title: Retail

text: Presentation refers to the physical evidence that signals the retail image. Physical evidence may include a diverse range of elements – the store itself including premises, offices, exterior facade and interior layout, websites, delivery vans, warehouses, staff uniforms. The environment in which the retail service encounter occurs is sometimes known as the "retail servicescape." The store environment consists of many elements such as smells, the physical environment (furnishings, layout and functionality), ambient conditions (lighting, temperature, noise) as well as signs, symbols and artifacts (e.g. sales promotions, shelf space, sample stations, visual communications). Retail designers pay close attention to the front of the store, which is known as the "decompression zone". In order to maximise the number of selling opportunities, retailers generally want customers to spend more time in a retail store. However, this must be balanced against customer expectations surrounding convenience, access and realistic waiting times. The way that brands are displayed is also part of the overall retail design. Where a product is placed on the shelves has implications for purchase likelihood as a result of visibility and access. Ambient conditions, such as lighting, temperature and music, are also part of the overall retail environment. It is common for a retail store to play music that relates to their target market.


title: Retail

text: Two different strands of research have investigated shopper behaviour. One is primarily concerned with shopper motivations. The other stream of research seeks to segment shoppers according to common, shared characteristics. To some extent, these streams of research are inter-related, but each stream offers different types of insights into shopper behaviour.


title: Retail

text: Babin et al. carried out some of the earliest investigations into shopper motivations and identified two broad motives: "utilitarian" and "hedonic." Utilitarian motivations are task-related and rational. For the shopper with utilitarian motives, purchasing is a work-related task that is to be accomplished in the most efficient and expedient manner. On the other hand, hedonic motives refer to pleasure. The shopper with hedonic motivations views shopping as a form of escapism where they are free to indulge fantasy and freedom. Hedonic shoppers are more involved in the shopping experience.


title: Retail

text: Many different shopper profiles can be identified. Retailers develop customised segmentation analyses for each unique outlet. However, it is possible to identify a number of broad shopper profiles. One of the most well-known and widely cited shopper typologies is that developed by Sproles and Kendal in the mid-1980s. Sproles and Kendall's consumer typology has been shown to be relatively consistent across time and across cultures. Their typology is based on the consumer's approach to making purchase decisions.


title: Retail

text: Some researchers have adapted Sproles and Kendall's methodology for use in specific countries or cultural groups. Consumer decision styles are important for retailers and marketers because they describe behaviours that are relatively stable over time and for this reason, they are useful for market segmentation.


title: Retail

text: "Retail formats" (also known as "retail formulas") influence the consumer's store choice and addresses the consumer's expectations. At its most basic level, a retail format is a simple marketplace, that is; a location where goods and services are exchanged. In some parts of the world, the retail sector is still dominated by small family-run stores, but large retail chains are increasingly dominating the sector, because they can exert considerable buying power and pass on the savings in the form of lower prices. Many of these large retail chains also produce their own private labels which compete alongside manufacturer brands. Considerable consolidation of retail stores has changed the retail landscape, transferring power away from wholesalers and into the hands of the large retail chains. In Britain and Europe, the retail sale of goods is designated as a "service activity." The European Service Directive applies to all retail trade including periodic markets, street traders and peddlers.


title: Retail

text: Retail stores may be classified by the type of product carried. Softline retailers sell goods that are consumed after a single-use, or have a limited life (typically under three years) in they are normally consumed. Soft goods include clothing, other fabrics, footwear, toiletries, cosmetics, medicines and stationery. Grocery stores, including supermarkets and hypermarkets, along with convenience stores carry a mix of food products and consumable household items such as detergents, cleansers, personal hygiene products. Retailers selling consumer durables are sometimes known as "hardline retailers" – automobiles, appliances, electronics, furniture, sporting goods, lumber, etc., and parts for them. Specialist retailers operate in many industries such as the arts e.g. green grocers, contemporary art galleries, bookstores, handicrafts, musical instruments, gift shops.


title: Retail

text: Types of retail outlets by marketing strategy include shopping arcade, anchor store, bazaar, boutique, category killer, chain store, co-operative store convenience store, department stores, discount stores, e-tailer, general store, give-away shop, hawkers also known as peddlers, costermongers or street vendors, high street store, hypermarket, pop-up retail, marketplace, market square, shopping center, speciality store, supermarket variety stores, vending machine, no frills, warehouse clubs, warehouse stores, automated retail, big-box stores, second-hand shop, and charity shop. Retailers can opt for a format as each provides different retail mix to its customers based on their customer demographics, lifestyle and purchase behavior. An effective format will determine how products are display products, as well as how target customers are attracted.


title: Retail

text: To achieve and maintain a foothold in an existing market, a prospective retail establishment must overcome the following hurdles:


title: Retail

text: When discussing the impact of technology on shopping and retail, e-commerce is often the first thing that comes to mind for retailers. However, technologies such as big data, artificial intelligence, computer vision and the Internet of Things have used data to transform every part of the shopping experience, from browsing to checkout.


title: Retail

text: It is important for organizations to embrace digital disruption in order to gain a competitive advantage. When an industry experiences digital disruption, it typically signals that consumer needs are shifting. Retailers enhance their analytics process and make better informed decisions thanks to big data, artificial intelligence, computer vision, and the Internet of Things. The use of data by retailers is mostly evident in the following aspects, based on the above-mentioned new technologies:


title: Retail

text: Among retailers and retails chains a lot of consolidation has appeared over the last couple of decades. Between 1988 and 2010, worldwide 40,788 mergers & acquisitions with a total known value of US$2.255 trillion have been announced. The largest transactions with involvement of retailers in/from the United States have been: the acquisition of Albertson's Inc. for US$17 billion in 2006, the merger between Federated Department Stores Inc with May Department Stores valued at 16.5 bil. USD in 2005 – now Macy's, and the merger between Kmart Holding Corp and Sears Roebuck & Co with a value of US$10.9 billion in 2004.


title: Retail

text: Between 1985 and 2018 there have been 46,755 mergers or acquisitions conducted globally in the retail sector (either acquirer or target from the retail industry). These deals cumulate to an overall known value of around US$2,561 billion. The three major Retail M&A waves took place in 2000, 2007 and lately in 2017. However the all-time high in terms of number of deals was in 2016 with more than 2,700 deals. In terms of added value 2007 set the record with the US$225 billion.


title: Retail

text: Retail stores may or may not have competitors close enough to affect their pricing, product availability, and other operations. A 2006 survey found that only 38% of retail stores in India believed they faced more than slight competition. Competition also affected less than half of retail stores in Kazakhstan, Bulgaria, and Azerbaijan. In all countries the main competition was domestic, not foreign.


title: Retail

text: The National Retail Federation and Kantar annually rank the nation's top retailers according to sales. The National Retail Federation also separately ranks the 100 fastest-growing U.S. retailers based on increases in domestic sales.


title: Retail

text: Since 1951, the U.S. Census Bureau has published the Retail Sales report every month. It is a measure of consumer spending, an important indicator of the US GDP. Retail firms provide data on the dollar value of their retail sales and inventories. A sample of 12,000 firms is included in the final survey and 5,000 in the advanced one. The advanced estimated data is based on a subsample from the US CB complete retail & food services sample.


title: Retail

text: Retail is the largest private-sector employer in the United States, supporting 52 million working Americans.


title: Retail

text: In 2011, the grocery market in six countries of Central Europe was worth nearly €107bn, 2.8% more than the previous year when expressed in local currencies. The increase was generated foremost by the discount stores and supermarket segments, and was driven by the skyrocketing prices of foodstuffs. This information is based on the latest PMR report entitled Grocery retail in Central Europe 2012<ref name="http://www.pmrpublications.com/product/Grocery-retail-Central-Europe-2012">Grocery retail in Central Europe 2012 Retail in Central Europe </ref>


title: Retail

text: National accounts show a combined total of retail and wholesale trade, with hotels and restaurants. in 2012 the sector provides over a fifth of GDP in tourist-oriented island economies, as well as in other major countries such as Brazil, Pakistan, Russia, and Spain. In all four of the latter countries, this fraction is an increase over 1970, but there are other countries where the sector has declined since 1970, sometimes in absolute terms, where other sectors have replaced its role in the economy. In the United States the sector has declined from 19% of GDP to 14%, though it has risen in absolute terms from $4,500 to $7,400 per capita per year. In China the sector has grown from 7.3% to 11.5%, and in India even more, from 8.4% to 18.7%. Emarketer predicts China will have the largest retail market in the world in 2016.


title: Retail

text: In the Republic of Armenia, retail trade has been increasing recently. In October 2022, it increased by 23.1% year by year, which was the most considerable rise since April 2021, faster than the 20.7 percent increase recorded a month earlier. Retail dropped by 1.9% after accumulating 2.1%in the earlier month. For the first 10 months of 2022, retail sales increased by 15.5% by measuring the exact time of 2021. Among its bordering countries, on retail trade percentage of GDP, Armenia ranks more increased than Turkey, but it is still lower than Georgia.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon (; , ), officially the Republic of Cameroon (), is a country in west-central Africa. It is bordered by Nigeria to the west and north; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and the Republic of the Congo to the south. Its coastline lies on the Bight of Biafra, part of the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean. Due to its strategic position at the crossroads between West Africa and Central Africa, it has been categorized as being in both camps. Its nearly 27 million people speak 250 native languages.


