Tift Merritt

Tift Merritt

Tift Merritt is an American singer-songwriter and musician from Houston, Texas, and is based in New York. Her work sits in alternative country, americana, country and country folk.

Early life and beginnings

Born Catherine Tift Merritt in 1975, she moves to Raleigh, North Carolina, soon after birth. Her father teaches her guitar chords and Percy Sledge songs. In her early twenties she begins to focus on writing as much as music, studying creative writing at the University of North Carolina after first playing gigs on her own.

Her professional career begins in 1998 with the band The Carbines, which she forms with Zeke Hutchins. The group plays small clubs in Chapel Hill, including the Cave, Cat's Cradle and the front porch of the General Store in Bynum, North Carolina.

Recording career

In 2000 Merritt wins Merlefest's Chris Austin Songwriting Contest. With help from Ryan Adams she gets a manager and a recording contract with Lost Highway Records. Her debut album, Bramble Rose, is recorded in Los Angeles and released in 2002. It is produced by Ethan Johns and appears on year-end best-of lists from Time and The New Yorker; the Associated Press names it the best debut of the year in any genre.

Tambourine follows in 2004. Produced by George Drakoulias and featuring Mike Campbell of the Heartbreakers on guitar, it receives a Grammy nomination in the country album category and three Americana Music Award nominations. The tour supports Elvis Costello, and Merritt records Austin City Limits, later issuing the performance as a live DVD. She also releases Home Is Loud, a document of the tour's homecoming concert in Raleigh.

While the tour is ending, Merritt goes to Paris and starts writing the songs that become Another Country. It is released in 2008 on Fantasy Records, again with George Drakoulias and her longtime band.

Buckingham Solo, an intimate concert recording made in England, appears on Fantasy in 2009. In the same year she has her first art exhibition, Other Countries, which presents journals and photographs connected to Another Country.

Her fifth studio album, Traveling Alone, is recorded in Brooklyn and includes guest appearances by Marc Ribot and Andrew Bird among others. Her sixth studio album, Stitch of the World, follows in 2017.

Other work

Merritt also produces The Spark for KRTS, Marfa, Texas Public Radio. The programme looks at the lives and working methods of people behind creative work, and its guests include Nick Hornby, Kiki Smith and Mac McCaughan.

Personal life

Emmylou Harris praises Merritt after seeing her perform at a writer's night in Nashville, describing her as a standout performer with strong future promise. Merritt marries Zeke Hutchins in 2009; they later live in a small Greenwich Village apartment in New York City and later divorce.