Skip to Content, Navigation, or Footer.
The Rotunda Online
The Rotunda
Thursday, May 8, 2025

Featured Interview: Nate Currin, Grammy Nominated Artist

756b8c7292445daf8c313c0fa221d08f
Nate Currin

When I first met Nate Currin he was busy typing away on his keyboard, with a half-full mug of coffee that was quickly losing its heat. Having previouslu interviewed with local radio stations and a show at Uptown Coffee Café’s Victoria location, which he had later that night, Currin is truly an on the go artist.

It is necessary to mention that Currin has traveled to over twenty other countries, toured with notable acts like Blues Traveler and the Neon Trees, featured on MTV, and received a first ballot Grammy nomination.

Despite these many credible accomplishments, he sells himself as a storyteller who aims to create one on one connections with his audiences – which is hardly the typical attitude that Farmville is used to, but perhaps this is precisely what we were missing.

Our interview began with banters over how good food should always be the motivating force of our daily life.

Here is some of what he had to say about his artistic life:

Q: Why are you billed as both a musical artist as well as a storyteller?

A: “I’ve never considered myself a storyteller. I’ve released a lot of music and side projects under different names; but it was really only in the last few years that my audience expressed how much they enjoyed the stories not just in my music but also in the introductions and bylines. I found that people would come for the underlying narrative in my songs – which is my life.”

Q: When you create music, do you go into the process with the intention to tell stories or, perhaps, did you grow up with a storytelling tradition?

A: “I grew up in a very strict religious home. I was not allowed to listen to most pop music, so I didn’t grow up with a lot of mainstream influence. I did,

however, grow up reading a lot, and writing. Short stories and poems – and I’ve played piano since I was a little kid. So when I started writing music in high school and college, it came naturally despite still being a craft that one still needs to work at, develop over years of writing.

We also traveled a lot. My dad was traveling speaker; so I got to see a lot of the world and that definitely shaped my writing.”

Q:What do you like to write about?

A: “I like to write about everything. I write about my faith, my family, my friends, my relationships, love and loss and heartbreak. One of my albums The Pilgrim is actually about a book written in the 1600s, so definitely literature as well. I try not to get stuck in a mold where I get stuck writing about one thing. What I want to write is about everything: life is multidimensional and I want to be able to put all of that in my stories.”

Q: Is there a particular piece of music that you’ve written that speaks to you most?

A: “The most meaningful songs though for me are ones where I can be the most honest. The most honest one I’ve ever written I feel is a song called “The Confessional” from “Goodnight California” (2010). It’s me pouring my heart out in my beliefs in that moment – my lack of belief – everything that had happened in my life to that point is just stripped down. It’s songs like that where I can feel the most fulfilled because they take a little more out of me. They hit home with myself and the audience.”

Currin performed for a full house at Uptown Coffee Café’s Farmville location on 236 North Main Street. For a genuine story from this traveling artist, check out his latest album “You and I Are Ghosts.” It’s the perfect album for this chilling autumn, while you sit with a hot mug of apple cider.