New book celebrates Nanci Griffith’s songwriting legacy

Tributes to Seguin-born singer/songwriter Nanci Griffith have come from far and wide since her death in 2021.

Artists who recorded her songs and those she influenced have shared their admiration of her skill as a songwriter. In 2023, a tribute album, “More Than a Whisper: Celebrating the Music of Nanci Griffith,’” brought an array of artists together to record 14 of Griffith’s songs 

Now comes a book – part tribute, part biography, and something of a lament for what might have been – had Griffith been able to achieve all that she wanted.

‘Love at the Five and Dime: The Songwriting Legacy of Nanci Griffith’ author Brian T. Atkinson says Griffith’s renown as a songwriter is likely to continue to grow. Listen to the interview above or read the transcript below. 

This transcript has been edited lightly for clarity: 

Texas Standard: Throughout your book, Nanci Griffith’s peers place her in the company of some really major league songwriting legends – Townes Van Zandt, Guy Clark, John Prine… Where do you see Griffith in that pantheon of country/folk songwriters? 

Brian T. Atkinson: Well, now, not quite, maybe. But I think she’s going to get there. I think sort of like Townes [Van Zandt], you know, after he died. Maybe about ten, 15, 20 years, I think people are going to talk about her in the same breath as those guys.

She was definitely one of the boys. There was a boys’ club for sure at that time, with Townes and Guy [Clark] and [John] Prine and everybody. And they loved her. They loved her music. And I think at some point she’s going to be pretty famous for it.

Why do you say “gonna be?” I mean, there are a lot of people who see her as a first-rate talent now. And yet I know what you’re referring to. I mean, it was a kind of good old boys’ club of of Texas singer/songwriters who would sort of drift between Colorado and Nashville and some other places.

Well, I mean, I don’t think she’s famous, is why I say that.

I mean, I think that she was on Letterman a bunch. She was on the Today Show. You know, she was out more than Townes or Guy. She was more in the pop culture. But yeah, she was sort of a cult… you know, like a lot of people would whisper about her like a “you found that secret, too?” cool.

But I think that she’s going to be appreciated more. There will be more tribute albums and more books, and maybe a movie. Who knows? That kind of thing seems to happen after people die and the ball starts rolling on their legacy.

And yet she had some really outstanding songs. Could you say a little bit more about perhaps the title track [“Love at the Five and Dime”]? Because I think that’s how she came to a lot of folks – through that song in particular. 

Yeah, I think she grew to not really love it so much, but it’s definitely one of her more recognizable songs. Kathy Mattea had a huge hit with it, and it just seemed to sum up Nanci.

It seems like a little love story, but it’s a really complex little love story with lots of tragedy and sadness. And that was sort of her thing – was telling a really sad story, but finding the light and the hope somewhere within that. 

Your book consists mainly of the recollections of people who knew and worked with Nanci at all these different stages of her career – from gigging in Austin during the ’70s, to her Nashville years in the ’80s and beyond. Why did you decide to structure the book as a collection of recollections?

Well, Nanci was, I think, my seventh book for Texas A&M University Press. I did my Townes book that way out of necessity – I knew there were two other biographies, and I just did it for something different. And that kind of stuck.

I just like that style. That’s the way to sort of guide the ship – the people who actually knew her and were influenced by her tell the stories firsthand. I’d rather have that, rather than me kind of guessing at what were the facts.

Yeah, I totally get that. Are there people you wanted to talk to but couldn’t or parts of her life you would have liked to learn more about?

You know, there’s always a couple of people – that’s just the way it goes.

But the thing about this book is I did it in the second year of the pandemic and everybody was home still, and everybody wanted to talk to anyone that they didn’t live with for a little while. And so, pretty much I talked to someone like Steve Earle and he said, “hey, did you talk to Rodney [Crowell] and whoever?” And he’d say, “Here’s a number. Call him up real quick.”

And there was an army of people who helped out with this book, even to like Adam Duritz from Counting Crows sent me to four or five different people I wouldn’t have known to talk to. And they just all sort of wanted to help out and get the word out about Nanci. 