title: Cameroon

text: Early inhabitants of the territory included the Sao civilisation around Lake Chad, and the Baka hunter-gatherers in the southeastern rainforest. Portuguese explorers reached the coast in the 15th century and named the area "Rio dos Camarões" ("Shrimp River"), which became "Cameroon" in English. Fulani soldiers founded the Adamawa Emirate in the north in the 19th century, and various ethnic groups of the west and northwest established powerful chiefdoms and fondoms. Cameroon became a German colony in 1884 known as Kamerun. After World War I, it was divided between France and the United Kingdom as League of Nations mandates. The Union des Populations du Cameroun (UPC) political party advocated independence, but was outlawed by France in the 1950s, leading to the national liberation insurgency fought between French and UPC militant forces until early 1971. In 1960, the French-administered part of Cameroon became independent, as the Republic of Cameroun, under President Ahmadou Ahidjo. The southern part of British Cameroons federated with it in 1961 to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon. The federation was abandoned in 1972. The country was renamed the United Republic of Cameroon in 1972 and back to the Republic of Cameroon in 1984 by a presidential decree by president Paul Biya. Paul Biya, the incumbent president, has led the country since 1982 following Ahidjo's resignation; he previously held office as prime minister from 1975 on. Cameroon is governed as a Unitary Presidential Republic.


title: Cameroon

text: The official languages of Cameroon are French and English, the official languages of former French Cameroons and British Cameroons. Its religious population is predominantly Christian, with a significant minority practicing Islam, and others following traditional faiths. It has experienced tensions from the English-speaking territories, where politicians have advocated for greater decentralisation and even complete separation or independence (as in the Southern Cameroons National Council). In 2017, tensions over the creation of an Ambazonian state in the English-speaking territories escalated into open warfare.


title: Cameroon

text: Large numbers of Cameroonians live as subsistence farmers. The country is often referred to as "Africa in miniature" for its geological, linguistic and cultural diversity. Its natural features include beaches, deserts, mountains, rainforests, and savannas. Its highest point, at almost , is Mount Cameroon in the Southwest Region. Its most populous cities are Douala on the Wouri River, its economic capital and main seaport; Yaoundé, its political capital; and Garoua. Limbe in the Southwest has a natural seaport. Cameroon is well known for its native music styles, particularly Makossa, Njang and Bikutsi, and for its successful national football team. It is a member state of the African Union, the United Nations, the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), the Commonwealth of Nations, Non-Aligned Movement and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation.


title: Cameroon

text: Originally, Cameroon was the exonym given by the Portuguese to the Wouri River, which they called "Rio dos Camarões" meaning "river of shrimps" or "shrimp river", referring to the then abundant Cameroon ghost shrimp. Today the country's name in Portuguese remains "Camarões".


title: Cameroon

text: Present-day Cameroon was first settled in the Neolithic Era. The longest continuous inhabitants are groups such as the Baka (Pygmies). From there, Bantu migrations into eastern, southern and central Africa are believed to have occurred about 2,000 years ago. The Sao culture arose around Lake Chad, c. 500 AD, and gave way to the Kanem and its successor state, the Bornu Empire. Kingdoms, fondoms, and chiefdoms arose in the west.


title: Cameroon

text: Portuguese sailors reached the coast in 1472. They noted an abundance of the ghost shrimp "Lepidophthalmus turneranus" in the Wouri River and named it ("Shrimp River"), which became "Cameroon" in English. Over the following few centuries, European interests regularised trade with the coastal peoples, and Christian missionaries pushed inland.


title: Cameroon

text: The Ottoman wars in Africa began at the end of the 16th century. Born in Logone-Birni, Cameroon, Abram Petrovich Gannibal ( – 14 May 1781[1]), Russian military engineer, general-in-chief, and nobleman, was kidnapped as a child by Ottomans, traded, presented to Peter the Great, who freed him, adopted and raised him as his godson. His descendants entered the Russian nobility. One of them was Russia's national poet Alexander Pushkin.


title: Cameroon

text: In the early 19th century, Modibo Adama led Fulani soldiers on a jihad in the north against non-Muslim and partially Muslim peoples and established the Adamawa Emirate. Settled peoples who fled the Fulani caused a major redistribution of population.


title: Cameroon

text: In 1896, Sultan Ibrahim Njoya created the Bamum script, or Shu Mom, for the Bamum language. It is taught in Cameroon today by the Bamum Scripts and Archives Project.


title: Cameroon

text: Germany began to establish roots in Cameroon in 1868 when the Woermann Company of Hamburg built a warehouse. It was built on the estuary of the Wouri River. Later Gustav Nachtigal made a treaty with one of the local kings to annex the region for the German emperor. The German Empire claimed the territory as the colony of Kamerun in 1884 and began a steady push inland; the natives resisted. Under the aegis of Germany commercial companies were local administrations. These concessions used forced labour to run profitable banana, rubber, palm oil, and cocoa plantations. Even infrastructure projects relied on forced labor regimen. This economic policy was much criticised by the other colonial powers.


title: Cameroon

text: With the defeat of Germany in World War I, Kamerun became a League of Nations mandate territory and was split into French Cameroon () and British Cameroon in 1919. France integrated the economy of Cameroon with that of France and improved the infrastructure with capital investments and skilled workers, modifying the colonial system of forced labour.


title: Cameroon

text: The British administered their territory from neighbouring Nigeria. Natives complained that this made them a neglected "colony of a colony". Nigerian migrant workers flocked to Southern Cameroons, ending forced labour altogether but angering the local natives, who felt swamped. The League of Nations mandates were converted into United Nations Trusteeships in 1946, and the question of independence became a pressing issue in French Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: France outlawed the pro-independence political party, the Union of the Peoples of Cameroon ("Union des Populations du Cameroun"; UPC), on 13 July 1955. This prompted a long guerrilla war waged by the UPC and the assassination of several of the party's leaders, including Ruben Um Nyobè, Félix-Roland Moumié and Ernest Ouandie. In the British Cameroons, the question was whether to reunify with French Cameroon or join Nigeria; the British ruled out the option of independence.


title: Cameroon

text: On 1 January 1960, French Cameroun gained independence from France under President Ahmadou Ahidjo. On 1 October 1961, the formerly British Southern Cameroons gained independence from the United Kingdom by vote of the UN General Assembly and joined with French Cameroun to form the Federal Republic of Cameroon, a date which is now observed as Unification Day, a public holiday. Ahidjo used the ongoing war with the UPC to concentrate power in the presidency, continuing with this even after the suppression of the UPC in 1971.


title: Cameroon

text: His political party, the Cameroon National Union (CNU), became the sole legal political party on 1 September 1966 and on 20 May 1972, a referendum was passed to abolish the federal system of government in favour of a United Republic of Cameroon, headed from Yaoundé. This day is now the country's National Day, a public holiday. Ahidjo pursued an economic policy of planned liberalism, prioritising cash crops and petroleum development. The government used oil money to create a national cash reserve, pay farmers, and finance major development projects; however, many initiatives failed when Ahidjo appointed unqualified allies to direct them.


title: Cameroon

text: The national flag was changed on 20 May 1975. Two stars were removed, replaced with a large central star as a symbol of national unity.


title: Cameroon

text: Ahidjo stepped down on 4 November 1982 and left power to his constitutional successor, Paul Biya. However, Ahidjo remained in control of the CNU and tried to run the country from behind the scenes until Biya and his allies pressured him into resigning. Biya began his administration by moving toward a more democratic government, but a failed coup d'état nudged him toward the leadership style of his predecessor.


title: Cameroon

text: An economic crisis took effect in the mid-1980s to late 1990s as a result of international economic conditions, drought, falling petroleum prices, and years of corruption, mismanagement, and cronyism. Cameroon turned to foreign aid, cut government spending, and privatised industries. With the reintroduction of multi-party politics in December 1990, the former British Southern Cameroons pressure groups called for greater autonomy, and the Southern Cameroons National Council advocated complete secession as the Republic of Ambazonia. The 1992 Labour Code of Cameroon gives workers the freedom to belong to a trade union or not to belong to any trade union at all. It is the choice of a worker to join any trade union in his occupation since there are more than one trade union in each occupation.


title: Cameroon

text: In June 2006, talks concerning a territorial dispute over the Bakassi peninsula were resolved. The talks involved President Paul Biya of Cameroon, then President Olusegun Obasanjo of Nigeria and then UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, and resulted in Cameroonian control of the oil-rich peninsula. The northern portion of the territory was formally handed over to the Cameroonian government in August 2006, and the remainder of the peninsula was left to Cameroon 2 years later, in 2008. The boundary change triggered a local separatist insurgency, as many Bakassians refused to accept Cameroonian rule. While most militants laid down their arms in November 2009, some carried on fighting for years.


title: Cameroon

text: In February 2008, Cameroon experienced its worst violence in 15 years when a transport union strike in Douala escalated into violent protests in 31 municipal areas.


title: Cameroon

text: In May 2014, in the wake of the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping, presidents Paul Biya of Cameroon and Idriss Déby of Chad announced they were waging war on Boko Haram, and deployed troops to the Nigerian border. Boko Haram launched several attacks into Cameroon, killing 84 civilians in a December 2014 raid, but suffering a heavy defeat in a raid in January 2015. Cameroon declared victory over Boko Haram on Cameroonian territory in September 2018.


title: Cameroon

text: Since November 2016, protesters from the predominantly English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions of the country have been campaigning for continued use of the English language in schools and courts. People were killed and hundreds jailed as a result of these protests. In 2017, Biya's government blocked the regions' access to the Internet for three months. In September, separatists started a guerilla war for the independence of the Anglophone region as the Federal Republic of Ambazonia. The government responded with a military offensive, and the insurgency spread across the Northwest and Southwest regions. , fighting between separatist guerillas and government forces continues. During 2020, numerous terrorist attacks—many of them carried out without claims of credit—and government reprisals have led to bloodshed throughout the country. Since 2016, more than 450,000 people have fled their homes. The conflict indirectly led to an upsurge in Boko Haram attacks, as the Cameroonian military largely withdrew from the north to focus on fighting the Ambazonian separatists.


title: Cameroon

text: More than 30,000 people in northern Cameroon fled to Chad after ethnic clashes over access to water between Musgum fishermen and ethnic Arab Choa herders in December 2021.


