That’s set to change Saturday night, when the 79-year-old singer and songwriter headlines the Gorge Amphitheatre on the banks of the Columbia River in Washington state. The show follows an unannounced appearance Mitchell made at 2022’s Newport Folk Festival, seven years after she suffered a debilitating brain aneurysm that made it difficult for her to move and to use her voice.
Modeled by organizer Brandi Carlile after the so-called Joni Jams the singer has held in recent years at her Bel-Air home, the instant-classic Newport gig had Mitchell and Carlile seated in glittering armchairs surrounded by friends and admirers as Mitchell sang and played guitar in some of the indelible tunes that made her a giant of American songwriting in the 1970s, including “Help Me,” “Big Yellow Taxi,” “Both Sides Now,” “The Circle Game” and “A Case of You.” (A live album is scheduled for release next month.)
Saturday’s show — part of Carlile’s annual Echoes Through the Canyon event at the Gorge — is expected to be a similar affair: Among the artists on the bill for the three-day festival are many who appeared at Newport, including Marcus Mumford, Allison Russell, Lucius, Blake Mills and Taylor Goldsmith of Dawes. Yet Carlile has also promised surprises: Performing a set of her own Friday night, the folk-rock star brought out Sarah McLachlan and Annie Lennox for unexpected duets.
The Times’ Mikael Wood and Amy Kaufman are at the Gorge and will provide live updates from the concert as it happens.
6:13 p.m. Greetings from the Gorge, where Joni fever is running hot enough that a woman playing “California” on a dulcimer in the parking lot had drawn a considerable crowd of enthusiastic onlookers.
I’m Mikael Wood, The Times’ pop music critic, and I’m here with Times columnist Amy Kaufman to see the woman Brandi Carlile described onstage last night as “probably the greatest living legend on planet Earth.”
High praise? No doubt. Yet there’s been something undeniably moving over the last few years in Carlile’s Joni fandom, which has played out against a larger swell of appreciation for Mitchell’s groundbreaking work by the likes of Taylor Swift and Phoebe Bridgers.
I’m curious to see which of Mitchell’s many famous fans might show up announced tonight, though the real attraction, of course, is Joni herself — an artist I and many others assumed we’d never see perform again. — Mikael Wood
6:32 p.m. I’ve always heard that you need to see a show at the Gorge before you die, and upon driving into this remote Washington venue, it’s immediately obvious why. Think the Hollywood Bowl, except you’re overlooking a massive, majestic expanse — the Columbia River winding between the foothills of the Cascade mountains.
Getting to the Gorge is an experience all its own. If you’re coming from Seattle, it’s at least a 2.5 hour drive. There’s camping on the grounds, but most concertgoers stay an hour away in a town called Wenatchee.
As you inch closer to the venue, traffic slows and cow pastures become more frequent. Tonight’s Joni Jam is sold out, which means over 27,000 people are going to be lounging on the lawns above the stage.
The crowd is boomer heavy, and eclectic outfits abound. I saw one woman wearing a hippie ensemble that they definitely sell at Halloween stores.
I’ve got my eyes peeled for any special guests who made the trek out here. Word is that the show tonight will be reminiscent of Mitchell’s surprise appearance at the 2022 Newport Folk Festival. Brandi Carlisle will start off with an acoustic set at 7 p.m., and Joni and friends are set to come out at 9. Given Carlile’s set last night, there could be appearances by Annie Lennox, Sarah McLachlan and Marcus Mumford. — Amy Kaufman
7:45 p.m. “I’m Brandi Carlile, from here in Washington state,” tonight’s opener-slash-facilitator says to begin her set, before telling the crowd that she “came for the same reason as you tonight,” which is to witness a performance by “the greatest living songwriter.” Her job, as she sees it: to “kill a little bit of time while everyone’s getting their makeup done.” — M.W.
(Chona Kasinger / For The Times)
7:53 p.m. Joni Mitchell has always known how to rock a beret. She’s worn them since the inception of her career, on the 1976 cover of “Hejira” and all the way through the Grammy Awards last year. She’s selling a red beret at the show tonight — the hats are going for $45 a pop and feature her signature embroidered in gold.
But a group of ten women who traveled from New Orleans to the show tonight had no need for the merch.
The ladies, who I deemed the Beret Brigade, ordered an array of multi-colored chapeaus well in advance in the show. The group of Mitchell fans, who range in age from 50 to 79, decided to rent a house near the Gorge even before they’d secured tickets to the show.
“The Beret Brigade.”
(Amy Kaufman / The Los Angeles Times)
But when the tickets became available to the public, none of the women were able to secure one. As it turned out, the owner of the house they’d rented had his own box at the venue and offered it to them — at face value.
“She was the soundtrack of our childhoods,” said Jean Hannan, the elder of the group. “This is like a dream come true.
Tracy Middendorf, an actor who got the gang of local Louisianans together for the trip, said she was hoping for a surprise appearance from Graham Nash or Paul Simon.
“We could hear them playing [Crosby Stills & Nash’s] ‘Helplessly Hoping’ and [Simon and Garfunkel’s] ‘The Sound of Silence’ from our house during soundcheck, so maybe they’ll be surprise guests,” said Middendorf. — A.K.
8:00 p.m. Even 1,000 miles from L.A., the stars are turning out for Mitchell. As Carlile walked onto the stage, I spotted Paul Scheer and wife June Diane Raphael rushing to their seats, as well as “Schitt’s Creek” star Dan Levy. Asked why he’d made the journey, Levy gestured towards the breathtaking view.
“Isn’t it obvious?” he replied. — A.K.
8:11 p.m. An on-the-fly lyrical edit to Carlile’s song “The Mother,” which name-checks her older daughter, Evangeline: “I am the mother of Elijah too.” Both Carlile kids are in the audience tonight, which leads the singer to explain that Elijah always asks why she doesn’t get a shout-out. — M.W.
8:16 p.m. Another Carlile-fam cameo: the singer’s wife, Catherine Shepherd, who joins Carlile with an acoustic guitar to perform a stripped-down rendition of the Grammy-nominated (and very Joni-esque) “You and Me on the Rock.” — M.W.
8:29 p.m. Carlile pauses her set to advise the audience on what we’re about to experience: “It’s not gonna be someone coming up here singing their songs one after the other,” she says. Instead, Carlile compares the Joni Jam to a snow globe in which we’re able to see what life has been like for Mitchell as she’s relearned how to play music at her home with the encouragement of her pals and inheritors. The show will be long, she warns-slash-promises; it might find some of those involved winging it as they blend covers with tributes with tunes where Mitchell is going it alone. “You’re gonna see something like you haven’t seen before,” Carlile says. — M.W.