Tag Archive for: Kathy Mattea

Craig Carothers lived in Portland before it was hip and moved to Nashville before it was ready for prime time. He’s always been a little ahead of the curve and an old school kind of cool. His music is heartbreakingly beautiful and scathingly funny, delivered with a lively deadpan smile and a voice that’s downright swoony.

Too folk for rock, too pop for folk, too jazz for country, too tall to be a jockey. It’s difficult to easily categorize his music without the use of hyphens. But the wide-ranging influences of Craig’s music-teacher parents can be heard in each of his more than 20 albums.

He’s a songwriter’s songwriter, sharing co-writes with Bruce Hornsby, Marty Stewart, Don Henry, Maia Sharp, and Don Schlitz, to name a few. He’s had songs recorded by Trisha Yearwood, Kathy Mattea, Lorrie Morgan, Russell Hitchcock, and Peter, Paul and Mary, as well as numerous international artists whose names are unspellable.

As a touring musician and a regular at the Bluebird Cafe in Nashville, Craig has shared a stage with the likes of Richard Thompson, Janis Ian, Donovan, David Wilcox, John Gorka, Patty Larkin, Gretchen Peters, Catie Curtis, Greg Brown, Shawn Mullins, Patty Larkin, Michael McDonald, and Kim Richey.

When not traveling to hundreds of shows each year, Craig shares his songwriting expertise as a professor at University of Miami, and through online and in-person songwriting workshops across the U.S. and Europe.

A true Renaissance man, Craig is also a producer, recording engineer, background singer, booking agent, graphic designer, photographer, Tex-Mex connoisseur, left-wing inactivist, and a collector of exquisitely obsolete gadgets.

His many recordings are available at live shows and via the website, as well as Amazon, iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, CDbaby, and all other digital streaming providers.