title: Cameroon

text: The President of Cameroon is elected and creates policy, administers government agencies, commands the armed forces, negotiates and ratifies treaties, and declares a state of emergency. The president appoints government officials at all levels, from the prime minister (considered the official head of government), to the provincial governors and divisional officers. The president is selected by popular vote every seven years. There have been 2 presidents since the independence of Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: The National Assembly makes legislation. The body consists of 180 members who are elected for five-year terms and meet three times per year. Laws are passed on a majority vote. The 1996 constitution establishes a second house of parliament, the 100-seat Senate. The government recognises the authority of traditional chiefs, fons, and lamibe to govern at the local level and to resolve disputes as long as such rulings do not conflict with national law.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon's legal system is a mixture of civil law, common law, and customary law. Although nominally independent, the judiciary falls under the authority of the executive's Ministry of Justice. The president appoints judges at all levels. The judiciary is officially divided into tribunals, the court of appeal, and the supreme court. The National Assembly elects the members of a nine-member High Court of Justice that judges high-ranking members of government in the event they are charged with high treason or harming national security.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon is viewed as rife with corruption at all levels of government. In 1997, Cameroon established anti-corruption bureaus in 29 ministries, but only 25% became operational, and in 2012, Transparency International placed Cameroon at number 144 on a list of 176 countries ranked from least to most corrupt. On 18 January 2006, Biya initiated an anti-corruption drive under the direction of the National Anti-Corruption Observatory. There are several high corruption risk areas in Cameroon, for instance, customs, public health sector and public procurement. However, the corruption has gotten worse, regardless of the existing anti-corruption bureaus, as Transparency International ranked Cameroon 152 on a list of 180 countries in 2018.


title: Cameroon

text: President Biya's Cameroon People's Democratic Movement (CPDM) was the only legal political party until December 1990. Numerous regional political groups have since formed. The primary opposition is the Social Democratic Front (SDF), based largely in the Anglophone region of the country and headed by John Fru Ndi.


title: Cameroon

text: Biya and his party have maintained control of the presidency and the National Assembly in national elections, which rivals contend were unfair. Human rights organisations allege that the government suppresses the freedoms of opposition groups by preventing demonstrations, disrupting meetings, and arresting opposition leaders and journalists. In particular, English-speaking people are discriminated against; protests often escalate into violent clashes and killings. In 2017, President Biya shut down the Internet in the English-speaking region for 94 days, at the cost of hampering five million people, including Silicon Mountain startups.


title: Cameroon

text: Freedom House ranks Cameroon as "not free" in terms of political rights and civil liberties. The last parliamentary elections were held on 9 February 2020.


title: Cameroon

text: Its foreign policy closely follows that of its main ally, France (one of its former colonial rulers). Cameroon relies heavily on France for its defence, although military spending is high in comparison to other sectors of government.


title: Cameroon

text: President Biya has engaged in a decades-long clash with the government of Nigeria over possession of the oil-rich Bakassi peninsula. Cameroon and Nigeria share a 1,000-mile (1,600 km) border and have disputed the sovereignty of the Bakassi peninsula. In 1994 Cameroon petitioned the International Court of Justice to resolve the dispute. The two countries attempted to establish a cease-fire in 1996; however, fighting continued for years. In 2002, the ICJ ruled that the Anglo-German Agreement of 1913 gave sovereignty to Cameroon. The ruling called for a withdrawal by both countries and denied the request by Cameroon for compensation due to Nigeria's long-term occupation. By 2004, Nigeria had failed to meet the deadline to hand over the peninsula. A UN-mediated summit in June 2006 facilitated an agreement for Nigeria to withdraw from the region and both leaders signed the Greentree Agreement. The withdrawal and handover of control was completed by August 2006.


title: Cameroon

text: In July 2019, UN ambassadors of 37 countries, including Cameroon, signed a joint letter to the UNHRC defending China's treatment of Uyghurs in the Xinjiang region.


title: Cameroon

text: The Cameroon Armed Forces, (French: "Forces armées camerounaises", FAC) consists of the country's army ("Armée de Terre"), the country's navy ("Marine Nationale de la République" (MNR), includes naval infantry), the Cameroonian Air Force ("Armée de l'Air du Cameroun", AAC), and the Gendarmerie.


title: Cameroon

text: Males and females that are 18 years of age up to 23 years of age and have graduated high school are eligible for military service. Those who join are obliged to complete 4 years of service. There is no conscription in Cameroon, but the government makes periodic calls for volunteers.


title: Cameroon

text: Human rights organisations accuse police and military forces of mistreating and even torturing criminal suspects, ethnic minorities, homosexuals, and political activists. United Nations figures indicate that more than 21,000 people have fled to neighboring countries, while 160,000 have been internally displaced by the violence, many reportedly hiding in forests. Prisons are overcrowded with little access to adequate food and medical facilities, and prisons run by traditional rulers in the north are charged with holding political opponents at the behest of the government. However, since the first decade of the 21st century, an increasing number of police and gendarmes have been prosecuted for improper conduct.


title: Cameroon

text: On 25 July 2018, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein expressed deep concern about reports of violations and abuses in the English-speaking Northwest and Southwest regions of Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: Same-sex sexual acts are banned by section 347-1 of the penal code with a penalty of from 6 months up to 5 years' imprisonment.


title: Cameroon

text: Since December 2020, Human Rights Watch claimed that Islamist armed group Boko Haram has stepped up attacks and killed at least 80 civilians in towns and villages in the Far North region of Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: The constitution divides Cameroon into 10 semi-autonomous regions, each under the administration of an elected Regional Council. Each region is headed by a presidentially appointed governor.


title: Cameroon

text: These leaders are charged with implementing the will of the president, reporting on the general mood and conditions of the regions, administering the civil service, keeping the peace, and overseeing the heads of the smaller administrative units. Governors have broad powers: they may order propaganda in their area and call in the army, gendarmes, and police. All local government officials are employees of the central government's Ministry of Territorial Administration, from which local governments also get most of their budgets.


title: Cameroon

text: The regions are subdivided into 58 divisions (French ). These are headed by presidentially appointed divisional officers (). The divisions are further split into sub-divisions (), headed by assistant divisional officers (). The districts, administered by district heads (), are the smallest administrative units.


title: Cameroon

text: The three northernmost regions are the Far North (), North (), and Adamawa (). Directly south of them are the Centre () and East (). The South Province () lies on the Gulf of Guinea and the southern border. Cameroon's western region is split into four smaller regions: the Littoral () and South-West () regions are on the coast, and the North-West () and West () regions are in the western grassfields.


title: Cameroon

text: At , Cameroon is the world's 53rd-largest country. The country is located in Central and West Africa, known as the hinge of Africa, on the Bight of Bonny, part of the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean. Cameroon lies between latitudes 1° and 13°N, and longitudes 8° and 17°E. Cameroon controls 12 nautical miles of the Atlantic Ocean.


title: Cameroon

text: Tourist literature describes Cameroon as "Africa in miniature" because it exhibits all major climates and vegetation of the continent: coast, desert, mountains, rainforest, and savanna. The country's neighbours are Nigeria and the Atlantic Ocean to the west; Chad to the northeast; the Central African Republic to the east; and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon and the Republic of the Congo to the south.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon is divided into five major geographic zones distinguished by dominant physical, climatic, and vegetative features. The coastal plain extends inland from the Gulf of Guinea and has an average elevation of . Exceedingly hot and humid with a short dry season, this belt is densely forested and includes some of the wettest places on earth, part of the Cross-Sanaga-Bioko coastal forests.


title: Cameroon

text: The South Cameroon Plateau rises from the coastal plain to an average elevation of . Equatorial rainforest dominates this region, although its alternation between wet and dry seasons makes it less humid than the coast. This area is part of the Atlantic Equatorial coastal forests ecoregion.


title: Cameroon

text: An irregular chain of mountains, hills, and plateaus known as the Cameroon range extends from Mount Cameroon on the coast—Cameroon's highest point at —almost to Lake Chad at Cameroon's northern border at 13°05'N. This region has a mild climate, particularly on the Western High Plateau, although rainfall is high. Its soils are among Cameroon's most fertile, especially around volcanic Mount Cameroon. Volcanism here has created crater lakes. On 21 August 1986, one of these, Lake Nyos, belched carbon dioxide and killed between 1,700 and 2,000 people. This area has been delineated by the World Wildlife Fund as the Cameroonian Highlands forests ecoregion.


title: Cameroon

text: The southern plateau rises northward to the grassy, rugged Adamawa Plateau. This feature stretches from the western mountain area and forms a barrier between the country's north and south. Its average elevation is , and its average temperature ranges from to with high rainfall between April and October peaking in July and August. The northern lowland region extends from the edge of the Adamawa to Lake Chad with an average elevation of . Its characteristic vegetation is savanna scrub and grass. This is an arid region with sparse rainfall and high median temperatures.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has four patterns of drainage. In the south, the principal rivers are the Ntem, Nyong, Sanaga, and Wouri. These flow southwestward or westward directly into the Gulf of Guinea. The Dja and Kadéï drain southeastward into the Congo River. In northern Cameroon, the Bénoué River runs north and west and empties into the Niger. The Logone flows northward into Lake Chad, which Cameroon shares with three neighbouring countries.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon's per capita GDP (Purchasing power parity) was estimated as US$3,700 in 2017. Major export markets include the Netherlands, France, China, Belgium, Italy, Algeria, and Malaysia.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has had a decade of strong economic performance, with GDP growing at an average of 4% per year. During the 2004–2008 period, public debt was reduced from over 60% of GDP to 10% and official reserves quadrupled to over US$3 billion. Cameroon is part of the Bank of Central African States (of which it is the dominant economy), the Customs and Economic Union of Central Africa (UDEAC) and the Organization for the Harmonization of Business Law in Africa (OHADA). Its currency is the CFA franc.


title: Cameroon

text: Unemployment was estimated at 3.38% in 2019, and 23.8% of the population was living below the international poverty threshold of US$1.90 a day in 2014. Since the late 1980s, Cameroon has been following programmes advocated by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) to reduce poverty, privatise industries, and increase economic growth. The government has taken measures to encourage tourism in the country.


