Born in Fort Worth TX, home to native sons Townes van Zandt and T Bone Burnett (a band mate of one of her uncles back in the '60s) to a family of musicians and singers helped develop her flexible approach to interpretation. Her parents moved the family to Washington DC when she was still a baby and she spent her early years on the east coast. With no television or stereo in the house, she spent long hours teaching herself piano and guitar after school, eventually listening to Thelonious Monk on a portable radio in her room late at night.