SINGER-SONGWRITER BLAZED OWN QUIRKY PATH Karla Peterson, Arts Writer San Diego Union/Tribune August 19,1993 She has toured with Nanci Griffith, recorded with Emmylou Harris, and written sweet, sad songs that made John Prine weep into his pork chops. For an up-and-coming artist, singer-songwriter Iris DeMent has a surprising number of admirers in high places. But it took the granddaddy of them all to say the words this Arkansas original really needed to hear. “When I met my first famous person,…