Joni Mitchell performs at the Grammys for the first time

It's hard to believe that at 80 years old, and after a pioneering career in music, there are still new accomplishments left for Joni Mitchell. But on Sunday night, she did something for the first time: she performed at the Grammy Awards.

Joined by Brandi Carlile, Jacob Collier, Lucious, Blake Mills, Allison Russell and Systastrings, the singer-songwriter played “Both Sides Now.”

Carlyle, one of Mitchell's most prominent champions, is largely responsible for bringing her hero back to the stage, and she introduced Mitchell, who had previously won a Grammy for best folk album for “Joni Mitchell in Newport.” Nine years ago, Mitchell suffered an aneurysm and largely disappeared from the public eye. Her legions of fans feared her singing days were over.

But the writer and unmistakable soprano behind such classics as “Big Yellow Taxi” and “A Case of You” wasn't finished yet. She made a surprise appearance at the 2022 Newport Folk Festival alongside Carlisle, as well as musicians including Wynonna Judd and Marcus Mumford.

Mitchell followed that performance with a nearly three-hour set at the Carlisle Echoes Through the Canyon Festival in George, Washington, last spring. (There are two other shows from Joni Mitchell and Joni Jam Scheduled for October at the Hollywood Bowl“Hearing Mitchell play certain notes again in that unique voice was like catching a glimpse, in the wild, of a magnificent bird that had long been feared extinct,” Lindsay Zoladz wrote in a New York Times review of the Washington program.

Mitchell's recording career, which began in the 1960s, included her early folk music, the self-composing of her classic albums “Blue” and “Court and Spark,” and the jazz music that followed. Decades later, in 1996, Mitchell, then 52, won Grammy Awards for Best Pop Album and Best Recording Package for her 15th album, Turbulent Indigo. “I've been thinking about whether I should quit music and go into painting, and maybe I will do it now,” she said that night.