Tift Merritt with Eric Heywood
Tift Merritt wanted to be a writer until her father taught her guitar chords and Percy Sledge songs. In her 20 year career, she has toured around the world with her sonic short stories and garnered a reputation for making her own way and setting an interesting artistic table. The New Yorker calls her “the bearer of a proud tradition of distaff country soul that reaches back to artists like Dusty Springfield and Bobbie Gentry.” Emmylou Harris praised her as “a diamond in a coal mine.
Merritt is hardly one to dominate the spotlight. She engages in dialogue with fellow artists of all disciplines on her public radio broadcast and podcast The Spark With Tift Merritt, bringing in fellow sojourners ranging from Patty Griffin and Rosanne Cash to Rick Moody and Nick Hornby (who devoted a chapter to Merritt in his essay collection 31 Songs).
Merritt is joined at Big Ears by the guitarist and pedal steel player Eric Heywood, who’s toured and recorded extensively with Son Volt, The Pretenders, and Richard Buckner.
