The people we think we know will surprise us, particularly after they’re gone.
Charlie Tee (Tuitt) was a familiar face, a regular on the Charleston music scene for decades, most notably as a member of The Carpenter Ants, one of the city’s best known local bands.
He also kept a kite in the backseat of his car.
His wife, Lynn, said they always took a kite with them whenever they went anywhere. It was one of the many quirky things about her husband.
“One of our friends asked him about that,” she said.
Charlie told him, “You never know when it’s going to be a kite flying kind of day.”
Lynn said she and Charlie had plenty of kite flying days together. They used to take their dogs to the park to run around and break out the kites to fly on warm, breezy days.
Friends who remembered the kites in Charlie’s car dropped off a couple of kites recently. Lynn didn’t say when she’d get around to flying them.
Charlie died in December from complications due to COVID-19. A tribute show, organized by guitarist Michael Lipton of The Carpenter Ants, is scheduled for March 5 at the Alban Arts Center in St. Albans.
The show will feature performances by many local musicians who knew and loved Charlie, including The Carpenter Ants, members of the “Mountain Stage” house band, members of Stratus and singer/songwriter John Ellison.
A second tribute show is scheduled for April 2 at The Empty Glass.
Lipton said, “There were a lot of people who were interested in taking part. The second show will probably feature some other performers.”
Lynn said Charlie would’ve had a big laugh about the tribute shows.
“He was so humble,” she said. “He never took himself seriously.”
Charlie Tuitt was born in New York City. His father was a Muslim, a faith Charlie converted to his in his early teens.
Though his mother wasn’t Muslim, she supported the spiritual path he’d taken and made sure he went to services.
He attended an all-black military school in Virginia in the 1960s before eventually coming to West Virginia, where he studied at West Virginia State University.
“He was so proud of that,” Lynn said.
After he graduated, Charlie worked various jobs before landing employment with the Kanawha County Public Library, where he eventually retired.
In the early 1990s, he was one of several musicians who wandered through the front door of The Empty Glass and sat in with Lipton. A band formed around the regulars, including drummer Jupie Little and bassist Ted Harrison, which became The Carpenter Ants.
“He started off just playing saxophone, but then gravitated to the front to sing,” Lipton said.
Charlie became the de facto lead singer for the band for years, though occasionally bowed out because of health problems.
“He went through a laundry list of illnesses,” Lipton said. “He had his thyroid removed. He was diabetic and then on dialysis for something like 12 years.”
Charlie took dialysis every other day. When the band toured, they often had to get the singer to dialysis treatments early in morning before heading off to their next destination and then performing that night.
It was even worse when the band performed overseas.
Lipton said it was a very difficult thing for Charlie to have to go through.
“But he never complained about it,” he said.
Lynn said she’d known Charlie since the 1970s, but they didn’t start dating until much later in life.
“Our first date was in December of 2014,” she said. “And it was the worst.”
Married before, Lynn said that after a series of bad dates, she’d posted on Facebook, “My God, are there any nice guys out there are who aren’t barflies?”
Charlie contacted her and asked her out.
At first, Lynn thought Charlie was up to something. She thought he was married, but he explained that his wife, Vickie, had died in 2010.
He wanted to get to know Lynn better, but Charlie hadn’t been out on a date in years. He fumbled and bumbled through their evening, which ended with Lynn slamming a car door and stomping away.
They met again a month later. Lynn, who is Jewish, went with her congregation to an open house at the Islamic Center where Charlie attended services.
Charlie apologized for how things went on their date, said he’d just been so nervous. He begged for a second chance.
“We played backgammon at Taylor Books and had dinner at Little India,” she said.
It was magical. After that, they were practically inseparable and married in 2016.
Charlie’s health continued to decline. In 2017, he had his lower left leg amputated. Diabetes had led to the bones in his left foot painfully dissolving.
Lipton said he and the rest of the band were always a little amazed at Charlie’s resilience.
“He would have these medical issues come up and then be gone for a month or two to recover,” Lipton said. “Sometimes, when he came back, he’d struggle, and we’d wonder whether he could keep this up.”
In 2019, he got a kidney transplant and his health seemed to finally turn around.
Lynn said, “That changed everything. With the kidney, he wasn’t diabetic, and it was probably the best he’d felt since he was a child.”
Touring with The Carpenter Ants was easier and when the band went to Slovakia, Lynn said her husband really got to enjoy the travel.
“He loved being part of the band and with the boys,” she said.
Lipton and Charlie were friends beyond the band. Lipton said they spent time together, but that Charlie’s life was sort of compartmentalized. He was part of several very different communities.
“I talked to a guy who told me he knew Charlie from the library in St. Albans,” Lipton said. “He said Charlie used to help him with his term papers. I knew he made a trip to Princeton to take some kids to some sort of music thing.”
Lipton added, “I think he did a lot of things like that. He just didn’t broadcast them.”
Lynn said she and her husband helped out where they could. They brought snacks and blankets to the dialysis center. The room, Lynn said, was cold and dialysis makes people hungry.
“They were our people,” she said.
Bassist Kevin Kidd worked with Charlie in the audio-visual department at Kanawha County Public Library.
Kid said, “Tee heard a tape of my bass playing and said he knew the exact musician I should be playing with.”
They met up at a bar in Dunbar, where Spurgie Hankins was playing.
“I ended up playing with the band all night,” Kidd said.
The bassist has been part of the Spurgie Hankins band for 22 years.
“Charlie Tee changed the trajectory of my musical life, the best part of my life,” Kidd said.
During the pandemic, public performances all but vanished. Lynn said she and Charlie stayed home for a year. They were cautious. They wore masks and got vaccinated.
“We did everything we were supposed to do,” she said. “We were wearing masks even after everybody else was stopping. We wore masks and gloves.”
A few days before Thanksgiving, they both began to feel ill. Lynn made a big Thanksgiving meal, but neither of them felt like eating. On that Saturday, a rapid test told them they had COVID. By the middle of the following week, Charlie was in the hospital.
“I stayed home for about a week,” Lynn said. “Charlie just got worse.”
The singer died a week before Christmas, though the doctor said Charlie had passed before life support was turned off.
“It was the most horrible thing,” Lynn said. “I held his hand for four minutes and then he was just gone.”
A little time has passed since Charlie’s passing. It’s easier to talk about him now, but still not easy. They were very happy, particularly those last couple of years when Charlie’s health had improved so much.
“We used to laugh so much,” she said. “He would sing to me in the morning when I woke up, but he’d sing like Mr. Miyagi (played by actor Pat Morita) from the ‘Karate Kid.’”
She laughed as she remembered, adding, “Who does that?”
“We had the best time,” Lynn said. “He was my best friend. I miss him.”
“Tribute to our brother Charlie Tee”
WHERE: Alban Arts Center, 65 Olde Main Plz, St. Albans
TICKETS: Donations accepted
