Joni Mitchell | A Case of You (1971)

Mitchell wrote "A Case of You" in or before 1970. As with many of the songs on her album Blue, her breakup with Graham Nash is often cited as the inspiration for it. It is also claimed that it is about Leonard Cohen.

She performed the song at the Amchitka Greenpeace benefit concert in October 1970. She recorded the song in 1971, and it was released on the 1971 album Blue with Mitchell playing Appalachian dulcimer, accompanied by James Taylor on acoustic guitar, which was tuned to standard tuning, (EADGBE), although there are cover versions played in an open G tuning (DGDGBD).

Mitchell's earliest public performances of "A Case of You" contain six lines that had changed by the time Blue was recorded. The line "I am as constant as a northern star" is an allusion to Caesar's "I am constant as the Northern Star" from the Shakespeare play Julius Caesar, while the quoted line "Love is touching souls" is inspired by the German poet Rainer Maria Rilke.

"A Case of You" was also released as the B-side of "California".