I think Nanci felt underappreciated. I don’t know if that was true or not, but they, the friends, definitely wanted to have her find a bigger audience.

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So I’d imagine you would probably learn some things or two about Nanci Griffith that surprised you? 

Honestly, I didn’t know much about her going into the book. I expected there to be some good songs, but, man, her songs blew me away. But then just the number of people that she helped, and in two ways, really – like songwriters that she sort of just mentored in Nashville and even here in Austin.

But the songwriters whose music she covered – which was a big thing, and she seemed just as happy singing other people’s music – and every time she would introduce a song, she would say, “This is written by so-and-so” just to make sure their name was attached to that song. And she was a real champion of great music.

Griffith received enormous praise for her songwriting, but her most successful album [“Other Voices, Other Rooms”], the one that won her a Grammy, was made up entirely of folk music covers. And that’s not an accident, is it? 

No, I mean, it’s kind of like I just said. I mean, she loved doing other people’s music.

And I think that [album] came out in ’93. They recorded probably ’91 and ’92. And by that point, folk music kind of had its moment, like long ago. And I think that she just loved those songs – [Bob] Dylan and Prine and Woody [Guthrie] and that kind of stuff – and just wanted to bring it back.

But then she also had people like Buddy Mondlock, who was a pretty unknown guy in Nashville, but he had this song, “Comin’ Down in the Rain,” that she loved, and it was sort of one of the highlights of the album, just because she knew a good song. 

And yet she wrote so many really good songs that other people appreciated. She didn’t score huge country hits in the U.S. with her songs, although you mentioned Kathy Mattea’s version of “Love at the Five and Dime.” But she was really something of a – I don’t know if you call her a “superstar” – but a really big deal in Ireland and England.

What do you think they found in Nanci’s writing and performances that spoke to them as perhaps she was unable to reach that size audience in the U.S.?

Well, I mean nothing against us here in the U.S., but I think they just have better taste in music overseas. I mean, it’s hard to argue that, and especially in Ireland.

And I think they were drawn to the idea of a lot of songs or people struggling through bad conditions – farms drying up and things like that. And people in Ireland really related to that. And like I was saying earlier, finding that sort of hope.

“Gulf Coast Highway” is a great example of a song where there is two old people living together forever. Their land has gone to hell. Everything’s falling apart. But the song is about how much they love each other and love that land, despite it is the only place in the world where the bluebonnets grow. And they’re happy just to have that, and I think that’s really relatable overseas.

And there are stories in the book of people bringing their blind children backstage to her shows. They’re having her bless them, like the pope. I mean, it’s crazy how much she was loved over there. 

You talk about the struggles and how much that was a part of her music, and of course, she was known in the songwriting community for having her own struggles. You talk about that in the book, especially during her later years dealing with alcoholism and feeling let down by the industry, which she often didn’t get the sort of recognition she and others thought she deserved.

Do you think she was justified in feeling slighted, or were those problems that she faced in her career perhaps a result of deeper issues for her? Or how do you understand what happened with her career?

Well, my best guess is, like you said, she got a lot of awards. She wasn’t underappreciated totally, but she really thought she should be, you know, Emmylou Harris or like a huge star and it just never happened.

And, you know, the cycle of alcoholism and stuff, it starts and it gets bad and it gets bad and then it gets worse. And then all of a sudden, she just went off the deep end in the last 15 or 20 years of her life.

You start to feel bad about yourself when that happens. I think that just sort of snowballed everything. 

And yet, as you say in your final chapter of the book, that’s not the end of Nanci Griffith’s story. I mean, you were hearing from younger people who said that they were influenced by people who became performers and writers themselves. What did they tell you about Griffith’s legacy? 

Oh, that it’s huge. I mean, you’re right. Do you think of Townes as just an alcoholic or a drug addict? No. I mean, you think of him as a guy who wrote these incredible songs that should be celebrated around the world. And this is the same.

And I think it’ll take, like I said, a little bit of time. But right now, younger women, especially, just think that she is the best songwriter ever.

You know, like your Sarah Jarosz’s and like the younger generation, they had nothing but great things to say. They don’t care about her personal life. All they care about is what they grew up with, which is the songs. 

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