The one “extraordinary” song that changed Joni Mitchell’s life forever
There are moments, even as children, when music stops you in your tracks, and everything is suddenly illuminated. For Joni Mitchell, this first happened when she was eight years old, and the song remains sacred to her.
At that young age, things are able to be uncovered for the first time on an almost daily basis, and unlocking music was a vital moment for Mitchell that altered the trajectory of her existence. It also proved to be a salvation for her during her childhood, when she spent an extensive period in hospital due to suffering from polio.
In moments of triumph and defeat, music has always been there as a source of comfort for Mitchell. She began performing in local jazz clubs as a teenager, before waving goodbye to Canada in order to pursue her dream in Greenwich Village.
Many seminal points in her life put Mitchell on that path, including the unexpected discovery of Édith Piaf, who created music in a beguiling way that she didn’t even know was possible. Since childhood, Piaf has remained a hero of Mitchell’s, which can all be traced back to a friend’s birthday party.
Due to the cultural complexities of Canada, particularly the Toronto region, millions of the country’s population are of French heritage and are naturally fluent in their mother tongue. Therefore, Mitchell’s friendship group included French-speaking children, and as a result, she was introduced to a new culture, which included the work of Piaf.
Piaf wasn’t an ordinary artist to hear at an eight-year-old’s birthday party at that time, but her prominence in the French-speaking community was vast. Her fanbase included the family of Mitchell’s friend, Helen Le Franeer, who was responsible for the indoctrination by introducing her to ‘Les Trois Cloches’.
The classic song, released in 1946, is one of the most well-known creations by Piaf and was later re-recorded in English by Frank Sinatra, but nothing compares to the magnificence of Piaf’s original.
After electing to put ‘Les Trois Cloches’ on the 2005 compilation Artist’s Choice – Music That Matters to Her, Mitchell explained how she found the precious song: “When I was seven or eight years old, I went to Helen La Franeer’s birthday party. Helen lived on our street but out past where the pavement ended and the gravel began. They were very poor, and there seemed to be no father around.”
She continued: “Helen’s mother made a table for the party out of an old door resting on two saw horses and she covered it with pink crêpe paper. I got seated where the doorknob used to be – I know because my elbow found the hole and ripped the paper. Out in the kitchen the radio was set to the French station – people chattering away in French. Then I heard an extraordinary sound.”
At this precise moment, the last thing that Mitchell expected was to be blown away by a piece of French-language music, and suddenly, her life was never the same again. She added, “A men’s choir began to sing, and up from the bottom of it bubbled a voice like I had never heard before – a woman’s voice. Captivated by the sound of it, I was drawn up from the table and out to the kitchen to listen closer.”
After the song came to an end, Mitchell needed to find out who was responsible for the song, and her friend’s mother, who “was tiny and sickly looking”, informed her of the ‘Little Sparrow.’
The Canadian singer-songwriter retold the anecdote during an interview with Elton John for Apple Music in 2022. In the conversation, she delved into more detail about the profound feeling ‘Les Trois Cloches’ gave her. Mitchell told the legendary musician how she’d “never heard anything so amazing” before in her young life and said it “amazed me as an eight-year-old”. She also hailed it as “so beautiful”.
Decades later, Mitchell paid tribute to the French cultural icon by writing ‘Édith and The Kingpin’, appearing on her 1975 album Hissing of Summer Lawns.
While Mitchell’s love of Piaf has never been audible in her work, she has been one of her greatest musical heroes for, essentially, her own life, and a figure that she places on an untouchable pedestal.
