Songs of Roads and Fields and Times Past
Local talent John Lathim is a working-class hero
By Stephanie Smith
April 30, 2008
If you’ve lived in Chattanooga for a while, chances are you’ve heard of John Lathim & Friends. Lathim’s music has been perfectly suited to Chattanooga’s singer/songwriter acoustic music scene for more than 15 years.
His songs tell of the rural life of the farmer, the traveling vagabond and the minstrel, weaving in stories of the pioneers and days gone by. “The songs consist of several stages of my life. I grew up on a farm on the eastern shores of Maryland. Experience is my best teacher as far as songwriting,” he says.
Lathim attended high school in California, and explains, “When I came back from California at 17, I wanted to be a beatnik musician like all the USC students I had seen in coffeehouses. I wanted to be a recording artist.”
His musical career, he says, is a story similar to Jack and the Beanstalk. When he moved back to Maryland, he worked with a friend who was fascinated with folk music and helped him write nine songs. He decided to take a risk.
“I heard there was a music producer living incognito down the road, so I sent him my songs. He listened to it and said, ‘You’re not playing this stuff in public, are you?’ I was devastated; I wanted some encouragement,” Lathim says. “So, he took out an album of folk music and starting teaching me. He showed me all the examples of reflective writing, expression, and soulful communication on the album, which turned out to be by Gordon Lightfoot. I listened to it one time and threw it out. It was a lesson I pushed away into my subconscious. Years later it grew into a beanstalk and bloomed.”
Lathim gave up the idea of being a professional singer, but joined a local church choir to keep singing. The pastor’s son, a talented jazz guitarist, starting playing with him and they sounded good together.
“People really loved it. I got a lot of encouragement, including the comment that I sounded like Gordon Lightfoot. And so everything came full circle,” he says, noting that his music has since been described as a cultural European-American folk sound with original compositions similar to Gordon Lightfoot.
Terry Harrison and Glen Burgess were other mentors. “Terry taught me how to use a flat pick. Glen was a banjo player who could always make my music sound better than it was; we made a recording together and that was the first album, John Lathim & Friends in St. Michael’s, Maryland.”
Current friends who have helped him adapt his Northern ways to the South include Stephen Smith (bass), John Cady (acoustic/electric guitars), Tim Starnes (fiddle, harmonica, lap steel), Monte Coulter (percussion), and Brad Johnson (percussion). Lathim especially credits Stephen “Smitty” Smith for help with his transition.
“Smitty is an excellent coach and a highly skilled bass player. When the band has to just wing it, he talks to them and keeps everybody in sync. From him I have learned about how to make my songs more listenable.”
Today, Lathim sings about working-class culture and social issues. His recent albums include Chorus in the Wildwood, Native Sons of the Pioneer Days and From the Heart of the Tiller Man. He’s currently working on a new album, The Stage Down Below.
By day, Lathim is an RN at Siskin Rehabilitation Hospital, where he’s worked for 17 years. The new album’s title song was inspired by a CNA at work, who “has a genuineness and sincerity but is judged by her status instead.” The album’s central theme is,“The things most significant that people do for other people remain unseen. These unsung heroes are on a stage being observed by an audience above.” Some of the most poignant lines from the song are:
“Look up at the audience looking down on us / They’re as numerous as the specks of dust / More often than not we’re on the same page/ But like it or not we’re on the same stage.” The new album is scheduled for release in June.
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If you want to sample his work, go to
http://www.johnlathim.com/ "Mourning Dove" is particularly lovely.
Another singer-songwriter influenced by Gord
