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Hejiraby Joni Mitchell I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars That shell shock love away There's comfort in melancholy When there's no need to explain It's just as natural as the weather In this moody sky today In our possessive coupling So much could not be expressed So now I'm returning to myself These things that you and I suppressed I see something of myself in everyone Just at this moment of the world As snow gathers like bolts of lace Waltzing on a ballroom girl You know it never has been easy Whether you do or you do not resign Whether you travel the breadth of extremities Or stick to some straighter line Now here's a man and a woman sitting on a rock They're either going to thaw out or freeze Listen Strains of Benny Goodman * Coming through the snow and the pinewood trees I'm porous with travel fever But you know I'm so glad to be on my own Still somehow the slightest touch of a stranger Can set up trembling in my bones * I know no one's going to show me everything We all come and go unknown Each so deep and superficial Between the forceps and the stone Well I looked at the granite markers Those tribute to finality to eternity And then I looked at myself here Chicken scratching for my immortality In the church they light the candles And the wax rolls down like tears There's the hope and the hopelessness I've witnessed thirty years We're only particles of change I know I know Orbiting around the sun But how can I have that point of view When I'm always bound and tied to someone White flags of winter chimneys Waving truce against the moon In the mirrors of a modern bank From the window of a hotel room I'm traveling in some vehicle I'm sitting in some cafe A defector from the petty wars Until love sucks me back that way © 1976; Crazy Crow Music |
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Additional information:*Footnotes
Born into a large, poverty stricken family, Benny began playing the clarinet at an early age. He was associated with the Austin High School Gang, having gone to school with drummer Dave Tough. By the time he was twelve, Goodman appeared onstage imitating famous bandleader/clarinetist Ted Lewis. It was at this concert that Ben Pollack heard the young clarinetist and Benny was soon playing in Pollack's band. Goodman’s first recordings were made with the Pollack group in 1926, and give a strong example of Benny's influences at the time including Jimmie Noone, who was then with Doc Cook and His Dreamland Orchestra and Leon Roppolo of the New Orleans Rhythm Kings. During this period Goodman recorded his first sides as a leader with members of the Pollack band including one 1928 date which features the only known recording of Benny on alto and baritone saxophones. Following the musical migration out of Chicago and into New York, Goodman became a very successful and popular free-lancer, joining the likes of Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey in New York studios. In 1934 Benny put together his first big band, featuring Bunny Berigan on trumpet, Jess Stacey on piano and Gene Krupa on drums. With the addition of some excellent, sophisticated arrangements by Fletcher Henderson, the "Swing Era" was born. Goodman spent the next fifty years recording and touring with various groups big and small, including some very successful trips to Russia and the Far East. He also played many concerts on a classical format that received mixed reviews. Known by musicians for his stand-offish and "cheap" nature, many sidemen had a love/hate relationship with Goodman. Many musicians claimed that Benny was dishonest when it came time to pay off the band and many more recalled the Goodman "ray", the dirtiest of looks received when a mistake was made. That aside, its clear that without Goodman the "Swing Era" would have been nowhere near as strong when it came, if it came at all. After his death, the Yale University library received the bulk of Goodman's personal collection including many private never-before-heard recordings and rare unpublished photos. cali57 noted the following in the Forum: Albert Camus wrote, in 1963: "What gives value to travel is fear. It is the fact that, at a certain moment, when we are so far from our own country... we are seized by a vague fear, and the instinctive desire to go back to the protection of old habits. This is the most obvious benefit of travel. At that moment we are feverish but also porous, so that the slightest touch makes us quiver to the depths of our being... There is no pleasure in traveling, and I look upon it as an occasion for spiritual testing... Travel, which is like a greater and graver science, brings us back to ourselves." » Would you like to help annotate the lyrics to Hejira? Send us a note with your idea, and thanks!
Guitar Transcriptions of HejiraHejira has been recorded by 14 others
A Bird That Whistles (from "A Bird That Whistles" - 1996)
Anne, Emely (from "The Way Home" - 2011) Blanchart, Dirk (from "Europe Blue (Remastered) [Extended Edition 2012]" - 2012) Caputo, Valeria (- ) D'Agostina, Simona (- ) Jackman, Vanessa (- 2007) Jacob Fred Jazz Odyssey (from "Live Performance" - 2003) James "Jez" Graham & The Trio (from "Monday" - 2003) Jones, Robert (- ) Kevin Halporn & Flor Guillén (from "HalpornGuillén" - 2010) Khan, Chaka (from "A Case Of Joni" - ) Michael Paz Band (from "PazFest - The New Orleans Tribute to Joni Mitchell at the Howlin' Wolf" - 2002) Tatyana Balakirsky & Alex Nadjarov (from "Live at MuzEnergo-4" - 2008) Will Taylor And Strings Attached (from "Back To The Garden: A Tribute To Joni Mitchell" - 2007) » [more information on recordings by other artists]
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