For Scott Wolverton, the path to Nashville didn’t begin under bright stage lights or inside a recording studio. It started on a cattle farm in southeast Nebraska — where early mornings, livestock chores and county fairs were simply part of everyday life.
Raised on a cow-calf operation in Seward, Neb., Wolverton grew up immersed in agriculture. He started taking guitar lessons when he was 10. He says music was always there, but it wasn’t always the priority.
“I grew up on a small cattle farm,” Wolverton says. “We have a cow-calf operation back home. I grew up playing music here and there, but it really took the back burner to football, baseball, wrestling, 4-H events, showing cattle and doing all that stuff.”
Agriculture wasn’t just something Wolverton participated in. It was embedded in his family.
“My dad’s a veterinarian back home in Seward. He has a small cow-calf operation, K.A.W. Red Angus, and that’s what we would show cattle through and do all that stuff, 4-H projects,” Wolverton says. “My mom works for 4-H Extension out of Seward County. She helps with after-school programs for kids. She helps the county fair set up, running this county fair, hiring judges, all the livestock shows. She does a lot of that.”
Wolverton, his older brother and twin sister were raised around livestock, showing both Red Angus cattle and horses. It was those experiences on the farm and showing livestock that prepared him for the challenges of building a career in Nashville.
“I feel like I learned a lot about responsibility and work ethic just through working with animals, working with my dad and my siblings on the farm and doing just everyday things out there,” Wolverton says.
A Chance Introduction That Changed Everything
Growing up, Wolverton’s interests were split between 4-H and athletics. Baseball, in particular, became a major focus. In college, he majored in agronomy — a natural extension of his agricultural upbringing — while also pursuing baseball seriously enough that it eventually became his career. Wolverton coached at Hutchinson Community College in Kansas, and during that time, he quietly began recording music on his own.
What he didn’t expect was that a casual connection would open a door he never saw coming. The coaches he worked with introduced him to a man who would eventually become his manager.
That manager, Zach, happened to be in Hutchinson one night when an opportunity surfaced almost out of nowhere — a chance for Wolverton to open for country artist Riley Green in Salt Lake City the very next day.
“I was like, ‘OK, that’s awesome. I don’t know if I’m going to get there. That’s about 21 hours away,’” Wolverton says. “And he said, ‘We’ll just fly you out, and then fly you back on Friday.’ And so I flew out Thursday morning, played the show Thursday night, and flew back on a Friday morning. And I’m back in time for practice that afternoon.”
The experience was fast, surreal and life-altering for a farm kid from Nebraska.
“It was kind of surreal in the moment. The Riley Green thing kind of came out of the blue,” Wolverton says. “And it was one of those things where you’re kind of like, it happened so quickly. In the moment I was kind of like, ‘Is this really where I’m at right now?’ Because it happened in less than 24 hours. I was on a plane and back in Kansas.”
That moment set Wolverton on a new path — one that eventually led him to Nashville and a full-time pursuit of country music. But even as his career shifted, his connection to agriculture never faded.
His Inspiration
Wolverton says his main inspiration as a songwriter comes from home and how he was raised — the work, love and lifestyle he learned growing up around cattle.
“A lot of my inspiration comes from home,” Wolverton says. “It comes from where I grew up, what I grew up doing, that west country life, I guess. It’s very simple, but a lot of it has to do with work ethic, my faith, that kind of lifestyle.”
His Most Personal Song Yet
One of his most personal songs, “Cattleman’s Call,” draws directly from his upbringing and a sound that defined his childhood.
“My dad has always done that cow, the ‘come-boss,’ cattle call, and it’s always been such a fascinating thing to me because growing up as a little kid, you hear your dad scream and you’re like, ‘What was that?’” Wolverton explains. “And then you kind of learn about it, but it’s so amazing the cows always come right when he calls. They’ll perk their heads up and you can see them just start walking because they know they’re going to get taken care of.”
That cattle call became more than a memory. It became a metaphor and a message.
“My parents have been my rock throughout college baseball and just life in general,” he says. “My dad’s always called me and he’s always been very reassuring of, ‘Hey man, if anything ever happens, you fall flat on your face, you can always come home.’ And so, I tried really hard to relate that cattle call to that feeling, and that’s kind of where that inspiration really came from.”
Released last summer, “Cattleman’s Call” serves as both a tribute to his father and a reflection of the values Wolverton learned growing up in agriculture — values that continue to guide him in an industry that demands persistence and grit.
“Working in any branch of agriculture, a lot of it is hard work. It takes a lot of discipline, it takes a lot of hard work, it take a lot know-how or ‘figure it out,’” Wolverton says. “And the music industry is not a whole lot different from that. It’s really difficult. There’s a lot people doing it. You kind of got to find a way to stand out. And I feel very prepared in that way through the hard work and the dedication that I learned through working with animals, through working on the farm.”
From cattle country to country music, Scott Wolverton’s journey is rooted in the land and shaped by the lessons learned on a Nebraska farm. No matter how far the road takes him, the call of home is never far away.
