Tim Shelton: Farmer, Musician, “Marlboro Boy”
Tim Shelton was once a Marlboro Boy. To be clear, that has nothing to do with his rugged good looks, or a cowboy hat, and he doesn’t have a cigarette dangling between his lips.That’s the Marlboro Man. Folks around Farmville remember that a Marlboro Boy was altogether different.
Tim Shelton explained that in the late ‘90s he was attending a small church in Walstonburg that had a good music program, and he played mandolin some there. A couple of musicians from the nearby Marlboro church – banjo player Steve Sutton and bass player Reed Kennedy – were thinking of starting a group and had heard about Shelton.
“They were dyed-in-the-wool Free Will Baptist gospel bluegrass guys–you know, they grew up on Flatt & Scruggs, Little Roy Lewis, the Easter Brothers, and Doyle Lawson and all that type of stuff which I really hadn’t had a lot of exposure to,” Shelton remembered. “But once I researched it and started playing and listening to it, I realized quickly that it was pretty powerful music.”
By the mid-to-late ‘90s the Marlboro Boys were getting fairly serious about it, Shelton said, and they played a lot of church gigs–at practically every original Free Will Baptist Church in eastern North Carolina. Men’s meetings, revivals, fifth Sundays, and special occasions. They got good enough to record a couple of CDs.
Photo by Tom Whelan
“The first CD we cut, I want to say it’s probably in the early 2000s, was called ‘ First Time Around’ because it was the first time around for any of us,” he said. “That group included Reed Kennedy, Steve Sutton, Bobby Harper (who I still play some with) and Jason Tyson from the Farmville Marlboro church. Also Steve’s brother Joseph Sutton was a rhythm guitar player, then I played mandolin, and not long after we started we picked up a Dobro player, Tim Tyner.”
Alex Albright invited the band to play at R.A. Fountain on a Sunday afternoon, and before long they were playing bluegrass gospel standards regularly there on the first Sundays.
Shelton said: “I don’t mind telling you that a lot of our audience was older people because we played songs that have been around for 100 years. Those boys had good four part harmony: they had a tenor, bass and a baritone. They had fun in church and I figured out pretty soon that I better get better singing so they would let me stay in the band. I’d pick out songs that I could sing lead to and they could sing parts to and that worked out pretty well. We kept it simple and didn’t get in over our heads, and kept the harmonies tight.”
One thing that Shelton said he became aware of when he got into bluegrass: the trick of the trade is to sing any song just as high as you can sing it, like Bill Monroe.
Shelton recalled a show when one of the members wasn’t available and they asked Clyde Mattocks if he would sit in on banjo. Shelton said Mattocks had probably heard them but never played with them before. He showed him the set list and like the professional he is, without practice, five minutes later Mattocks said, “I got it.”
“We played and he never missed a lick, never missed coming in at the right time, never missed the kickoff,” Shelton said. “You know it’s just amazing and I play with Clyde these days over around Shine, North Carolina. A friend of mine’s got a band over there and we play a Friday night gig so I get to stand beside Clyde Mattocks and play once a month.”
A farmer by profession, Shelton is originally from Wilson County in Saratoga and that’s where he has lived his whole life, except during the college years. He said neither of his parents played instruments, growing up, but they always had records on, like Jim Reeves, Hank Williams, and those that made the Opry what it was back in the ‘60s. He said he was brought up on country music but was a child of the rock and roll generation and argues there was no better music than the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. He played guitar a little in high school but when he got to college at UNC-Chapel Hill, he discovered a lot of music from the people he met from all over the country and played a lot of blues and whatever was current.
Geography was Shelton’s major, like another familiar figure from North Carolina. Shelton joked that years later the Geography Department could boast they had the highest take-home pay of any department–thanks to Michael Jordan.
While at Chapel Hill, Shelton saw a number of influential performances at venues like the Cat’s Cradle. Musicians like Sharon White, before she married Ricky Skaggs, but he was in her band, along with Jerry Douglas. He saw legends like Tony Rice, Seldom Scene, and Bonnie Rait. David Bromberg, Bobby Hicks, George Thorogood. Shelton described them as musicians at the height of their profession who weren’t in it for the glamour, but just to make great music. He said he didn’t see his favorite guitar player of all time – Doc Watson – until later when he went to Merlefest 18 years in a row.
For years Sheltonlayed in a jam at Four Way, near Hookerton at Carl Blizzard’s place. It was there he met and p began playing with Don Dunn, John Booker, Tim Myatt, Clyde Mattocks and others. When Carl passed, that jam and an era ended.
Even so, these days if you find yourself at a crossroads out in the country in eastern North Carolina and you hear the unmistakable high lonesome sounds of a banjo, mandolin, guitar, and a bass, look for Tim Shelton. He’ll be the farmer wearing Carolina blue, picking a mandolin, singing just as high as he can.
• • •
