Education and Early Career
Shelton studied voice with Robert Grayson at Louisiana State University and then at Yale University on the graduate level. He made his professional opera debut in 1994 while still at LSU as Tamino in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Die Zauberflöte with Baton Rouge Opera. That same year he played the roles of Frederic in The Pirates of Penzance, the Second Composer in The Great Waltz and the Second Waiter in Giuditta with Ohio Light Opera. In 1995 he sang the role of Dino in the world premiere of George Chadwick's The Padrone with the Waterbury Symphony at the Thomaston Opera House.
In 1997 Shelton sang the role of Alfredo in Yale University's production of Giuseppe Verdi's La traviata. That same year he was awarded a Richard F. Gold Career Grant by the Shoshana Foundation and became a member of the Young Artist Program at the Central City Opera where he debuted in the role of Hayes in Carlisle Floyd's Susannah. He returned there in 1998 to sing the roles of Reverend Paris in Robert Ward's The Crucible and Cavaradossi in Tosca. He joined the Wolf Trap Opera Company's Young Artist Program for the Summer of 1999, performing there in the roles of Tom Rakewell in The Rake's Progress, the High priest of Neptune in Idomeneo, and Monostatos in The Magic Flute. That same year he sang the role of Laërte in Ambroise Thomas's Hamlet with Washington Concert Opera. In 2000 he was awarded a Richard Tucker Career Grant.
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