The Colours of Joni | album

9 June 2023

THE COLOURS OF JONI | ALBUM

‘The Colours of Joni’ album is the lastest collection of Joni Mitchell instrumental re-imaginations by Redtenbacher’s Funkestra. It goes hand-in-hand with their ‘Both Sides Now | Joni reimagined’ album featuring a stellar cast of top vocalists like Rumer, Hamish Stuart, Jo Harman, Sarah Jane-Morris, Mim Grey, Mike Mayfield and Jana Varga.

WATCH ‘THE COLOURS OF JONI’ VIDEO PLAYLIST HERE.

Liner Notes

Sometime back in the 80s I came to the music of Joni Mitchell via Jaco Pastorius. Being an aspiring bassist and seeing Jaco in concert in my hometown in 1986 rocked my path forever. Weather Report were true heroes, Joe Zawinul and the late Wayne Shorter were magicians and then there was ‘Bright Size Life’ with Pat Metheny – just wow!

Consequently, I had to check out everything else that Jaco had played on. This bought me to 70s classics ‘Shadows and Light’, ‘Mingus’ and ‘Hejira’. These three records were on heavy rotation and yet somehow I had no idea about the 60s singer/songwriter Joni nor the 80s one, as songs without ‘heavy’ bass or a virtuoso band were not of much interest in my formative years. Joni, with the most heavy-hitter musicians of the 70s, filled my world.

It wasn’t until my wife was playing ‘Blue’ on repeat, years ago in our tiny Notting Hill flat, that my Joni horizon broadened significantly. Without fail Joni’s music and words really got under my wife’s skin and eventually under mine. Decades on, I don’t know where my accolades for Joni might stop. I got into her records, her arrangements, her unique approach to playing guitar and the resulting harmonic structures, the at times angular high flying melodies, her artwork, poetry, her emotional universe and so much more. In short, an incredible all-round artist controlling her own artistic destiny. To me as great as any of the composers of the classic American songbook. That she won the Gershwin prize in 2023 is just about right and I wonder, what took them so long?

I never in a million years dreamt that I would create and record not one but two Joni albums. The starting point of the journey for ‘Both Sides Now’ (an homage to the songs of Joni Mitchell) and this, ‘The Colours of Joni’ album, are the same, an instrumental trio ‘Masterlink Sessions’ video with UK Hammond organ wizard Ross Stanley. He really seemed to conjure up some sincere emotions with his interpretation of ‘A Case of You’. And this is where it all started.

Next thing we recorded a vocal version of a case of you with Jo Harman after her manager Mark Ede heard the instrumental one and saw the emotional potential in our re-imagination.

At this point we thought it might be fun to record all the songs from ‘Blue’, this by coincidence also going hand in hand with the 50 year celebrations since its release in 1971.

We started to talk to many artists and musicians and it soon transpired that most of them had their favourite Joni song, album or decade. ‘Only’ recording songs from ‘Blue’ seemed a little restrictive as we thought each artist should be able to bring maximum meaning and heart to the performance.

We recorded a few more vocal and instrumental songs and soon it became clear that it would probably be too much of a stretch for the instrumental re-imaginations and vocal ones to sit side by side on the same album. The idea of two separate records was born. This allowed the vocal album ‘Both Sides Now’ to be soulful with Americana and Blues elements, and for the instrumental one to take some of the arrangements still further from Jonis’ originals, sailing less close to the wind, musically speaking. However, there’s still plenty of soul.

Some tunes like ‘The Fiddle and The Drums’ and ‘The Jungle Line’ are re-imaginations whilst tunes like ‘River’ and ‘A Case Of You’ stay closer to the originals.

All the featured artists brought plenty of love for the music of Joni without being restricted by their reverence. Always a fine line when taking on classic songs. Some listeners will be married to the original sound recordings, some will be embracing of both and some will welcome new interpretations of classic songs like Gershwin’s ‘Summertime’ or in more recent decades tunes from vintage video games like ‘Super Mario Bros’ (8-bit Big Band). After all there is a tradition in music creation to take on the greatest songs from previous times and reinterpret them, keeping the gospel of great tunes alive, becoming disciples of classic singer-songwriter repertoire, hopefully enchanting the older and also younger generations. I hope all this is the case of our ‘The Colours of Joni’ album.

We also feel hugely privileged that Joni is still around and is receiving all the love, prizes and accolades she truly deserves. She really has conjured a creative universe of her own and what a joy to live within it.

Track-by-Track

BOTH SIDES NOW (ft. Varga Quartet Vienna)

The Varga Quartet Vienna performing the opening for ‘Both Sides Now’ from Joni Mitchell’s album ‘Clouds’, first released in 1969.