Joni Mitchell awarded doctorate from Berklee College of Music
What do you give to the woman who has achieved everything? Well, you give her an honorary doctorate from the Berklee College of Music and she most certainly will be forever grateful. The beaming smile of Joni Mitchell should tell you that.
“Well, luckily, I’m too old to get a swelled head,” Mitchell announced in her acceptance speech at the ceremony. “It’s a beautiful event. Words can’t describe it. I’ve got my good friends here with me.”
Adding: “I wish my parents were alive. My mother in particular would be really proud of this because she wanted me to go to college. I went to art school and I quit after a year. She thinks of me as a quitter. So to see this achievement would be really impressive to her. I wish I could share it with her.”
Meanwhile, Berklee’s Office of the President and Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice’s founder and artistic director, Terri Lyne Carrington, said: “I am thrilled that we are finally able to honour Joni Mitchell.”
Before handing Mithcell the award at the private Santa Monica event, she added: “Her career and social principles stand for the values our institute pursues—imagination, freedom, equity, and identity. I can think of no one more deserving.”
It’s an accolade that comes a month after Mitchell made her unexpected live return. Thus, with a string of previously rare public appearances being made in quick succession, many are wondering what else she has in store?
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