![\"Joni](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/Joni-Mitchell-David-Crosby-Split-Far-Out-Magazine-1140x855.jpg\")
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(Credits: Far Out \/ Alamy \/ David Gans)<\/p>\n
Thu 20 November 2025 19:39, UK <\/p>\n
Break-ups are one of the most revisited topics in songwriting. Heartbreak has proven to be a limitless muse, inspiring some of the most emotional and esteemed songs of all time,\u00a0but most musicians pen their sonic odes to separation after the deed has been done. For Joni Mitchell<\/a>, that simply wouldn\u2019t do.<\/p>\n Mitchell\u2019s position as a so-called confessional songwriter has meant that much of her life events can be found in the liner notes of her albums. For better or worse, Mitchell\u2019s abilities have meant that she has found expression and exorcism in her work, allowing her fans an insight into her life and a comforter for their own. But it also means some people are caught in the crossfire. <\/p>\n Over the years, Mitchell has written about many people in her life. Some who floated in and swept her away, like her ode to Leonard Cohen, and others who left her disgruntled with their willingness to blast away at her work, like her pointed attack of Bob Dylan. But it was some of her love interests who perhaps bore the brunt of her work, with one particular boyfriend suffering the prestigious honour of a song written simply to break up with him.<\/p>\n In the late 1960s, two musical giants collided when Mitchell embarked upon a romantic relationship with David Crosby of the Byrds and Crosby, Stills and Nash fame<\/a>. Their lives would intertwine both professionally and personally as Crosby produced Mitchell\u2019s debut record, Song to a Seagull, for release in 1968. <\/p>\n Despite an early honeymoon phase marked by romance and record production, their relationship would eventually come to an end in a particularly fitting manner. Rather than breaking up with Crosby in any of the usual ways \u2013 a tender conversation or even a casual phone call \u2013 Mitchell decided to do it via song. <\/p>\n She penned \u2018That Song About the Midway\u2019, a damning song containing all of Mitchell\u2019s anger towards her soon-to-be ex. The song begins with the couple\u2019s tender beginnings before plunging into Crosby\u2019s transgressions. \u201cYou were betting on some lover, you were shaking up the dice, and I thought I saw you cheating once or twice,\u201d Mitchell declares over glorious guitars. <\/p>\n The song is a savage enough statement in its own right, but the way Mitchell delivered it was all the more embarrassing. At a gathering, surrounded by their friends, the Canadian songwriter performed the track not once, but twice, directing it at Crosby. <\/p>\n