title: Cameroon

text: An estimated 70% of the population farms, and agriculture comprised an estimated 16.7% of GDP in 2017. Most agriculture is done at the subsistence scale by local farmers using simple tools. They sell their surplus produce, and some maintain separate fields for commercial use. Urban centres are particularly reliant on peasant agriculture for their foodstuffs. Soils and climate on the coast encourage extensive commercial cultivation of bananas, cocoa, oil palms, rubber, and tea. Inland on the South Cameroon Plateau, cash crops include coffee, sugar, and tobacco. Coffee is a major cash crop in the western highlands, and in the north, natural conditions favour crops such as cotton, groundnuts, and rice. Production of Fairtrade cotton was initiated in Cameroon in 2004.


title: Cameroon

text: Livestock are raised throughout the country. Fishing employs 5,000 people and provides over 100,000 tons of seafood each year. Bushmeat, long a staple food for rural Cameroonians, is today a delicacy in the country's urban centres. The commercial bushmeat trade has now surpassed deforestation as the main threat to wildlife in Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: The southern rainforest has vast timber reserves, estimated to cover 37% of Cameroon's total land area. However, large areas of the forest are difficult to reach. Logging, largely handled by foreign-owned firms, provides the government US$60 million a year in taxes (), and laws mandate the safe and sustainable exploitation of timber. Nevertheless, in practice, the industry is one of the least regulated in Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: Factory-based industry accounted for an estimated 26.5% of GDP in 2017. More than 75% of Cameroon's industrial strength is located in Douala and Bonabéri. Cameroon possesses substantial mineral resources, but these are not extensively mined (see "Mining in Cameroon"). Petroleum exploitation has fallen since 1986, but this is still a substantial sector such that dips in prices have a strong effect on the economy. Rapids and waterfalls obstruct the southern rivers, but these sites offer opportunities for hydroelectric development and supply most of Cameroon's energy. The Sanaga River powers the largest hydroelectric station, located at Edéa. The rest of Cameroon's energy comes from oil-powered thermal engines. Much of the country remains without reliable power supplies.


title: Cameroon

text: Transport in Cameroon is often difficult. Only 6.6% of the roadways are tarred. Roadblocks often serve little other purpose than to allow police and gendarmes to collect bribes from travellers. Road banditry has long hampered transport along the eastern and western borders, and since 2005, the problem has intensified in the east as the Central African Republic has further destabilised.


title: Cameroon

text: Intercity bus services run by multiple private companies connect all major cities. They are the most popular means of transportation followed by the rail service "Camrail". Rail service runs from Kumba in the west to Bélabo in the east and north to Ngaoundéré. International airports are located in Douala and Yaoundé, with a third under construction in Maroua. Douala is the country's principal seaport. In the north, the Bénoué River is seasonally navigable from Garoua across into Nigeria.


title: Cameroon

text: Although press freedoms have improved since the first decade of the 21st century, the press is corrupt and beholden to special interests and political groups. Newspapers routinely self-censor to avoid government reprisals. The major radio and television stations are state-run and other communications, such as land-based telephones and telegraphs, are largely under government control. However, cell phone networks and Internet providers have increased dramatically since the first decade of the 21st century and are largely unregulated.


title: Cameroon

text: The population of Cameroon was in . The life expectancy was 62.3 years (60.6 years for males and 64 years for females).


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has slightly more women (50.5%) than men (49.5%). Over 60% of the population is under age 25. People over 65 years of age account for only 3.11% of the total population.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon's population is almost evenly divided between urban and rural dwellers. Population density is highest in the large urban centres, the western highlands, and the northeastern plain. Douala, Yaoundé, and Garoua are the largest cities. In contrast, the Adamawa Plateau, southeastern Bénoué depression, and most of the South Cameroon Plateau are sparsely populated.


title: Cameroon

text: According to the World Health Organization, the fertility rate was 4.8 in 2013 with a population growth rate of 2.56%.


title: Cameroon

text: People from the overpopulated western highlands and the underdeveloped north are moving to the coastal plantation zone and urban centres for employment. Smaller movements are occurring as workers seek employment in lumber mills and plantations in the south and east. Although the national sex ratio is relatively even, these out-migrants are primarily males, which leads to unbalanced ratios in some regions.


title: Cameroon

text: Both monogamous and polygamous marriage are practised, and the average Cameroonian family is large and extended. In the north, women tend to the home, and men herd cattle or work as farmers. In the south, women grow the family's food, and men provide meat and grow cash crops. Cameroonian society is male-dominated, and violence and discrimination against women is common.


title: Cameroon

text: The number of distinct ethnic and linguistic groups in Cameroon is estimated to be between 230 and 282. The Adamawa Plateau broadly bisects these into northern and southern divisions. The northern peoples are "Sudanic" groups, who live in the central highlands and the northern lowlands, and the Fulani, who are spread throughout northern Cameroon. A small number of Shuwa Arabs live near Lake Chad. Southern Cameroon is inhabited by speakers of Bantu and Semi-Bantu languages. Bantu-speaking groups inhabit the coastal and equatorial zones, while speakers of Semi-Bantu languages live in the Western grassfields. Some 5,000 Gyele and Baka Pygmy peoples roam the southeastern and coastal rainforests or live in small, roadside settlements. Nigerians make up the largest group of foreign nationals.


title: Cameroon

text: In 2007, Cameroon hosted approximately 97,400 refugees and asylum seekers. Of these, 49,300 were from the Central African Republic (many driven west by war), 41,600 from Chad, and 2,900 from Nigeria. Kidnappings of Cameroonian citizens by Central African bandits have increased since 2005.


title: Cameroon

text: In the first months of 2014, thousands of refugees fleeing the violence in the Central African Republic arrived in Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: Both English and French are official languages, although French is by far the most understood language (more than 80%). German, the language of the original colonisers, has long since been displaced by French and English. Cameroonian Pidgin English is the lingua franca in the formerly British-administered territories. A mixture of English, French, and Pidgin called Camfranglais has been gaining popularity in urban centres since the mid-1970s. The government encourages bilingualism in English and French, and as such, official government documents, new legislation, ballots, among others, are written and provided in both languages. As part of the initiative to encourage bilingualism in Cameroon, six of the eight universities in the country are entirely bilingual.


title: Cameroon

text: In addition to the colonial languages, there are approximately 250 other languages spoken by nearly 20 million Cameroonians. It is because of this that Cameroon is considered one of the most linguistically diverse countries in the world.


title: Cameroon

text: Many Memorandums of Understanding have been signed with Germany for the study of German, which still enjoys huge popularity among pupils and students, with 300,000 people learning or speaking German in Cameroon in 2010. Today, Cameroon is one of the African countries with the highest number of people with knowledge of German.


title: Cameroon

text: In the northern regions of the Far North, the North, and Adamawa, the Fulani language Fulfulde is the lingua franca with French merely serving as an administrative language. However, Chadian Arabic in the Far North region's department of Logone-et-Chari acts as the lingua franca irrespective of ethnic groups.


title: Cameroon

text: In 2017 there were language protests by the anglophone population against perceived oppression by francophone speakers. The military was deployed against the protesters and people were killed, hundreds imprisoned and thousands fled the country. This culminated in the declaration of an independent Republic of Ambazonia, which has since evolved into the Anglophone Crisis. It is estimated that by June 2020, 740,000 people had been internally displaced as a result of this crisis.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has a high level of religious freedom and diversity. The predominant faith is Christianity, practised by about two-thirds of the population, while Islam is a significant minority faith, adhered to by about one-fourth. In addition, traditional faiths are practised by many. Muslims are most concentrated in the north, while Christians are concentrated primarily in the southern and western regions, but practitioners of both faiths can be found throughout the country. Large cities have significant populations of both groups. Muslims in Cameroon are divided into Sufis, Salafis, Shias, and non-denominational Muslims.


title: Cameroon

text: People from the North-West and South-West provinces, which used to be a part of British Cameroons, have the highest proportion of Protestants. The French-speaking regions of the southern and western regions are largely Catholic. Southern ethnic groups predominantly follow Christian or traditional African animist beliefs, or a syncretic combination of the two. People widely believe in witchcraft, and the government outlaws such practices. Suspected witches are often subject to mob violence. The Islamist jihadist group Ansar al-Islam has been reported as operating in North Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: In the northern regions, the locally dominant Fulani ethnic group is mostly Muslim, but the overall population is fairly evenly divided among Muslims, Christians, and followers of indigenous religious beliefs (called "Kirdi" ("pagan") by the Fulani). The Bamum ethnic group of the West Region is largely Muslim. Native traditional religions are practised in rural areas throughout the country but rarely are practised publicly in cities, in part because many indigenous religious groups are intrinsically local in character.


title: Cameroon

text: In 2013, the total adult literacy rate of Cameroon was estimated to be 71.3%. Among youths age 15–24 the literacy rate was 85.4% for males and 76.4% for females. Most children have access to state-run schools that are cheaper than private and religious facilities. The educational system is a mixture of British and French precedents with most instruction in English or French.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has one of the highest school attendance rates in Africa. Girls attend school less regularly than boys do because of cultural attitudes, domestic duties, early marriage, pregnancy, and sexual harassment. Although attendance rates are higher in the south, a disproportionate number of teachers are stationed there, leaving northern schools chronically understaffed. In 2013, the primary school enrollment rate was 93.5%.


title: Cameroon

text: School attendance in Cameroon is also affected by child labour. Indeed, the United States Department of Labor Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor reported that 56% of children aged 5 to 14 were working children and that almost 53% of children aged 7 to 14 combined work and school. In December 2014, a "List of Goods Produced by Child Labor or Forced Labor" issued by the Bureau of International Labor Affairs mentioned Cameroon among the countries that resorted to child labor in the production of cocoa.


