“I was horrified!”: Rick Beato recalls hearing that Joni Mitchell watched his video dissecting her 1976 track, Amelia

Rick Beato has revealed how it felt when he found out folk legend Joni Mitchell watched one of his videos in which he broke down one of her classic songs.

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On his hugely popular YouTube channel – which boasts nearly 3.7 million subscribers at the time of writing – Beato hosts a ‘What Makes This Song Great’ series, in which he dissects classic songs and shows viewers, well, what makes them so great.

Several years ago, he made an episode on Joni Mitchell’s track Amelia, which appeared on 1976’s Hejira. And in a new interview with The Guardian, Beato recalls the time Mitchell sent him a Christmas present after watching his video, with a message that read: “Next time you’re in LA, let me know. I’d love to get together.”

“Joni Mitchell watched me sing one of her songs,” he exclaims. “I was horrified. Keith [Jarret] watched me play piano too, badly. Definitely surreal!”

In other news, Gibson recently announced a second signature guitar for Beato, a Les Paul Special Double Cut.

The axe is 1.5” thinner than normal and also dons a Tune-O-Matic bridge and Stop Bar tailpiece to ensure “excellent sustain and easy intonation adjustment”. In addition to this is a pair of P-90 pickups and a burgundy finish.

Beato has promised to donate all of his royalties from the sale of his Gibson Rick Beato Les Paul Special Double Cut to the Save The Music Foundation, which delivers over 15,000 instruments to over 100 school and community projects nationwide every school year.

You can check out the video below: