Walter "Buddy Boy" Hawkins, country blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter, years active 1927–1929.
Hawkins represents one of the most fascinating lacunae in the history of the blues. It is rumoured that he was raised around Blythville, Mississippi, but what minimal research has been undertaken has never produced anything conclusive. What is certain is that he was a unique performer who used a guitar style and vocal delivery that have defied categorization. He recorded 12 tracks for Paramount between 1927 (Chicago) and 1929 (Richmond, Indiana), much prized by collectors, that featured his oddly constructed blues, rag tunes and the peculiar ‘Voice Throwing Blues’ which gave rise to speculation that he may have been a medicine show ventriloquist. Evidence from his songs certainly seems to indicate that he was a rambler or hobo.
* * *
By Jason Ankeny
The scant discography of Walter "Buddy Boy" Hawkins reveals one of the most distinctive country-blues performers of the pre-war era, a gifted vocalist whose taste for slow, dirge-like songs was ideally suited to his intricate guitar work. Almost nothing is known about the singer; various attempts to determine his date and place of birth have resulted in countless chronological and geographical inconsistencies, although the consenus places him as a product of either Alabama or the northern Delta region. Between 1927 and 1929, Hawkins recorded a dozen tracks for Paramount, many of them portraits of trains and life on the railroad (another possible piece of the puzzle); in any case, these sessions are the only surviving document of his music, and his subsequent activities remain a mystery.