title: Cameroon

text: The quality of health care is generally low. Life expectancy at birth is estimated to be 56 years in 2012, with 48 healthy life years expected. Fertility rate remains high in Cameroon with an average of 4.8 births per woman and an average mother's age of 19.7 years old at first birth. In Cameroon, there is only one doctor for every 5,000 people, according to the World Health Organization. In 2014, just 4.1% of total GDP expenditure was allocated to healthcare. Due to financial cuts in the health care system, there are few professionals. Doctors and nurses who were trained in Cameroon, emigrate because in Cameroon the payment is poor while the workload is high. Nurses are unemployed even though their help is needed. Some of them help out voluntarily so they will not lose their skills. Outside the major cities, facilities are often dirty and poorly equipped.


title: Cameroon

text: In 2012, the top three deadly diseases were HIV/AIDS, lower respiratory tract infection, and diarrheal diseases. Endemic diseases include dengue fever, filariasis, leishmaniasis, malaria, meningitis, schistosomiasis, and sleeping sickness. The HIV/AIDS prevalence rate in 2016 was estimated at 3.8% for those aged 15–49, although a strong stigma against the illness keeps the number of reported cases artificially low. 46,000 children under age 14 were estimated to be living with HIV in 2016. In Cameroon, 58% of those living with HIV know their status, and just 37% receive ARV treatment. In 2016, 29,000 deaths due to AIDS occurred in both adults and children.


title: Cameroon

text: Breast ironing, a traditional practice that is prevalent in Cameroon, may affect girls' health. Female genital mutilation (FGM), while not widespread, is practiced among some populations; according to a 2013 UNICEF report, 1% of women in Cameroon have undergone FGM. Also impacting women and girls' health, the contraceptive prevalence rate is estimated to be just 34.4% in 2014. Traditional healers remain a popular alternative to evidence-based medicine.


title: Cameroon

text: Music and dance are integral parts of Cameroonian ceremonies, festivals, social gatherings, and storytelling. Traditional dances are highly choreographed and separate men and women or forbid participation by one sex altogether. The dances' purposes range from pure entertainment to religious devotion. Traditionally, music is transmitted orally. In a typical performance, a chorus of singers echoes a soloist.


title: Cameroon

text: Musical accompaniment may be as simple as clapping hands and stamping feet, but traditional instruments include bells worn by dancers, clappers, drums and talking drums, flutes, horns, rattles, scrapers, stringed instruments, whistles, and xylophones; combinations of these vary by ethnic group and region. Some performers sing complete songs alone, accompanied by a harplike instrument.


title: Cameroon

text: Popular music styles include ambasse bey of the coast, assiko of the Bassa, mangambeu of the Bangangte, and tsamassi of the Bamileke. Nigerian music has influenced Anglophone Cameroonian performers, and Prince Nico Mbarga's highlife hit "Sweet Mother" is the top-selling African record in history.


title: Cameroon

text: The two most popular music styles are makossa and bikutsi. Makossa developed in Douala and mixes folk music, highlife, soul, and Congo music. Performers such as Manu Dibango, Francis Bebey, Moni Bilé, and Petit-Pays popularised the style worldwide in the 1970s and 1980s. Bikutsi originated as war music among the Ewondo. Artists such as Anne-Marie Nzié developed it into a popular dance music beginning in the 1940s, and performers such as Mama Ohandja and Les Têtes Brulées popularised it internationally during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s.


title: Cameroon

text: The most notable holiday associated with patriotism in Cameroon is National Day, also called Unity Day. Among the most notable religious holidays are Assumption Day, and Ascension Day, which is typically 39 days after Easter. In the Northwest and Southwest provinces, collectively called Ambazonia, October 1 is considered a national holiday, a date Ambazonians consider the day of their independence from Cameroon.


title: Cameroon

text: Cuisine varies by region, but a large, one-course, evening meal is common throughout the country. A typical dish is based on cocoyams, maize, cassava (manioc), millet, plantains, potatoes, rice, or yams, often pounded into dough-like fufu. This is served with a sauce, soup, or stew made from greens, groundnuts, palm oil, or other ingredients. Meat and fish are popular but expensive additions, with chicken often reserved for special occasions. Dishes are often quite spicy; seasonings include salt, red pepper sauce, and maggi.


title: Cameroon

text: Cutlery is common, but food is traditionally manipulated with the right hand. Breakfast consists of leftovers of bread and fruit with coffee or tea. Generally breakfast is made from wheat flour in various different foods such as puff-puff (doughnuts), accra banana made from bananas and flour, bean cakes, and many more. Snacks are popular, especially in larger towns where they may be bought from street vendors.


title: Cameroon

text: Water, palm wine, and millet beer are the traditional mealtime drinks, although beer, soda, and wine have gained popularity. 33 Export beer is the official drink of the national football team and one of the most popular brands, joining Castel, Amstel Brewery, and Guinness.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon's relatively large and diverse population is likewise diverse in its fashions. Climate, religious, ethnic and cultural beliefs, and the influences of colonialism, imperialism, and globalization are all factors in contemporary Cameroonian dress.


title: Cameroon

text: Notable articles of clothing include: Pagnes, sarongs worn by Cameroon women; Chechia, a traditional hat; kwa, a male handbag; and Gandura, male custom attire.


title: Cameroon

text: Wrappers and loincloths are used extensively by both women and men but their use varies by region, with influences from Fulani styles more present in the north and Igbo and Yoruba styles more often in the south and west.


title: Cameroon

text: Traditional arts and crafts are practiced throughout the country for commercial, decorative, and religious purposes. Woodcarvings and sculptures are especially common. The high-quality clay of the western highlands is used for pottery and ceramics. Other crafts include basket weaving, beadworking, brass and bronze working, calabash carving and painting, embroidery, and leather working. Traditional housing styles use local materials and vary from temporary wood-and-leaf shelters of nomadic Mbororo to the rectangular mud-and-thatch homes of southern peoples. Dwellings of materials such as cement and tin are increasingly common. Contemporary art is mainly promoted by independent cultural organizations (Doual'art, Africréa) and artist-run initiatives (Art Wash, Atelier Viking, ArtBakery).


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroonian literature has concentrated on both European and African themes. Colonial-era writers such as Louis-Marie Pouka and Sankie Maimo were educated by European missionary societies and advocated assimilation into European culture to bring Cameroon into the modern world. After World War II, writers such as Mongo Beti and Ferdinand Oyono analysed and criticised colonialism and rejected assimilation.


title: Cameroon

text: Shortly after independence, filmmakers such as Jean-Paul Ngassa and Thérèse Sita-Bella explored similar themes. In the 1960s, Mongo Beti, Ferdinand Léopold Oyono and other writers explored postcolonialism, problems of African development, and the recovery of African identity. In the mid-1970s, filmmakers such as Jean-Pierre Dikongué Pipa and Daniel Kamwa dealt with the conflicts between traditional and postcolonial society. Literature and films during the next two decades focused more on wholly Cameroonian themes.


title: Cameroon

text: National policy strongly advocates sport in all forms. Traditional sports include canoe racing and wrestling, and several hundred runners participate in the Mount Cameroon Race of Hope each year. Cameroon is one of the few tropical countries to have competed in the Winter Olympics.


title: Cameroon

text: Sport in Cameroon is dominated by football. Amateur football clubs abound, organised along ethnic lines or under corporate sponsors. The national team has been one of the most successful in Africa since its strong showing in the 1982 and 1990 FIFA World Cups. Cameroon has won five African Cup of Nations titles and the gold medal at the 2000 Olympics.


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon was the host country of the Women Africa Cup of Nations in November–December 2016, the 2020 African Nations Championship and the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations. The women's football team is known as the "Indomitable Lionesses", and like their men's counterparts, are also successful at international stage, although it has not won any major trophy.


title: Cameroon

text: Cricket has also entered into Cameroon as an emerging sport with the Cameroon Cricket Federation participating in international matches


