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Bassett High School graduate Josh Shilling will perform with The Domino Band on Thursday at Celebration 2008. Shilling, who lives near Nashville, is a member of the bluegrass band Mountain Heart and has played with them at the Grand Ole Opry. (Contributed photo) |
Tuesday, July 1, 2008
By JENNIFER BEELER - Bulletin Intern
For Celebration 2008 at the Martinsville Speedway, Henry County native Josh Shilling will leave the big city of Nashville, Tenn., and return to his roots to perform.
Although he is a member of Mountain Heart, an acoustic bluegrass jam band, Shilling will join the Domino Band on Thursday for Celebration 2008, an annual free concert. This year, Domino will open for country singer Tracy Lawrence.
Gates will open at 5 p.m., and Shilling and Domino will perform at 7 p.m. Lawrence will follow around 8:30. There is no charge for the concert, fireworks show or children’s rides, which will stay open until 11:30 p.m.
Shilling described his “homecoming” as a “back to the roots experience.”
A 2001 graduate of Bassett High School, Shilling, son of Billy and Kathy Shilling, is looking forward to his trip home, he said.
“It’s a great way to see my family and friends,” he said, and to “get to perform in front of my hometown and see that many familiar faces.”
Although he will be home only for a day, Shilling said the Independence Day celebration, held the day before July 4, always fits conveniently into his touring schedule. This will be his third Celebration performance.
On Wednesday, Shilling will be performing in North Carolina with Mountain Heart, and he also will be performing with them on Friday in Elizabeth City, N.C. With a few days off from touring with the band, Shilling will have time to return home and celebrate an early birthday with his family, he said. His 25th birthday is Saturday.
Shilling lives in Tennessee, about 18 miles outside of Nashville, and works full time as a songwriter and performer.
In Nashville, Shilling explained, “I’m exposed to a lot I wouldn’t have seen in Martinsville, Roanoke or even Raleigh.”
Currently he writes three to five days a week, records as a singer, pianist and guitarist, performs 100 shows a year with Mountain Heart, performs at the Grand Ole Opry a couple times a month and makes guest appearances, he said, such as at Celebration 2008.
His music career is just as varied as his work schedule. Shilling said he has performed with R & B jam bands, Southern rock country bands, beach bands, and has played jazz in downtown Roanoke and piano and Frank Sinatra at the Hotel Roanoke, The Greenbrier and other resorts.
“The biggest change in my life musically,” he said, is playing with Mountain Heart, an acoustic band. “It’s the hardest thing to get used to.”
Shilling joined Mountain Heart, which was formed in 1998, in January 2007 and played piano and guitar in its album “Road That Never Ends,” which was on the BillBoard Magazine Top 15 after four months of sales.
“I do love jumping around from the different bands and genres,” Shilling said, and to be able to get in the different artists’ heads to think about music differently. “I’ve pretty much covered the spectrum,” he added.
Although he has no definite plans for the future, the “only thing that could make me jump around anymore is a solo deal,” Shilling said. “If I do that,” he stressed, “it has to be the right scenario — a major record deal only.”
Shiling’s goal as a child never was to play at the Opry or make record deals, he said. Instead, he thought smaller.
“I set a goal in every level of my career, even as a kid,” he said.
As he accomplished one goal, Shilling would then make another, slightly bigger one, which would gradually grow to larger goals set outside of his hometown, he said.
“I never dreamed I would look over, see Brad Paisley, say ‘Hey,’ then walk out on the stage at the Opry,” he said, but that happened. Shilling first performed at the Opry with Mountain Heart after joining in 2007.
His dreams certainly never reached Europe either. But while performing in Zurich, Switzerland, last year, he visited a music store and saw his band’s album and “my face plastered everywhere,” he said.
“They knew way more about me than I ever thought,” Shilling said, adding that “they even know more about American music than I do.”
Shilling describes this growing fame as a “pinch yourself sort of thing,” but he doesn’t consider himself famous. He merely thinks of himself as a “cut-off jeans in the river” type guy, he said.
“I do step back a whole lot and go ‘Wow,’” he admitted. “It’s hard to consider myself famous.”
Shilling is looking forward to his trip home, he said, and plans to escape from the big city, take his shotgun and fishing gear for his Henry County homecoming and simply “disappear into the mountains” with some friends for awhile.
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