Joni Mitchell

Judy Collins charted 'Both Sides Now' in 1968, and most people had never heard of the woman who wrote it. That changed when David Crosby caught Mitchell performing at a club in Coconut Grove and brought her to Los Angeles, where she got signed to Reprise. Her debut followed, but the real statement was Blue in 1971, produced and written entirely by herself when women in music rarely held either role. She's called it 'probably the purest emotional record I will ever make.'

At 80, she walked onto a Grammy stage for the first time in her career, seated with a cane, and performed 'Both Sides Now' to a standing ovation. This was 2024, almost a decade after a brain aneurysm left her unable to walk, talk, or play guitar. Blue ranks third on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums list, the highest placement for any woman. She followed the Grammys with two sold-out nights at the Hollywood Bowl. The comeback didn't taper off. It got louder.

Her 35 unique open guitar tunings weren't a stylistic choice, they were a workaround. Polio at age 9 weakened her left hand, so she invented chord shapes that standard tuning couldn't accommodate. She's also dealt with Morgellons disease, a condition so disputed that many doctors don't believe it exists. In 2022, she pulled her catalog from Spotify when Neil Young protested Joe Rogan. At the 2026 Grammys, she showed up wearing an 'ICE OUT' pin.