Laurel Canyon Cronies: Watch Joni Mitchell jam with Crosby, Stills and Nash
You quite simply couldn’t tell the story of the life and career of Joni Mitchell without the inclusion of three specific characters that go by the names of David Crosby, Stephen Stills, and Graham Nash. They were everything to each other – friends, enemies, lovers – but perhaps most importantly, the sonic output they produced, often together but sometimes in spite of themselves, was enough to turn the sonic axis completely on its head.
This relationship began when Crosby discovered Mitchell on stage at a Florida club in 1967. From there, he largely never let her out of his sights again, between their short-lived romantic relationship, his insistence on producing her debut album Song to a Seagull, and all that came afterwards over the decades that ensued into their old age, remaining close – if platonic – companions until Crosby’s passing in 2023.
But Crosby’s influence on Mitchell was not singular, as this was a two-way street. In many ways, the folk fairy queen had just as much of a command over him and his life’s work as the man himself, leading to her helpful hand in bringing together the worlds of Crosby, Stills and Nash. It was little over a year since the pair had first met, in the summer of 1968, when Mitchell invited her then-beau to a house party where Stills and Nash both performed. Mesmerised by their vocals, the trio decided to put their harmonies to the test – and the rest, they say, is history.
That leads us swiftly on to 1969, when the three-piece had put their heads together in the form of their debut album, spawning hits including the likes of ‘Suite: Judy Blue Eyes’. But naturally, the influence of the Hollywood Hills was never far from view, and far from the African sands of the ‘Marrakesh Express’, they decided to join up with their Laurel Canyon crony Mitchell for one special public performance.
The occasion was the Big Sur Folk Festival in their native California on September 14th, 1969, where Mitchell performed her song ‘Get Together’ while backed up by the band, and also flanked by The Lovin’ Spoonful founder John Sebastian. Combined, this ramshackle quintet brought the house down with their tonic of folkish freedoms – but this was only natural given the time and landscape they found themselves in.
It was, after all, 1969 – otherwise better known as the Summer of Love. By the time the Big Sur Festival rolled around that September, the blazing sun may have mellowed as the autumn overtures began to take force, but in many ways, Mitchell, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Sebastian’s song was the perfect elixir of all the happy hippiness that had been, and sending its legacy off as a time period to remember in packaged sonic form.
Of course, it was hardly as though this was the last hurrah for any of them. In fact, it was possibly more like a precursor of bigger and better things coming over the sunny horizon. The following year, Crosby, Stills, and Nash would join up with Neil Young and unleash Déjà Vu into the world, while Mitchell would chase up their tails shortly afterwards with Blue – and that needs no introduction. As such, their performance of ‘Get Together’ may have been a symbolic fond farewell to the Summer of Love, but only indicative of the firestorm of rapture that lay ahead.
