Roberta Joan Anderson

She can be pretty quirky, but there's no one like her. Happy birthday, Joni Mitchell.

She was born in Alberta. Her dad moved to Saskatchewan and she spent much of her childhood in Saskatoon. She got a lot of early exposure on Canadian television.



I never knew "Chelsea Morning" was partly inspired by the Mothers Of Invention.



By the late 60s, other artists were having hits with her songs. By the early 70s, she was a big on her own.



She soon moved from folk to more jazz-inflected music.



She went further and further out musically through the years. Not all her fans followed. While she made moves into pop and acoustic in the 80s and 90s, her albums never sold like they did in the 70s.

She's slowed down her pace in the last decade, but even if she never records again, she's still one of the greatest singer-songwriters of our time.