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In songs far ahead of their time, Joni Mitchell has written about environmental and political issues since the 1960s. Her triptychs on show at Galway Arts Festival reveal similar insight and virtuosity, writes Aidan Dunne. 

MENTION JONI MITCHELL and chances are you'll think of her extraordinary voice on such classic songs as Big Yellow Taxi, Both Sides Now, The Last Time I Saw Richardor A Case of You, a voice acrobatic in its ability to soar and dive, to shift pitch and timbre in the middle of a phrase, to rush ahead and cut back on itself, to constantly surprise. And in her songwriting this vocal virtuosity is matched by a playful linguistic skill, manifested in a profusion of vivid, incisive images, caught on the wing and precisely fixed with amazingly few words. Inevitably, the range of her voice has narrowed with time but, as last year's album Shinereaffirmed, Mitchell is much more than a voice, and much more than a lyricist: hers is a formidable musical intelligence.