The Maine native first became aware of music's capacity to communicate while growing up as the youngest of seven siblings, listening to her mother sing hymns, country songs and made-up ditties. She began singing during childhood, and wrote poems and songs as a teenager, but was too shy to make much of an effort to perform in public. After a stint living in Florida, she moved to the Boston area, where she waited tables and worked as a telephone switchboard operator at Harvard University. It wasn't until her guitar teacher coaxed her into joining him on stage in a tiny Cambridge club that Griffin mustered up the courage to begin performing her songs in public.

On the strength of a set of unadorned acoustic demo recordings, Griffin won a recording deal with A&M Records. When an attempt at cutting more elaborate studio versions of the same material proved unsatisfactory, the label agreed to release the artist's stripped-down original demos instead. The result was her 1996 debut release Living with Ghosts, which won widespread critical acclaim and won Griffin the beginnings of a passionate and devoted fan following. The following year, Griffin defied expectations by taking a radically different approach on her noisy sophomore effort, Flaming Red.

After an album she recorded in 2000 went unreleased due to corporate shuffles, Griffin found a more hospitable home when fan Dave Matthews signed her to his new, artist-friendly ATO Records. The change in labels coincided with Griffin's determination to scale her music back down to its essence, a direction that was reflected on 2002's sparse, mostly acoustic 1000 Kisses, which earned a Grammy nomination in the Best Contemporary Folk Album category. It was followed in 2003 by the live CD/DVD set A Kiss In Time.

2004's Impossible Dream was Griffin's most ambitious and accomplished effort yet, encompassing a broad range of musical influences while boasting some of her most ambitious, emotionally complex songwriting to date. It also netted a second Grammy nomination for Griffin.

As her own releases have continued to win consistent critical attention and a steadily expanding audience, Griffin has simultaneously become a popular source of material for other artists. In addition to the ones mentioned above, Griffin's songwriting has been embraced by a diverse assortment of performers, including Kelly Clarkson, Susan Boyle, Bette Midler, Reba McEntire, Solomon Burke and Emmylou Harris, all of whom have recorded her songs. Also inspired by her work, filmmaker Cameron Crowe personally selected her to appear in his 2005 feature film "Elizabethtown.”  Her music has also been featured in numerous films and television shows.

In addition to raising her public profile, having her songs covered by other artists has allowed Griffin the luxury of making music on her own terms, and her iconoclastic approach is reflected throughout Children Running Through.
"I invested a lot more time in this than anything I've ever done," she says of the new album. "After Impossible Dream, I had used up all the songs I'd been carrying around for years, so it was a challenge to find out if I had anything left in me. It took some time, but it was a positive thing to be tested that way."

Children Running Through, was recorded in the artist's adopted hometown of Austin, Texas, in a makeshift studio set up in a rented house across the street from her home. In addition to Griffin on vocals and guitar, the sessions featured a sterling assortment of Austin, Nashville and New York players, including longtime Griffin collaborator Doug Lancio on guitar, legendary Faces keyboardist Ian McLagan, and a nine-person string section conducted and arranged by multi-instrumentalist John Mark Painter.  The recording generated an avalanche of praise from critics and fans and earned Griffin her third Grammy nomination.

Griffin’s most recent release, 2010’s “Downtown Church” finds her exploring the roots of American gospel music with a stylistically diverse collection of songs focusing not only on the black gospel tradition but on the white Southern gospel songs of Hank Williams and Alfred G. Karnes, and one beautiful nod to Hispanic gospel traditions. Also included are two Patty Griffin originals and a closing hymn attributed to St. Francis of Assisi.  Recording took place in Nashville’s historic Downtown Presbyterian Church and was produced by Americana music hero, Buddy Miller. The recording includes guest appearances by Mr. Miller, Emmylou Harris, Raul Malo, Jim Lauderdale, Shawn Colvin, Mike Farris, Julie Miller, Regina and Ann McCrary.