Jessi Alexander

Jessi Alexander was born in Jackson, Tenn. Her father, a painter and musician, named her after singer-songwriter Jessi Colter. Alexander's parents divorced when she was 3, so she divided her time between her mother's new home in Georgia and her
father's in Memphis. Summers with her father were highlights, with the two of them hitting Beale Street and absorbing the sounds. "I remember sitting on B.B. King's lap, and I also remember, when my dad played harmonica, passing the hat at clubs," she recalls. "Of course, that was a hit because who could say no to a little kid?"

At 10, her grandmother took her to the Miss Tennessee pageant, where a contestant sang a Patsy Cline song. On the way home, Alexander bought an albums of Cline's hits. By her early teens, she was deep into Hank Williams and Harlan Howard but also the West Coast sounds of Bonnie Raitt, Little Feat and Karla Bonoff. Though Alexander later asked for a bass guitar, the amp was too expensive, so her father bought an acoustic guitar for her.

After high school graduation, she enrolled in Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, Tenn., intending to major in social work. All through college, she sang in bands, often in nearby Nashville. Finally giving up school, she sang backup for a few new artists on the road before landing a gig as staff writer at the Warner-Chappell music publishing company.

Then, unbeknownst to her, a friend submitted Alexander's tape to the 2001 NARAS Grammy Showcase. She won, then signed a deal with MCA Nashville, but her only release for the label was a performance of "So Wrong" on the Remembering Patsy Cline tribute album in 2003. After leaving MCA, she signed to Sony Nashville, which released her debut album in early 2005.