title: Cameroon

text: Cameroon has produced multiple National Basketball Association players including Pascal Siakam, Joel Embiid, D. J. Strawberry, Ruben Boumtje-Boumtje, Christian Koloko, and Luc Mbah a Moute.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Roberta Joan "Joni" Mitchell ( Anderson; born November 7, 1943) is a Canadian-American musician, producer, and painter. Among the most influential singer-songwriters to emerge from the 1960s folk music circuit, Mitchell became known for her starkly personal lyrics and unconventional compositions, which grew to incorporate pop and jazz influences. She has received many accolades, including ten Grammy Awards and induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997. "Rolling Stone" called her "one of the greatest songwriters ever", and AllMusic has stated, "When the dust settles, Joni Mitchell may stand as the most important and influential female recording artist of the late 20th century".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell began singing in small nightclubs in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and throughout western Canada, before moving on to the nightclubs of Toronto, Ontario. She moved to the United States and began touring in 1965. Some of her original songs ("Urge for Going", "Chelsea Morning", "Both Sides, Now", "The Circle Game") were recorded by other folk singers, allowing her to sign with Reprise Records and record her debut album, "Song to a Seagull", in 1968. Settling in Southern California, Mitchell helped define an era and a generation with popular songs like "Big Yellow Taxi" and "Woodstock". Her 1971 album "Blue" is often cited as one of the best albums of all time; it was rated the 30th best album ever made in "Rolling Stone"s 2003 list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time", rising to number 3 in the 2020 edition. In 2000, "The New York Times" chose "Blue" as one of the 25 albums that represented "turning points and pinnacles in 20th-century popular music". NPR ranked "Blue" number 1 on a 2017 list of Greatest Albums Made By Women.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell switched labels and began exploring more jazz-influenced ideas, by way of lush pop textures, on 1974's "Court and Spark", which featured the radio hits "Help Me" and "Free Man in Paris" and became her best-selling album. Mitchell's vocal range began to shift from mezzo-soprano to more of a wide-ranging contralto around 1975. Her distinctive piano and open-tuned guitar compositions also grew more harmonically and rhythmically complex as she melded jazz with rock and roll, R&B, classical music and non-Western beats. In the late 1970s, she began working with noted jazz musicians including Jaco Pastorius, Tom Scott, Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, and Pat Metheny as well as Charles Mingus, who asked her to collaborate on his final recordings. She later turned to pop and electronic music and engaged in political protest. She was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award at the 44th Annual Grammy Awards in 2002 and became a Kennedy Center Honoree in 2021.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell produced or co-produced most of her albums. A critic of the music industry, she quit touring and released her 17th and last album of original songs in 2007. Mitchell has designed most of her own album covers, describing herself as a "painter derailed by circumstance".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell was born Roberta Joan Anderson on November 7, 1943, in Fort Macleod, Alberta, Canada, the daughter of Myrtle Marguerite ( McKee) and William Andrew Anderson. Her mother's ancestors were Scottish and Irish; her father was from a Norwegian family that possibly had some Sámi ancestry. Her mother was a teacher, while her father was a Royal Canadian Air Force flight lieutenant who instructed new pilots at RCAF Station Fort Macleod. She later moved with her parents to various bases in western Canada. After World War II ended, her father worked as a grocer and her family moved to Saskatchewan, living in Maidstone and North Battleford. She later sang about her small-town upbringing in several of her songs, including "Song for Sharon".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell contracted polio at age nine and was hospitalized for weeks. She also started smoking that year, but denies that smoking has affected her voice.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: She moved with her family to the city of Saskatoon, which she considers her hometown, at age 11. Mitchell struggled at school; her main interest was painting. During this time she briefly studied classical piano. She focused on her creative talent and considered a singing or dancing career for the first time. One unconventional teacher, Arthur Kratzmann, made an impact on her, stimulating her to write poetry; her first album includes a dedication to him. She dropped out of school in grade 12 (resuming her studies later) and hung out downtown with a rowdy set until she decided that she was getting too close to the criminal world.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Country music began to eclipse rock around this time. Mitchell wanted to play the guitar, but since her mother disapproved of country music's hillbilly associations, she initially settled for the ukulele. Eventually she taught herself guitar from a Pete Seeger songbook. Polio had weakened her left hand, so she devised alternative tunings to compensate; she later used these tunings to create nonstandard approaches to harmony and structure in her songwriting.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell started singing with her friends at bonfires around Waskesiu Lake, northwest of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan. She widened her repertoire to include her favourite performers, such as Édith Piaf and Miles Davis, at age 18. Her first paid performance was on October 31, 1962, at a Saskatoon club that featured folk and jazz performers. Although she never performed jazz herself in those days, Mitchell and her friends sought out gigs by jazz musicians. Mitchell said, "My jazz background began with one of the early Lambert, Hendricks and Ross albums." That album, "The Hottest New Group in Jazz", was hard to find in Canada, she says, "so I saved up and bought it at a bootleg price. I considered that album to be my Beatles. I learned every song off of it, and I don't think there is another album anywhere—including my own—on which I know every note and word of every song."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: After graduating from high school at Aden Bowman Collegiate in Saskatoon, Mitchell took art classes at the Saskatoon Technical Collegiate with abstract expressionist painter Henry Bonli and left home to attend the Alberta College of Art in Calgary for the 1963–64 school year. She felt disillusioned about the high priority given to technical skill over free-class creativity there, and felt out of step with the trend toward pure abstraction and the tendency to move into commercial art. She dropped out of school after a year at age 20, a decision that greatly displeased her parents, who remembered the Great Depression and valued education highly.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: She continued to play gigs as a folk musician on weekends at her college and at a local hotel. Around this time she took a $15-a-week job in a Calgary coffeehouse called The Depression Coffee House, "singing long tragic songs in a minor key". She sang at hootenannies and made appearances on some local TV and radio shows in Calgary. In 1964, at the age of 20, she told her mother that she intended to be a folk singer in Toronto. She left western Canada for the first time in her life, heading east for Ontario. Mitchell wrote her first song, "Day After Day", on the three-day train ride. She stopped at the Mariposa Folk Festival to see Buffy Sainte-Marie, a Saskatchewan-born Cree folk singer who had inspired her. A year later, Mitchell played Mariposa, her first gig for a major audience, and years later Sainte-Marie herself covered Mitchell's work.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Lacking the $200 needed for musicians' union fees, Mitchell performed at a few gigs at the Half Beat and the Village Corner in Toronto's Yorkville neighbourhood, but she mostly played non-union gigs "in church basements and YMCA meeting halls". Rejected from major folk clubs, she resorted to busking, while she "worked in the women's wear section of a downtown department store to pay the rent." She lived in a rooming house, directly across the hall from poet Duke Redbird. Mitchell also began to realize each city's folk scene tended to accord veteran performers the exclusive right to play their signature songs—despite not having written the songs—which Mitchell found insular, contrary to the egalitarian ideal of folk music. She found her best traditional material was already other singers' property. She said she was told "'You can't sing that. That's my song.' And I named another one. 'You can't sing that. That's my song.' This is my introduction to territorial songs. I ran into it again in Toronto." She resolved to write her own songs.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell discovered that she was pregnant by her Calgary ex-boyfriend Brad MacMath in late 1964. She later wrote, "[He] left me three months pregnant in an attic room with no money and winter coming on and only a fireplace for heat. The spindles of the banister were gap-toothed—fuel for last winter's occupants." She gave birth to a baby girl in February 1965. Unable to provide for the baby, she placed her daughter, Kelly Dale Anderson, for adoption. The experience remained private for most of Mitchell's career, although she alluded to it in several songs, such as "Little Green", which she performed in the 1960s and recorded eventually for the 1971 album "Blue". In "Chinese Cafe", from the 1982 album "Wild Things Run Fast", Mitchell sang, "Your kids are coming up straight / My child's a stranger / I bore her / But I could not raise her." These lyrics did not receive wide attention at the time.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: The existence of Mitchell's daughter was not publicly known until 1993, when a roommate from Mitchell's art-school days in the 1960s sold the story of the adoption to a tabloid magazine. By that time, Mitchell's daughter, renamed Kilauren Gibb, had already begun a search for her biological parents. Mitchell and her daughter met in 1997. After the reunion, Mitchell said that she lost interest in songwriting, and she later identified her daughter's birth and her inability to take care of her as the moment when her songwriting inspiration had really begun. When she could not express herself to the person she wanted to talk to, she became attuned to the whole world, and she began to write personally.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: A few weeks after the birth of her daughter in February 1965, Mitchell was playing gigs again around Yorkville, often with a friend, Vicky Taylor, and was beginning to sing original material for the first time, written with her unique open tunings. In March and April she found work at the Penny Farthing, a folk club in Toronto. There she met New York City-born American folk singer Charles Scott "Chuck" Mitchell, from Michigan. Chuck was immediately attracted to her and impressed by her performance, and he told her that he could get her steady work in the coffeehouses he knew in the United States.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell left Canada for the first time in late April 1965. She travelled with Chuck Mitchell to the US, where they began playing music together. Joni, 21 years old, married Chuck in an official ceremony in his hometown in June 1965 and took his surname. She said, "I made my dress and bridesmaids' dresses. We had no money... I walked down the aisle brandishing my daisies." Mitchell is both a Canadian and U.S. citizen.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: While living at the Verona apartments in Detroit's Cass Corridor, the couple regularly performed at area coffee houses, including the Chess Mate on Livernois, near Six Mile Road; the Alcove bar, near Wayne State University; the Rathskeller, a restaurant on the campus of the University of Detroit; and the Raven Gallery in Southfield. She began playing and composing songs in alternative guitar tunings taught to her by a fellow musician, Eric Andersen, in Detroit. Oscar Brand featured her several times on his CBC television program "Let's Sing Out" in 1965 and 1966. The marriage and partnership of Joni and Chuck Mitchell ended with their divorce in early 1967, and she moved to New York City to follow her musical path as a solo artist. She played venues up and down the East Coast, including Philadelphia, Boston, and Fort Bragg, North Carolina. She performed frequently in coffeehouses and folk clubs and, by this time creating her own material, became well known for her unique songwriting and her innovative guitar style.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Folk singer Tom Rush had met Mitchell in Toronto and was impressed with her songwriting ability. He took "Urge for Going" to the popular folk artist Judy Collins, but she was not interested in the song at the time, so Rush recorded it himself. Country singer George Hamilton IV heard Rush performing it and recorded a hit country version. Other artists who recorded Mitchell's songs in the early years were Buffy Sainte-Marie ("The Circle Game"), Dave Van Ronk ("Both Sides Now"), and eventually Judy Collins ("Both Sides Now", a top ten hit for her, and "Michael from Mountains", both included on her 1967 album "Wildflowers"). Collins also covered "Chelsea Morning", another recording that eclipsed Mitchell's own commercial success early on.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: While Mitchell was playing one night in 1967 in the Gaslight South, a club in Coconut Grove, Florida, David Crosby walked in and was immediately struck by her ability and her appeal as an artist. She accompanied him back to Los Angeles, where he set about introducing her and her music to his friends. Soon she was being managed by Elliot Roberts, who, after being urged by Buffy Sainte-Marie, had first seen her play in a Greenwich Village coffee house. He had a close business association with David Geffen. Roberts and Geffen were to have important influences on her career. Eventually she was signed to the Warners-affiliated Reprise label by talent scout Andy Wickham. Crosby convinced Reprise to let Mitchell record a solo acoustic album without the folk-rock overdubs in vogue at that time, and his clout earned him a producer's credit in March 1968, when Reprise released her debut album, known either as "Joni Mitchell" or "Song to a Seagull".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell toured steadily to promote the LP. The tour helped create eager anticipation for Mitchell's second LP, "Clouds", which was released in April 1969. This album contained Mitchell's own versions of some of her songs already recorded and performed by other artists: "Chelsea Morning", "Both Sides, Now", and "Tin Angel". The covers of both LPs, including a self-portrait on "Clouds", were designed and painted by Mitchell, a blending of her painting and music that she continued throughout her career.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In March 1970, "Clouds" produced her first Grammy Award for Best Folk Performance. The following month, Reprise released her third album, "Ladies of the Canyon". Mitchell's sound was already beginning to expand beyond the confines of acoustic folk music and toward pop and rock, with more overdubs, percussion, and backing vocals, and for the first time, many songs composed on piano, which became a hallmark of Mitchell's style in her most popular era. Her own version of "Woodstock", slower than the cover by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, was performed solo on a Wurlitzer electric piano. The album also included the already-familiar song "The Circle Game" and the environmental anthem "Big Yellow Taxi", with its now-famous line, "they paved paradise and put up a parking lot."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: "Ladies of the Canyon" was an instant smash on FM radio and sold briskly, eventually becoming Mitchell's first gold album (selling over a half million copies). She made a decision to stop touring for a year and just write and paint, yet she was still voted "Top Female Performer" for 1970 by "Melody Maker", a leading UK pop music magazine. On the April 1971 release of James Taylor's "Mud Slide Slim and the Blue Horizon" album, Mitchell is credited with backup vocals on the track "You've Got a Friend". The songs she wrote during the months she took off for travel and life experience appeared on her next album, "Blue", released in June 1971. Comparing Joni Mitchell's talent to his own, David Crosby said, "By the time she did "Blue", she was past me and rushing toward the horizon".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: "Blue" was an almost instant critical and commercial success, peaking in the top 20 of the "Billboard" albums chart in September and also hitting the British Top 3. The lushly produced "Carey" was the single at the time, but musically, other parts of "Blue" departed further from the sounds of "Ladies of the Canyon". Simpler, rhythmic acoustic parts allowed a focus on Mitchell's voice and emotions ("All I Want", "A Case of You"), while others such as "Blue", "River" and "The Last Time I Saw Richard" were sung to her rolling piano accompaniment. Her most confessional album, Mitchell later said of "Blue", "I have, on occasion, sacrificed myself and my own emotional makeup, ... singing 'I'm selfish and I'm sad', for instance. We all suffer for our loneliness, but at the time of "Blue", our pop stars never admitted these things." In its lyrics, the album was regarded as an inspired culmination of her early work, with depressed assessments of the world around her serving as counterpoint to exuberant expressions of romantic love (for example, in "California"). Mitchell later remarked, "At that period of my life, I had no personal defenses. I felt like a cellophane wrapper on a pack of cigarettes. I felt like I had absolutely no secrets from the world and I couldn't pretend in my life to be strong."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell decided to return to the live stage after the great success of "Blue", and she presented new songs on tour which appeared on her next album, her fifth, "For the Roses". The album was released in October 1972 and immediately zoomed up the charts. She followed with the single, "You Turn Me On, I'm a Radio", which peaked at No. 25 in the "Billboard" charts in February 1973.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: "Court and Spark", released in January 1974, saw Mitchell begin the flirtation with jazz and jazz fusion that marked her experimental period ahead. "Court and Spark" went to No. 1 on the "Cashbox" Album Charts. The LP made Mitchell a widely popular act for perhaps the only time in her career, on the strength of popular tracks such as the rocker "Raised on Robbery", which was released right before Christmas 1973, and "Help Me", which was released in March of the following year, and became Mitchell's only Top 10 single when it peaked at No. 7 in the first week of June. "Free Man in Paris" was another hit single and staple in her catalog.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: While recording "Court and Spark", Mitchell had tried to make a clean break with her earlier folk sound, producing the album herself and employing jazz/pop fusion band the L.A. Express as what she called her first real backing group. In February 1974, her tour with the L.A. Express began, and they received rave notices as they traveled across the United States and Canada during the next two months. A series of shows at L.A.'s Universal Amphitheater from August 14–17 were recorded for a live album. In November, Mitchell released that album, "Miles of Aisles", a two-record set including all but two songs from the L.A. concerts (one selection each from the Berkeley Community Theatre, on March 2, and the L.A. Music Center, on March 4, were also included in the set). The live album slowly moved up to No. 2, matching "Court and Spark"s chart peak on "Billboard". "Big Yellow Taxi", the live version, was also released as a single and did reasonably well (she released another version of the song in 2007).


