North Myrtle Beach man to audition for “America’s Got Talent’”

A North Myrtle Beach man will be at the Charlotte Convention Center Friday to flash a talent he expresses through his creations: playing the flute.

Paul Wilson said he received an invitation three weeks ago to audition for producers of NBC-TV’s “America’s Got Talent,” the seventh season of which will air this summer.

“They called me back last Friday to make sure I was still going,” Wilson said Wednesday.

Sharing his American Indian heritage, Wilson voiced his hopes of forging a path to perform on the show, which he and wife Virginia Wilson watch every season, a summertime series.

“I’ll be the first Native American flute player they’ve had,” he said.

Wilson figured that a couple of web videos he posted, showing his musical skills on a Native American flute, had caught the attention of show producers.

“I had put a couple of things on YouTube,” he said, “to try to increase my business. ... That’s how they found me.”

Wilson makes all his own instruments for sale through his family store, Golden Hawk Trading, 210 22nd Ave. N., North Myrtle Beach (www.goldenhawknativeflutes.com).

‘Going through the roof’

While growing up in Lake Waccamaw, N.C., he was first exposed to “Native American flutes” when he was 5 or 6 years old, and he starting carving them 15 years ago. He said as recently as eight to 10 years ago, he knew of only “a handful of Native American flute makers like myself,” but the instrument’s popularity continues “going through the roof.”

On average, he said crafting a flute takes a day and a half, and on the wood on top of the instrument, he carves designs such as wolves, bears, eagles and pretty much anything you want.”

“I have been into hand carving for so long that I could do a wolf in 10 minutes right there as you watch,” he said.

Special orders stream in, and every flute he builds is tuned to a certain key, Wilson said.

“Probably 60 percent of our sales are overseas,” Wilson said, enumerating the United Kingdom and Australia as popular destinations. ”We have flutes in probably every corner of the world.”

Wilson practices his chops on flutes every day.

“It works your lungs and your breathing,” he said.

Wilson said “Amazing Grace” and “Taps” remain popular numbers to play.

“I play a lot of old, traditional Native American songs,” he said. “I do some contemporary songs, too, so the public can see their use in various types of music.”

Flutes play parts in multiple music genres, such as jazz by the late Herbie Mann, as well as Men At Work’s “Down Under,” the late Phyllis Hyman’s “You Know How to Love Me,” and Walt Parazaider’s solo in the final minute of Chicago’s “Colour My World.”

Wilson said this winter, he wants to start swinging by schools, nursing homes and other community sites to give demonstrations of his instrument.

“The kids,” the father of two grown daughters said, “they really seem to appreciate it.”

Wilson said he planned to take four flutes for the “America’s Got Talent” tryout, “because I got to have a backup.”