Joni Mitchell became a United States citizen and shared a photograph of herself holding an American flag on Instagram Tuesday morning. The singer was called up to be sworn in as a citizen following her transition from Canadian nationality.
Born Roberta Joan Anderson in 1943 in Fort McLeod, Alberta, Mitchell moved to Saskatoon with her family at age nine. Mitchell enrolled at Calgary’s Alberta College of Art in 1963 before relocating to the United States in 1965.
After marrying Chuck Mitchell, she moved to Detroit in 1965 and made her first New York appearance at the Gaslight in 1966. She moved to Chelsea in 1967 and later headed west to the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles in 1968.
Mitchell purchased a home in Bel Air in 1975 and continued her career despite suffering a brain aneurysm in 2015. Recent performances include a set at the Newport Folk Festival in 2022 and a show at the Gorge in Washington state in 2023.
The New York Times previously excluded Mitchell from a list of the greatest living American songwriters because she was a Canadian citizen.