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In January 1975, "Court and Spark" received four nominations for Grammy Awards, including Grammy Award for Album of the Year, for which Mitchell was the only woman nominated. She won only the Grammy Award for Best Arrangement, Instrumental and Vocals.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell went into the studio in early 1975 to record acoustic demos of some songs that she had written since the "Court and Spark" tour. A few months later she recorded versions of the tunes with her band. Her musical interests were now diverging from both the folk and the pop scene of the era, toward less structured, more jazz-inspired pieces, with a wider range of instruments. The new song cycle was released in November 1975 as "The Hissing of Summer Lawns". On "The Jungle Line", she made an early effort at sampling a recording of African musicians, something that became more commonplace among Western rock acts in the 1980s. "In France They Kiss on Main Street" continued the lush pop sounds of "Court and Spark", and efforts such as the title song and "Edith and the Kingpin" chronicled the underbelly of suburban lives in Southern California.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: During 1975, Mitchell also participated in several concerts in the Rolling Thunder Revue tours featuring Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, and in 1976 she performed as part of "The Last Waltz" by the Band. In January 1976, Mitchell received a nomination for the Grammy Award for Best Female Pop Vocal Performance for the album "The Hissing of Summer Lawns", though the 1976 Grammy for that category went to Linda Ronstadt.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In early 1976, Mitchell traveled with friends who were driving cross country to Maine. Afterwards, she drove back to California alone and composed several songs during her journey which featured on her next album, 1976's "Hejira". She stated that "This album was written mostly while I was traveling in the car. That's why there were no piano songs ..." "Hejira" was arguably Mitchell's most experimental album so far, owing to her ongoing collaborations with jazz virtuoso bass guitarist Jaco Pastorius on several songs, namely the first single, "Coyote", the atmospheric "Hejira", the disorienting, guitar-heavy "Black Crow", and the album's last song "Refuge of the Roads". The album climbed to No. 13 on the Billboard Charts, reaching gold status three weeks after release, and received airplay from album-oriented FM rock stations. Yet "Coyote", backed with "Blue Motel Room", failed to chart on the Hot 100. "Hejira" "did not sell as briskly as Mitchell's earlier, more 'radio-friendly' albums, [but] its stature in her catalogue has grown over the years". Mitchell herself believes the album to be unique. In 2006 she said, "I suppose a lot of people could have written a lot of my other songs, but I feel the songs on "Hejira" could only have come from me."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In mid-1977, Mitchell began work on new recordings that became her first double studio album. Close to completing her contract with Asylum Records, Mitchell felt that this album could be looser in feel than any album she had done in the past. She invited Pastorius back, and he brought with him fellow members of jazz fusion pioneers Weather Report, including drummer Don Alias and saxophonist Wayne Shorter. Layered, atmospheric compositions such as "Overture/Cotton Avenue" featured more improvisatory collaboration, while "Paprika Plains" was a 16-minute epic that stretched the boundaries of pop, owing more to Mitchell's memories of childhood in Canada and her study of classical music. "Dreamland" and "The Tenth World", featuring Chaka Khan on backing vocals, were percussion-dominated tracks. Other songs continued the jazz-rock-folk collisions of "Hejira". Mitchell also revived "Jericho", written years earlier (a version is found on her 1974 live album) but never recorded in a studio setting.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter" was released in December 1977. The album received mixed reviews but still sold relatively well, peaking at No. 25 in the US and going gold within three months. The cover of the album would later create occasional controversy: Mitchell was featured on the cover in blackface disguise, wearing a curly afro wig, a white suit and vest, and dark sunglasses. The character, whom she called Art Nouveau, was based on a pimp who, she says, once complimented her while walking down an LA street. This character who symbolized her turn toward jazz and streetwise lyrics reappears in the concert video 'Shadows and Light', her contribution to the film anthology 'Love', and the music video for "Beat of Black Wings".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: A few months after the release of "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter", Mitchell was contacted by the esteemed jazz composer, bandleader and bassist Charles Mingus, who had heard the orchestrated song "Paprika Plains", and wanted her to work with him. She began a collaboration with Mingus, who died before the project was completed in 1979. She finished the tracks, and the resulting album, "Mingus", was released in June 1979, though it was poorly received in the press. Fans were confused over such a major change in Mitchell's overall sound, and though the album topped out at No. 17 on the "Billboard" albums chart—a higher placement than "Don Juan's Reckless Daughter"—"Mingus" still fell short of gold status, making it her first album since the 1960s to not sell at least half a million copies.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell's tour to promote "Mingus" began in August 1979 in Oklahoma City and concluded six weeks later with five shows at Los Angeles' Greek Theatre and one at the Santa Barbara County Bowl, where she recorded and filmed the concert. It was her first tour in several years, and with Pastorius, jazz guitarist Pat Metheny, and other members of her band, Mitchell also performed songs from her other jazz-inspired albums. When the tour ended she began a year of work, turning the tapes from the Santa Barbara County Bowl show into a two-album set and a concert film, both to be called "Shadows and Light". Her final release on Asylum Records and her second live double album, it was released in September 1980, and made it up to No. 38 on the "Billboard" charts. A single from the LP, "Why Do Fools Fall in Love?", Mitchell's duet with The Persuasions (her opening act for the tour), bubbled under on "Billboard", just missing the Hot 100.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: While the album was being readied for release, her friend David Geffen, founder of Asylum Records, decided to start a new label, Geffen Records. Still distributed by Warner Bros. (who controlled Asylum Records), Geffen negated the remaining contractual obligations Mitchell had with Asylum and signed her to his new label. "Wild Things Run Fast" (1982) marked a return to pop songwriting, including "Chinese Cafe/Unchained Melody", which incorporated the chorus and parts of the melody of the famous The Righteous Brothers hit, and "(You're So Square) Baby I Don't Care", a remake of the Elvis chestnut, which charted higher than any Mitchell single since her 1970s sales peak when it climbed to No. 47 on the charts. The album peaked on the "Billboard" charts in its fifth week at No. 25.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: During this period she recorded with bassist and sound engineer Larry Klein, whom she married in 1982.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In early 1983, Mitchell began a world tour, visiting Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, the United Kingdom, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Scandinavia and then going back to the United States. A performance from the tour was videotaped and later released on home video (and later DVD) as "Refuge of the Roads". As 1984 ended, Mitchell was writing new songs when she received a suggestion from Geffen that perhaps an outside producer with experience in the modern technical arenas that they wanted to explore might be a worthy addition. British synthpop performer and producer Thomas Dolby was brought on board. Of Dolby's role, Mitchell later commented: "I was reluctant when Thomas was suggested because he had been asked to produce the record [by Geffen], and would he consider coming in as just a programmer and a player? So on that level we did have some problems ... He may be able to do it faster. He may be able to do it better, but the fact is that it then wouldn't really be my music."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: The album that resulted, "Dog Eat Dog", released in October 1985, turned out to be only a moderate seller, peaking at No. 63 on "Billboard"s Top Albums Chart, Mitchell's lowest chart position since her first album peaked at No. 189 almost eighteen years before. One of the songs on the album, "Tax Free", created controversy by lambasting "televangelists" and what she saw as a drift to the religious right in American politics. "The churches came after me", she wrote, "they attacked me, though the Episcopalian Church, which I've seen described as the only church in America which actually uses its head, wrote me a letter of congratulation."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell continued experimenting with synthesizers, drum machines and sequencers for the recordings of her next album, 1988's "Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm". She also collaborated with artists including Willie Nelson, Billy Idol, Wendy & Lisa, Tom Petty, Don Henley, Peter Gabriel, and Benjamin Orr of the Cars. The album's first official single, "My Secret Place", was in fact a duet with Gabriel, and just missed the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart. The song "Lakota" was one of many songs on the album to take on larger political themes, in this case the Wounded Knee incident, the deadly battle between Native American activists and the FBI on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in the previous decade. Musically, several songs fit into the trend of world music popularized by Gabriel during the era. Reviews were mostly favorable towards the album, and the cameos by well-known musicians brought it considerable attention. "Chalk Mark" ultimately improved on the chart performance of "Dog Eat Dog", peaking at No. 45.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In 1990, Mitchell, who by then rarely performed live, participated in Roger Waters' "The Wall Concert in Berlin". She performed the song "Goodbye Blue Sky" and was also one of the performers on the concert's final song "The Tide Is Turning" along with Waters, Cyndi Lauper, Bryan Adams, Van Morrison and Paul Carrack.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Throughout the first half of 1990, Mitchell recorded songs that appeared on her next album. She delivered the final mixes for the new album to Geffen just before Christmas, after trying nearly a hundred different sequences for the songs. The album "Night Ride Home" was released in March 1991. In the United States, it premiered on "Billboard"s Top Albums chart at No. 68, moving up to No. 48 in its second week, and peaking at No. 41 in its sixth week. In the United Kingdom, the album premiered at No. 25 on the albums chart. Critically, it was better received than her 1980s work. This album was also Mitchell's first since Geffen Records was sold to MCA Inc., meaning that "Night Ride Home" was her first album not to be initially distributed by WEA (now Warner Music Group).


