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YOUR Independent Community Newspaper THURSDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2017
Vol. 5 Edition 40
Fall colours on display
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Blues icon to play Chatham By Bruce Corcoran bruce@chathamvoice.com
Mary Beth Corcoran/The Chatham Voice
A collective sigh of relief can be heard around the area now that the weather is a little cooler than the recent heat wave and fall is the air. Gearing up for Thanksgiving and Halloween, Sarah’s Farm Market on Park Avenue in Chatham has pumpkins, gourds, potted mums and their popular Fall Harvest Combo which is a straw bale, corn stalk and a pumpkin, on display.
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Joe Louis Walker’s credentials speak for themselves – Grammy nominee, member of the Blues Hall of Fame, and a man who’s played with the likes of Willie Dixon, Muddy Waters, B.B. King and John Lee Hooker. The 67-year-old blues icon is bringing his credentials, as well as his heart, soul and band, to Chatham Oct. 14 as a guest of the Canada South Blues Society, Chatham-Kent. He’s performing at the KBDC Club on Byng Avenue in Chatham. Walker, 67, despite being born in San Francisco, has the blues in his blood. He first picked up a guitar at the young age of eight. “What got me into music was my mom and dad. They loved music,” he said. “He (Dad) wanted to do that (perform), but he had a family. He weaned me on music.” Walker said his blues sound is “all over the place,” and is an amalgamation of all the influences he grew up with, from gospel music, a variety of blues, and rock ’n’ roll.
“I’m a product of my generation and my environment and I’m proud of it,” he said. Blues music has come a long way over the years, and increased its listener base. The blues trace back to the 19th century, birthed on southern plantations along the Mississippi River. Its roots are embedded in the soil tilled and worked by African-American sharecroppers. “It’s really survivors’ music. It’s the original rebel music,” Walker said. “You could say things in a blues song you couldn’t say to your boss or of your position in life. “The playing field was equal. It was cathartic for people who invented it because they didn’t have a voice.” The Beatles and the Rolling Stones first broke into the music business playing blues covers. “They were rebels,” he said of the British bands. “Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry – they spoke to their souls.” Today, Walker said all races, genders and cultures are blues fans, as “it transcends language.”
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