February 2019

Little Toby Walker

Friday, February 15 at 8 PM

Internationally and nationally acclaimed Toby Walker has been hailed as a roots music fingerstyle guitar wizard. He has toured the US, England, Wales, France, Scotland, Germany, Belgium, Austria, Cyprus, Canada, and Holland. Walker has been featured in The New York Times, the London Sunday Times, the London BBC, Sirius-XM radio and was the first place recipient of the International Blues Challenge Award, Solo division, given out by the Blues Foundation in Memphis, TN. 

Walker blends the styles of blues, ragtime, country, bluegrass, rock and old time jazz into his own unique style.  Jorma Kaukonen of Hot Tuna and the Jefferson Airplane says “Flat out… you have to hear this great musician… I’m blown away” and employed Walker to teach at his famous Fur Peace Ranch Guitar Camp for several years. In 2010 Walker won the NY Music Award for “Best Instrumental CD,” sharing the honors with Mariah Carey, Rufus Wainwright and Judy Collins among many others. Carnegie Hall acknowledged his rare talents and  hired him to augment and teach in their “American Roots” program aimed at honor level middle school students.

Toby’s passion for blues, rags, folk, and other traditional American music drove him to leave an apartment crammed full of recordings, books and instruments for the Mississippi Delta, Virginia and the Carolinas where he tracked down some of the more obscure – but immensely talented – music makers of an earlier era. He learned directly from Eugene Powell, James “Son” Thomas, Etta Baker, and R.L. Burnside, among others. Click here for his fabulous rendition of “The Bootlegger’s Blues.”