title: Joni Mitchell

text: To wider audiences, the real return to form for Mitchell came with 1994's Grammy-winning "Turbulent Indigo". The recording of the album coincided with the end of Mitchell's marriage to musician Larry Klein after 12 years; Klein was also co-producer of the album.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: "Indigo" was seen as Mitchell's most accessible set of songs in years. Songs such as "Sex Kills", "Sunny Sunday", "Borderline" and "The Magdalene Laundries" mixed social commentary and guitar-focused melodies for "a startling comeback". The album won two Grammy awards, including Best Pop Album, and it coincided with a much-publicized resurgence in interest in Mitchell's work by a younger generation of singer-songwriters.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In 1996, Mitchell agreed to release a greatest "Hits" collection, despite initial concerns that such a release would damage sales of her catalog. Reprise also agreed to release a second album, called "Misses", that would include some of the lesser-known songs from her career. "Hits" charted at No. 161 in the US, but made No. 6 in the UK. Mitchell also included on "Hits", for the first time on an album, her first recording, a version of "Urge for Going" which preceded "Song to a Seagull" but was previously released only as a B-side.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Two years later, Mitchell released her final set of "original" new work before nearly a decade of other pursuits, 1998's "Taming the Tiger". She promoted "Tiger" with a return to regular concert appearances, including a co-headlining tour with Bob Dylan and Van Morrison.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: On the album, Mitchell had played a custom guitar equipped with a Roland hexaphonic pickup that connected to a Roland VG-8 modeling processor. The device allowed Mitchell to play any of her many alternate tunings without having to re-tune the guitar. The guitar's output, through the VG-8, was transposed to any of her tunings in real-time.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: It was around this time that critics also began to notice a real change in Mitchell's voice, particularly on her older songs; the singer later confirmed the change, explaining that "I'd go to hit a note and there was nothing there". While her more limited range and huskier vocals have sometimes been attributed to her smoking (she was described by journalist Robin Eggar as "one of the world's last great smokers"), Mitchell believes that the changes in her voice that became noticeable in the 1990s were because of other problems, including vocal nodules, a compressed larynx, and the lingering effects of having had polio. In an interview in 2004, she denied that "my terrible habits" had anything to do with her more limited range, and pointed out that singers often lose the upper register when they pass fifty. In addition, she contended that her voice had acquired a more interesting and expressive alto range when she could no longer hit the high notes, let alone hold them as she had in her youth.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: The singer's next two albums featured no new songs and, Mitchell has said, were recorded to "fulfill contractual obligations", but on both she attempted to make use of her new vocal range in interpreting familiar material. "Both Sides Now" (2000) was an album composed mostly of covers of jazz standards, performed with an orchestra, featuring orchestral arrangements by Vince Mendoza. The album also contained remakes of "A Case of You" and the title track "Both Sides, Now", two early hits transposed down to Mitchell's now dusky, soulful alto range. It received mostly strong reviews and motivated a short national tour, with Mitchell accompanied by a core band featuring her ex-husband Larry Klein on bass plus a local orchestra on each tour stop. Its success led to 2002's "Travelogue", a collection of re-workings of her previous songs with lush orchestral accompaniments.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: Mitchell stated at the time that "Travelogue" would be her final album. In a 2002 interview with "Rolling Stone", she voiced discontent with the current state of the music industry, describing it as a "cesspool". Mitchell expressed her dislike of the record industry's dominance and her desire to control her own destiny, possibly by releasing her own music over the Internet.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: During the next few years, the only albums Mitchell released were compilations of her earlier work. In 2003, her Geffen recordings were collected in a remastered four-disc box set, "The Complete Geffen Recordings", including notes by Mitchell and three previously unreleased tracks. A series of themed compilations of songs from earlier albums were also released: "The Beginning of Survival" (2004), "Dreamland" (2004), and "Songs of a Prairie Girl" (2005), the last of which collected the threads of her Canadian upbringing and which she released after accepting an invitation to the Saskatchewan Centennial concert in Saskatoon. The concert, which featured a tribute to Mitchell, was also attended by Queen Elizabeth II. In the "Prairie Girl" liner notes, she wrote that the collection is "my contribution to Saskatchewan's Centennial celebrations".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In the early 1990s, Mitchell signed a deal with Random House to publish an autobiography. In 1998 she told "The New York Times" that her memoirs were "in the works", that they would be published in as many as four volumes, and that the first line would be "I was the only black man at the party." In 2005, Mitchell said that she was using a tape recorder to get her memories "down in the oral tradition".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In an interview with the "Ottawa Citizen" in October 2006, Mitchell "revealed that she was recording her first collection of new songs in nearly a decade", but gave few other details. Four months later, in an interview with "The New York Times", Mitchell said that the forthcoming album, titled "Shine", was inspired by the war in Iraq and "something her grandson had said while listening to family fighting: 'Bad dreams are good—in the great plan.'" Early media reports characterized the album as having "a minimal feel ... that harks back to [Mitchell's] early work" and a focus on political and environmental issues.


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In February 2007, Mitchell returned to Calgary and served as an advisor for the Alberta Ballet Company premiere of "The Fiddle and the Drum", a dance choreographed by Jean Grand-Maître to both new and old songs. She worked with the French-Canadian TV director Mario Rouleau, well known for work in art and dance for television, such as Cirque du Soleil. She also filmed portions of the rehearsals for a documentary that she was working on. Of the flurry of recent activity she quipped, "I've never worked so hard in my life."


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In mid-2007, Mitchell's official fan-run site confirmed speculation that she had signed a two-record deal with Starbucks' Hear Music label. "Shine" was released by the label on September 25, 2007, debuting at number 14 on the "Billboard" 200 album chart, her highest chart position in the United States since the release of "Hejira" in 1976, over thirty years previously, and at number 36 on the United Kingdom albums chart. On the same day, Herbie Hancock, a longtime associate and friend of Mitchell, released "", an album paying tribute to Mitchell's work. Among the album's contributors were Norah Jones, Tina Turner, Leonard Cohen, and Mitchell herself, who contributed a vocal to the re-recording of "The Tea Leaf Prophecy (Lay Down Your Arms)" (originally on her album "Chalk Mark in a Rain Storm"). On February 10, 2008, Hancock's recording won Album of the Year at the Grammy Awards. It was the first time in 43 years that a jazz artist had taken the top prize at the annual award ceremony. In accepting the award, Hancock paid tribute to Mitchell as well as to Miles Davis and John Coltrane. At the same ceremony Mitchell won a Grammy for Best Instrumental Pop Performance for the opening track, "One Week Last Summer", from her album "Shine".


title: Joni Mitchell

text: In 2009, Mitchell stated she had the skin condition Morgellons and that she would leave the music industry to work toward giving more credibility to people who suffer from Morgellons.