Eddie Walker is a British folk and acoustic guitarist and singer from the North East of England. He is known for songs and performances drawing on blues, ragtime, hillbilly, old-time and country material, alongside original writing.

Background

Walker grows up in the North East of England and remains based there. In his early years he is drawn to folk and country music through school lessons, radio listening and television, and he takes up a second-hand acoustic guitar. His early repertoire includes Irish rebel songs and old Scottish ballads, which he performs in folk clubs across the Teesside area.

He studies and performs the work of songwriters and traditional artists such as Ewan MacColl, Tom Paxton, Phil Ochs, Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie, and he also hears and absorbs the music of Nigel Denver, Carolyn Hester and Joan Baez. Festivals further widen his interests, including performances and influences from Tom Rush, Alex Campbell, Trevor Lucas, Martin Carthy, Rev. Gary Davis, Stefan Grossman, Mississippi John Hurt, Big Bill Broonzy, Blind Willie McTell, Steve Goodman and John Prine.

Career as a performer

Walker’s first paid booking takes place in 1967, when he is 18. He teams up with guitarist and bassist Frank Porter and supports Tiny Tim and Long John Baldry at local nightclubs. He also appears on the club tent at Cambridge and develops a professional career that becomes more established in 1980.

His performances cover a broad range of American roots styles, including bluegrass, old-time, hillbilly, country blues and ragtime. In the 1980s he begins touring beyond Britain, later performing in Belgium, Holland, Germany, Italy, Croatia, Slovenia, Ireland, Denmark, Austria, Switzerland and Luxembourg. He also makes repeated trips to Hong Kong, appears at the Auckland Festival in New Zealand, and becomes a regular presence at the Edinburgh Fringe.

Songwriting and recognition

In 1975 Walker’s song North Road wins the Northumbria Trophy for Songwriting at the Newcastle Festival. The following year he is runner-up in the North West Folk Songwriting competition at Poynton Folk Club, and he also wins the Second Edale Bluegrass Festival guitar competition. His songwriting brings him a television appearance on a Tyne Tees programme, where Stolen My Heart Away is selected from a large number of entries and is broadcast with orchestral backing.

He also contributes music to Stockton Council’s pageant for the 150th celebrations of the Stockton and Darlington Railway in 1975, and later returns to North Road for the railway’s 175th anniversary album A Full Head Of Steam.

Recordings and albums

Walker’s first album, Everyday Man, is released in 1978, followed by Castle Cafe in 1981. The title track of Castle Cafe is written after a tour in the Szczecin area of Poland with Chris Rea. In 1983 he releases Red Shoes On My Feet on his own label, Ragged Records, and presents a theatre show of the same name at the Edinburgh Folk Festival and the Aberdeen Alternative Music Festival.

His fourth solo album, Picking My Way, appears in 1985 and is dedicated to Steve Goodman. It continues his mix of old country blues, rags, hillbilly songs and original pieces. He later works in partnership with John James in the stage project Carolina Shout!, a seven-year collaboration beginning in 1988. The pair record two albums, Carolina Shout! and Sidesteppin’, released on Stoptime Recordings.

After Carolina Shout! ends in 1995, Walker returns to solo work and releases the video concert album Live At The Albert Hole!, recorded at the Albert Inn Folk Club in Bedminster, Bristol. He also issues Mind To Ramble, which reflects a more developed vocal style.

Stage work and repertoire

Walker’s show Red Shoes On My Feet focuses on early 20th-century guitar-picking singers and players, both black and white, and places them in the lineage that leads to Elvis Presley. His repertoire includes material associated with Jimmie Rodgers, The Carter Family, Merle Travis and Doc Watson, as well as songs by Broonzy, Hurt, McTell, Gary Davis and Blind Arthur Blake. With John James, he performs a wide-ranging set that includes material associated with the Louvin Brothers, Hank Williams, Chuck Berry and Bobby Vee.

Later work

Walker keeps returning to clubs in the North East, especially in Durham, Tyneside and North Yorkshire, and continues to perform as a solo artist. His work remains rooted in blues, rags and hillbilly songs, alongside his own compositions and instrumental pieces.