Nanci Griffith obituary

American folk-country singer and songwriter best known for Love at the Five and Dime and her album Other Voices, Other Rooms

Greatly admired by her fellow artists and a devoted army of fans, Nanci Griffith, who has died aged 68, exemplified a style of musical storytelling with a literary flavour, focusing on the small details of the lives of her characters. Songs such as Love at the Five and Dime and Gulf Coast Highway have become permanent fixtures in the folk-country canon (Griffith described her music as folkabilly"), and the Grammy award she won for her album Other Voices, Other Rooms in 1994 seemed a long overdue reward for her carefully crafted body of work.

While that album comprised versions of other people's songs, other artists appreciated the quality of her own material. Love at the Five and Dime, from Griffith's album The Last of the True Believers (1986), was a Grammy-nominated country hit for Kathy Mattea, while Emmylou Harris and Willie Nelson sang Gulf Coast Highway on Harris's hit album Duets (1990). Suzy Bogguss had a country Top 10 hit with Griffith's Outbound Plane.

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