house concerts and 21st century touring

Memphis House Concerts

For being relative newcomers to the house concert scene, Jim Lattimore and his partner Susan have made a big splash in the “music enthusiasts” pool. Jim recently served on the house concert panel at the Folk Alliance Conference, and also hosted a showcase room to give extra opportunities to the acts he loves.

Granted, he didn’t start out as an outsider, since he’s also an experienced musician and involved with the careers of a few notorious acts. But let’s have Jim tell it his way…

CIYH:How did Memphis House Concerts come about?

Jim: We got into this quite by accident. Our first show was with Dave Insley who had contacted a bandmate of mine and who had a gig on monday. Since the prior evening was super bowl sunday, we decided to have a few people over for a completely unplugged set and then watch the game.

Later that summer we had Jeff Holmes from the Floating Men and Jeff Black come play a 2-fer show in the backyard. Susan and I had executive produced a couple of tracks on The Floating Men’s cd and Holmes owed us a house concert.

A few months later we are at a Peter Bradley Adams show at a local club with 8 or 9 people in attendance. By the end of the night, I had consumed enough social lubrication that I went up to him and said we were considering starting a house concert series and also suggested we could pull a bigger crowd in our living room if he was interested. Just so happened he was moving from L.A. to Nashville in the next couple of weeks and suggested a date that was only a few weeks in the future.

Thus Memphis House Concerts was born. Our goal to bring Memphis the cream of the crop of singer/songwriter types. This is a “listening environment” - so y’all hush.

CIYH: What’s been the key(s) to building and maintaining your audience?

Jim: I think the key has been booking great acts. We are trying to build a reputation like The Bluebird Cafe in Nashville or the Ark in Ann Arbor. On any given night you may not know the artist playing the Bluebird but you trust that whomever it is will be awesome because of the vetting system they use. We want people to say, “Well, I’ve never heard of _______ but if they are playing MHC, they must be good.” And I’ve been amazed at the talent we’ve been able to attract.

CIYH: Please share one of your favorite moments from MHConcerts….

Jim: Number One has to be during intermission at last month’s show with Jeff Black. He closed his first set with “One Last Day to Live” at which point I grabbed the mic and proceeded to propose to Susan, and she said yes!!!

And second to that is the amazing time we’ve had hanging out with artists whom I’ve appreciated for many years. Some performers whose recordings I’ve listened to for years are now some of our good friends.

CIYH: If you have time, a little of your personal history would also be great…

Jim: You might enjoy my fictional biography.

By day I’m a mild-mannered investment banker specializing in mergers and acquisitions and business valuation; by night, performing songwriter, FOH sound engineer, baseball coach for my 8 yr old, and part-owner of a high-end speaker company. I played in a few bands from R&B to alt-country, and spent 8 months playing guitar in the streets of Europe. I have a BS in Accounting and MBA in finance and Susan is a partner in a CPA firm but don’t hold that against us - we’re hippies at heart.

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Artist of the Month for February 2008. Jennifer Batten

Hmm… the strangest pick yet? You bet! Although folk, roots, and traditional music generally rule the house concert scene, I think it’s important to know some of the incredibly diverse, world-class talent that is out there. And this one is out there…

Jennifer Batten toured playing guitar for Michael Jackson for 10 years, including Superbowl 26 which aired to 1.5 billion people. This decade was followed by 3 years of touring and recording with Jeff Beck. She’s authored 2 music books and has guested on numerous CD’s and videos.

She’s currently supporting her 3rd solo CD/DVD entitled “Whatever”. The DVD includes 90 min+ of art and live playing films, commentary, interviews, and a guitar lesson. She graduated from Musicians Institute and later taught there. Her first CD “Above, Below, and Beyond” was produced by grammy nominated producer Michael Sembello. She has toured the world consistently for 20 years playing solo as well as with different musicians from every continent.

This is a one woman show (with one roadie) and includes all equipment including projector and 8 foot wide screen.

If you live out west, and would like to shake up your house concert series a bit… this is a great opportunity. There’s a minimum guarantee, but it’s surprisingly reasonable. Find out more about her house concert show.

This is also a great one if you’ve got some serious “guitar-heads” in your community. I know several artists who’ve taken lessons from Jennifer - she’s the real deal.

Enjoy the video!

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