Why Linda Ronstadt was jealous of Joni Mitchell: “She looked better”
I want to start with the obvious here: a conversation about appearance is a really, really boring way to consider two idols. I guess, to a degree, it’s humanising. It would be easy to look back at the legends of the past and see them as perfect, removed beings who were always untouched by meek fears or insecurities. We never expect our heroes to share the same self-confidence issues that we do, but Linda Ronstadt did, and her era didn’t make it any easier.
The music world is still a man’s world, realistically. In 2024, 63% of all acts playing UK festivals that year were made up of only men. There still has to be active work done to manage even this, with more and more festivals committing to diversity schemes, setting quotas of how many women and nonbinary artists they need to bring in. It’s always seemed so odd to me. Each year, festivals seem to struggle, but if you asked me right now which artists, and especially which new and up-and-coming artists, I’m excited about, the names would be almost exclusively women.
I’m in an echo chamber, though, I guess, living in a world where, as a woman and a music lover, I’ve blocked out the enduring issues faced in this industry. But then you hear stories like this, like Linda Ronstadt talking about one of her peers, and I’m reminded how deep-rooted all these issues are.
“Joni Mitchell was threatening to everybody,” she said, talking about one of her few female peers who was reaching the top back then. But in 2019, with distance from the era and that scene, and in a world that is admittedly slightly better for women in music to inhabit, she could look at her old feelings critically.
Ronstadt admitted to being utterly jealous of Mitchell, with that feeling clouding her support. “[Joni Mitchell] could play better,” she said, “She could sing better, she looked better. She could just do it all.”
It’s an insight into Ronstadt’s younger mind and the insecurity of her youth, but also into the way misogyny becomes an internalised weapon women use against themselves. As Ronstadt not only became clouded by simplistic worries about which folk star looked better, her insecurity around the idea that Mitchell could “do it all” is part of it, too.
Especially when we know that Mitchell, despite having an incredible career, certainly never felt that way herself. Especially in the 1970s, when Ronstadt was at the height of her success too, Mitchell was trying to quit, writing her record For The Roses and initially intending it to be her goodbye to music as the same weight and pressure was piling on top of her, too.
But with hindsight, thinking back on this more insecure version of herself, Ronstadt now looks at her successes through a different lens. “I have to say that when I look at my whole career, overall, what counted the most was whether you showed up and played the music,” she said. Now able to chalk it up to talent and silence the younger, harsher critic in herself that connected success to superficial factors, she can see it in her peers now too, adding, “I saw it happen with Emmylou, and I saw it happen with Joni Mitchell.”
