I went through a period when I really liked Nanci Griffith — especially her live album, One Fair Summer Evening. I’ve always liked that kind of alt-country — or at least country music that was homey and not racist and nationalistic. Griffith has always been politically liberal. In fact, I saw her live when when I was in graduate school. I went with a Republican friend of mine, and she was none too fond of some of the things that Griffith had said. It served her right: I could never get a straight answer out of the woman about why she was a Republican other than that her family had always been Republican. That made absolutely no sense to me.

Anyway, I’m especially fond of the song “Once in a Very Blue Moon” — originally off her 1984 album of the same name. It’s a beautiful song by Pat Alger and Eugene Levine. It was eventually recorded by Alger on his 1991 album, True Love & Other Short Stories. It doesn’t much matter who does it — that’s the mark of a great song. You can hear Alger’s version of the song on YouTube. But Griffith really does belt that song out. It’s hard not to love it.