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         Big Walter  The Thunderbird

 

 

For 5 decades, Big Walter, known as The Thunderbird, has been making records.   Born in Gonzales, Texas in 1914, Walter Price started his music career in 1954.  He has recorded for T-N-T Records, Peacock, Goldband and other record labels with many hits along the way.  Shirley Jean, Git to Gettin’, If The Blues Was Money, Pack Fair and Square, are just a few.

 

Big Walter is a true living legend of the music industry.  His boogie-woogie piano style helped set and define the tempo of early Rock and Roll; Elvis Presley, Little Richard, and Jerry Lee Lewis were Big Walter’s early contemporaries.

 

Over these past 50 years of writing, recording and performing, Big Walter has worked with numerous blues legends.  Among them are: Bo Diddley, Little Richard, Chuck Berry, B.B. King, Jimmy Reed, Muddy Waters, John Lee Hooker, Gatemouth Brown, Fats Domino, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Juke Boy Bonner, Koko Taylor, Buddy Ace, T-Bone Walker, Albert Collins, Johnny Clyde Copeland, Big Mama Thornton, Texas blues stalwart Jerry Lightfoot, Joe Hughes, Peppermint Harris, jazz great Arnett Cobb, Pete Mayes, the dynamic Houston based vocalist Trudy Lynn, Texas Johnny Brown, Calvin Owens, Grady Gaines and Bobby Bland.

 

In mid-career, his insistence of being treated fairly angered record companies, booking agencies and venue operators.  He found himself being passed over while other people profited from his music. Years of legal actions stopped many, but the lawyers were the only winners. In fact, until his own recent releases, almost all of the Big Walter recordings on the market today are not properly licensed.

 

Still robust at the age of 90, Big Walter is again releasing his music to the world. At his 90th birthday party at the Continental Club in Houston, Texas, he played and sang many of the songs on his new CD releases "Tell Me" and "Pain In My Heart” to an appreciative audience.

 

Big Walter has been shown appreciation for his accomplishments by the City of Houston on numerous occasions.  Congresswoman, Sheila Jackson Lee, has also recognized his achievements.  He has acted in films and on stage and has been the subject of a cover story for Living Blues magazine (January ’97) among other periodicals, books, encyclopedias and media write-ups.

 

 

 

Big Walter may possibly be, the oldest blues singer/songwriter living on this continent and maybe the planet.  It would take a considerable amount of time and space to expand on the life of this extraordinary and talented human being.  All blues lovers should take a moment to listen and give this gentleman the “ear” he so well deserves. 

 

Big Walter The Thunderbird, the bird that flies so swift from coast to coast, is one of the last survivors of the blues’ golden age.  One day they’ll all be gone as so many already are.  Take a seat and enjoy the true essence of the blues for no matter where you are, be it America, Canada, Germany, France, Holland, Poland, England, Belgium, South America or Japan you can always find Big Walter singing the blues for you.

 

 

John Tolman & R. Carter

2004