Hard work turns Charles Wesley Godwin’s late-discovered talent for music into a growing fan base.
Catch Charles Wesley Godwin August 11, 2024, at the State Fair of West Virginia.
Morgantown singer–songwriter Charles Wesley Godwin’s first paying gig was a lingerie show in Tartu, Estonia.
No lie.
It was during his WVU junior semester abroad. When he and his roommates went out to a club one night, one of them got the room chanting for him to play a song—that turned out to be his first free gig. But a fashion designer who heard it asked him to play at her upcoming show. He got 150 euros, about $200, for 20 minutes. “After that, I was like, I’m going to keep doing this after I get home,” he says. “When I continued on, I realized this is my thing.”
If it seemed to you that Charles Wesley Godwin came out of nowhere in 2023, you just weren’t paying attention. What lifted him to superstar-in-the-making status last year was, on top of undeniable talent, a decade of drive—much of which played out in clubs around Morgantown.
Godwin was born at Mon General to a mom who taught 5th grade at Cheat Lake Elementary and a dad who mined coal for CONSOL and later worked at Swanson Industries. He graduated from Morgantown High in 2010 and went straight to college. “I got a finance degree because, when I was 18, I had no idea what my passions in life were. All I cared about was playing football—which didn’t work out.”
To fill that void, he picked up the guitar. The music came naturally—the songwriting, not so much. “But I took a Victorian literature class that kind of forced the issue,” he says. “I enjoyed the class and took it seriously, and it gave me the skills I needed to translate the ideas in my head onto paper. It helped my songwriting.”
So if the Charles Wesley Godwin who went to Estonia in early 2013 was nursing youthful disappointments, the one who came home that summer had a whole new direction. He started a bluegrass band, Vandalia, with a couple of longtime friends. They played at Chic-n-Bones, Schmitt’s Saloon, and Terra Cafe, and they kept at it after graduation.
And in 2015, Godwin got serious. He started playing solo all the time—at Schmitt’s, at the Regatta Bar and Grille, at Black Bear Burritos. He formed the band Union Sound Treaty, and they recorded the album Next Year in Nashville. And all through 2016 and 2017 he worked, playing in town, in nearby towns, alone, with the band, sometimes a little farther away: a musician who meant to succeed.
In February 2019, Godwin released his solo album Seneca, rich with Appalachian storytelling and a confident folk and country vibe. He’d just gotten married the previous fall, but he toured the album hard across the eastern U.S. When the pandemic shut the clubs down, he wrote, releasing his second album, How the Mighty Fall, in September 2021. He toured that album in 2022 as far away as California—maybe you caught him here in the Ruby Summer Concert Series.
All of that led to a terrific 2023. Named a breakthrough artist to watch by Amazon Music in January, Godwin played the Grand Ole Opry in February, then toured the club and festival circuit, firing up crowds for Zach Bryan and headlining sold-out shows from Atlanta to Los Angeles. In September, he released his third album, Family Ties. Four sold-out hometown shows in December capped off a blockbuster year.
Today’s success is a reward to hard work and risks taken. Godwin feels like he can spend more time at home with his family and do right by his backing band, The Allegheny High—Al Torrence and Eric Dull on guitar, Nate Catanzarite on bass, Max Somerville on keyboard, and Joe Pinchotti on drums. “They left full-time jobs and the security of having a 9 to 5 to come on the road with me in 2021, and I love them for doing that,” Godwin says. “It feels good to be able to take better care of my guys and everybody involved.”
But the success does not surprise him.
“We were starting to fill up the rooms in 2021, and we were selling out clubs all across the country in 2022, so 2023 felt like a natural progression,” he says. “We experienced a full-on arena tour for the first time, and me and the guys did a good job getting folks fired up for those Zach shows.”
2024 started strong, with an incandescent Rolling Stone review and a performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Godwin and the band have a new challenge this year, opening in
stadiums for Luke Combs. “We’re going to do our best to fill all that real estate,” he says,
“the giant stage and the catwalks and everything, and put on a show for folks.” You can catch them at the State Fair of West Virginia in Lewisburg in August 2024. charleswgodwin.com, @charlesgodwinmusic on FB
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