My two favorite musical artist are Nanci Griffith and Suzanne Vega (yes, I'm a little bit country and a little bit urban folk). When my wife told me a few days ago that Nanci had died, I didn't have to ask "Nanci who?"
I wasn't surprised by her death. She had stopped performing years ago and I had heard rumors suggesting that she was in rough shape for a while now. Still, the news hit me hard. Prince's death, the only thing I can compare, was shocking because it was so sudden and unexpected. Both Nanci and Prince meant a lot to me during some of the formative years of my life, but Prince's death felt like something that effected everyone because he was so famous and so widely revered. Nanci, though she surely has many, many fans, always felt like she belonged to me more--not just because she wasn't quite as famous, but mainly because her songs themselves have such an intimacy to them. She can take you to places that feel so private, and you can relate to her songs because they touch on emotions like regret and loneliness that we all experience but are not encouraged to express in our culture. Nanci validates something in me more deeply and consistently that any other musician has.
I first came across Nanci Griffith sometime in the mid 90s when I happened to catch the Other Voices, Other Rooms documentary on basic cable; it must have been on PBS or maybe A&E. While I don't recall exactly when this was ('93ish?), I vividly remember immediately feeling that it was a revelation. I had long loved the folk music of early Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and my mom's Peter, Paul, and Mary albums. Plus, Vega and Indigo Girls were around and were a big part of my playlist. I also always had a connection with country music, which I got from my dad. He introduced me Hank Williams and Roger Miller--not to mention Woody Guthrie. And while most of the popular country music of the early '90 was pretty awful, I had some albums by Dwight Yoakum, Randy Travis, and Mary Chapin Carpenter that came close to capturing what I consider 'real' country. But even as I was watching Nanci Griffith for the first time singing with Iris Dement and Emmylou Harris, two other country artists I already admired greatly, somehow I felt like I had found something different--the thing I had been looking for. With Nanci I immediately felt like "yes, this--this."
The mid-'90s wasn't like today where you can just do a google or youtube search and find out everything you want to know about an artist. I educated myself about Nanci mainly by digging through record bins and collecting the albums. The first thing I bought was the MCA Retrospective on cassette, which I still have. I fell in love with this album immediately. It has some great songs on it like "I Wish It Would Rain," "Ford Econoline," "Listen to the Radio," and others. This was my only Nanci album for a while. I know some think the MCA years were her apex, but I was soon to discover that the earlier records on Philo Rhino and the later Elektra records were where she really displayed her brilliance.
The second Nanci album I bought was Other Voices, Other Rooms, which I bought on CD. Luddite that I am, I didn't get a CD player until early in 1996, so it would have been around then. I must have bought nearly all of her albums by the end of 1997 or so, because I remember having them when I moved to Ohio University where I met my future wife and introduced her to Nanci. I recall making her a Nanci mixed tape when we had started dating in the Fall of '98, which must have been the last mixed tape I ever made for anyone. I still have it and it covers everything up to Blue Roses from the Moon--Nanci's last good album.
Part of why Nanci's death struck me so much is because of the associations I have with her and my family. I recall introducing her to my parents and my sister--who preceded to collect several of her albums. In the summer of 1997, my parents went with me to see Nanci at the beautiful Wolf Trap venue in Vienna, VA. She's just about the only artist I could imaging going to see with my parents at that stage in my life. I still have the t-shirt. Of course, my wife, Amber, and I bonded over Nanci. We've listened to her albums together so much over the years that they've become second nature to us. When we had kids and started singing them to sleep at night, we instinctively sang mostly Nanci Griffith songs. Both of my kids were a little sad to hear about her passing because the music has become a part of their lives now too.
Yes, her last few studio albums weren't very good. Her voice started to lose some of its smoothness and power as she got into her late '40s and the song writing just wasn't quite as strong, but she had already left such treasures. In my estimate, she has seven absolute masterpiece albums: the first five from 1978's starkly brilliant There's a Light Beyond These Woods to her excellent MCA debut, Lone Star State of Mind in 1987; 1993's Other Voices, Other Rooms, the best cover album ever made by anyone; and Flyer from 1994, which is kind of her Time Out of Mind, a great original album when you thought she might not have it in her anymore. Little Love Affairs, Storms, and Blue Roses from the Moon are also very good, and all of her live albums are well worth having.
There is really no one quite like Nanci Griffith. She has a kind of innocence about her; yet, paradoxically, her songs even from early on in her career display a wordiness and wisdom. It's as if a child came down on angel's wings and started singing about whisky drinking hookers, but with a distinct empathy for and understanding of the pain and emptiness of their lives. So many of Nanci's songs are so incredibly sad; yet, she always effortlessly exudes so much joy whenever you see her performing. No one looks like her or sings or even talks like her. Even though I've read and heard a lot about her parents and her upbringing, I could just as easily believe she was a spirit who one day magically emerged from the dust of the Texas plains with guitar in hand--who just floated into a club in Austin and began weaving her spell on a delighted audience. She's one of those unique beings who you just have to be grateful that you could share the earth with during your brief stay here.
On the evening that we heard about her death, my wife and I sat up and listened to most of the first ten Nanci Griffith albums over several drinks. We didn't listen to every song, but we started at the beginning and got all to way through Flyer by the end of the night. We shared memories of our relationship, our families, and our children. At times we felt compelled to express our awe at the storytelling and emotion in the songs, and the sheer breadth of Nanci's accomplishment as an artist. Nanci is great in the same way a great novelist or poet is: she tells captivating stories, she develops characters so that they become real to you and you care about them, and she captures moments of deep and complex emotional states through her art. Most of the time, we just closed our eyes and sang along. We teared up a few times here and there because life is sad and beauty is fleeting, and because none of this lasts forever and so few people can create things that make it seem worthwhile, and we knew we had lost one of those people.
This is an inadequate tribute. You really just have to listen to the music, so here are twenty songs spanning from 1978-1998. There are tons of great songs not included, and I'm not even saying these are absolutely her best songs, but it's a good list:
"Montana Backroads"
"Michael's Song"
"John Philip Griffith"
"Tonight I Think I'm Gonna Go Downtown"*
"Working in Corners"*
"Friend Out in the Madness"
"Time Alone"
"Spin on a Red Brick Floor"
"Wing and the Wheel"*
"Fly By Night"
"Ford Econoline"
"Lone Star State of Mind"
"I Wish It Would Rain"
"Listen to the Radio"
"Across the Great Divide"
"Morning Song for Sally"
"Going Back to Georgia"
"Anything You Need But Me"
"Not My Way Home"
"Waiting for Love"
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