Joanni

Joanni

Kate Bush

“Joanni” is the only song from the “A Sea of Honey” side of the album Kate Bush hasn’t discussed in any interview. Despite this, the song’s subject is quite obviously Joan of Arc.

Joan of Arc was a young peasant girl living in medieval France who, with no military training, convinced Prince Charles of Valois to allow her to lead a French army to the besieged city of Orléans. They achieved a momentous victory over the English and their French allies, the Burgundians. Joan was later captured by Anglo-Burgundian forces, tried for witchcraft and heresy and burned at the stake in 1431, at the age of 19. By the time she was officially canonized in 1920, the Maid of Orléans (as she was known) had long been considered one of history’s greatest saints, and an enduring symbol of French unity and nationalism.

It is this legacy that allows Joan to be presented as a strong archetype and accentuates the “A Sea of Honey” theme of each song being about a person.

The song was later performed live in Act One of the Before the Dawn residency and a live recording was released on the album of the same name in late 2016.