A Louisville, Kentucky, native, Landes moved to New York to attend N.Y.U. and play music. She obtained a weekly spot at the Jack Hardy song exchange and also performed frequently in New York as well as on the campuses of Yale, Sarah Lawrence, Barnard, Columbia, Brown, and course, her own school.

In the late 1990s, Landes trained and became a sound engineer; a trade she plies when she isn't recording her own albums. Her work has appeared on albums by Ryan Adams, Joseph Arthur, Hem, Jolie Holland, and Ruth Moody, to name a few.

In May 2005, Landes released her full-length debut album, Dawn's Music. Two Three Four, a mini album recorded with members of Hem, followed in 2006. She released Fireproof in 2008, in the middle of her courtship with singer/songwriter songwriter Josh Ritter -- they married in 2009. Landes released Sweet Heart Rodeo in 2010. She and Ritter divorced after 18 months. Her next release was the French-language Mal Habillee in 2012. After a year of working on other musicians' projects as both a musician and engineer, she recorded Bluebird, produced by Thomas Bartlett (aka Doveman), which was released in February of 2014. ~ Heather Phares