into the number one spot on the Billboard Pop 100 chart. She has sold over 1 million records in the United States alone and has been...

, Linda Ronstadt

Linda Ronstadt

Linda Ronstadt is an American popular music recording artist. She has earned eleven Grammy Awards, two Academy of Country Music awards, an Emmy Award, an ALMA Award, numerous United States and internationally certified gold, platinum and multiplatinum albums, in addition to Tony Award and Golden...

 on A Merry Little Christmas, Janis Siegel, Sister Hazel

Sister Hazel

Sister Hazel are an alternative rock band from Gainesville, Florida, whose style also blends elements of folk rock, pop, classic rock 'n' roll and southern rock. Their music is characterized by highly melodic tunes and generally optimistic lyrics. The band's instrumentation often features abrupt...

, The Swingle Singers

The Swingle Singers

The Swingle Singers are a mostly a cappella vocal group formed in 1962 in Paris, France by Ward Swingle with Anne Germain, Jeanette Baucomont, Jean Cussac and others. Christiane Legrand, the sister of composer Michel Legrand, was the group's lead soprano through 1972. Until 2011 the group...

, Angus Stone, James Taylor

James Taylor

James Vernon Taylor is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. A five-time Grammy Award winner, Taylor was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2000....

, Michelle Branch

Michelle Branch

Michelle Jacquet DeSevren Branch is an American singer-songwriter, guitarist and actress. During the early 2000s, she released two top-selling albums, The Spirit Room and Hotel Paper, and was subsequently nominated for the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 2003...

, Rosie Thomas

Rosie Thomas

Rosie Thomas is an American singer-songwriter, originally from Michigan. It was through mutual friends that she met Trey Many and began playing shows with Velour 100. They recorded one EP together and played a few short tours, where she met Damien Jurado and Pedro the Lion...

, Rachael Yamagata

Rachael Yamagata

Rachael Yamagata is an American singer-songwriter and pianist from Arlington, Virginia. She began her musical career with the band Bumpus before becoming a solo artist and releasing four EP's and three studio albums...

, Marti Pellow

Marti Pellow

Marti Pellow has been the lead singer of the Scottish pop group Wet Wet Wet since their formation in 1982. He has also recorded solo material.-Early life:...

, Corinne Bailey Rae

Corinne Bailey Rae

Corinne Bailey Rae is a British singer-songwriter and guitarist from Leeds, who released her debut album Corinne Bailey Rae in February 2006....

, Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk

Dave Van Ronk was an American folk singer, born in Brooklyn, New York, who settled in Greenwich Village, New York, and was eventually nicknamed the "Mayor of MacDougal Street" ....

, Kate Miller-Heidke

Kate Miller-Heidke

Kate Miller-Heidke is a singer-songwriter from Brisbane, Australia. Although classically trained, she has followed a career in alternative pop music. She is signed to Sony Australia, Epic in the US and RCA in the UK.-Career:...

, Angie Hart

Angie Hart

Angie Hart is an Australian pop singer best known for her role as lead vocalist in the band Frente!.Hart was a founding member of Frente! in 1989. She is renowned for her delicate songcraft, lyrics, and her breathy vocals....

 & Tim Freedman

Tim Freedman

Timothy "Tim" James Freedman is the mainstay lead singer and keyboardist of the Australian band The Whitlams formed in 1993...

, Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

Béla Fleck and the Flecktones

Béla Fleck and the Flecktones is a primarily instrumental group from the United States, that draws equally on bluegrass, fusion and jazz, sometimes dubbed "blu-bop". The band formed in 1988, initially to perform once on the PBS series Lonesome Pine Specials. The Flecktones have toured extensively...

, Hayley Westenra

Hayley Westenra

Hayley Dee Westenra is a New Zealand soprano, classical crossover artist, songwriter and UNICEF Ambassador. Her first internationally released album, Pure, reached No. 1 on the UK classical charts in 2003 and has sold more than two million copies worldwide...

, and Lea Michele

Lea Michele

Lea Michele Sarfati , known professionally as Lea Michele, is an American actress and singer. Michele began working professionally as a child actress on Broadway in productions such as Ragtime and Les Misérables. She originated the role of Wendla in the musical Spring Awakening and currently plays...

.

Rap artist and producer Kanye West

Kanye West

Kanye Omari West is an American rapper, singer, and record producer. West first rose to fame as a producer for Roc-A-Fella Records, where he eventually achieved recognition for his work on Jay-Z's album The Blueprint, as well as hit singles for musical artists including Alicia Keys, Ludacris, and...

 sampled Mitchell's line "gonna make a lot of money and then I'm gonna quit this crazy scene" for the song "Crazy" by R&B singer Aura that featured an appearance by The Clipse and was written by Static Major

Static Major

Stephen Ellis Garrett also known as Static Major, was a Grammy Award-Winning American rapper, singer, songwriter and record producer from Louisville, Kentucky. He was a member of the R&B trio Playa. Static Major gained posthumous fame for appearing on Lil Wayne's 2008 album Tha Carter III on the...

. The production was later borrowed on one of B.o.B

B.o.B

Bobby Ray Simmons, Jr. , better known by his stage name B.o.B, is an American rapper, singer-songwriter and record producer. He is currently signed under the labels of Grand Hustle Records, Rebel Rock Entertainment, and Atlantic Records. His debut single "Nothin' on You" reached number one in both...

's mixtapes.