While the Aug. 2 Back Door Coffeehouse will be welcoming the return of one of its favorite performers, a classical guitarist will be saying goodbye to the Hub City.
Grammy winner Tricia Walker, who serves as a mentor to aspiring artists at Delta State University, has written and performed with some of Nashville’s royalty. She counts the Back Door Coffeehouse as one of her favorite venues.
To open for Walker is classical guitarist Rodrigo Lara Alonso, who will be bidding his friends in Hattiesburg farewell as he assumes a new teaching position in Cleveland, Ohio.
Doors open at 7 p.m. at University Baptist Church, 3200 Arlington Loop. Childcare is available and the show starts at 7:30. The coffeehouse remains a donations-only event.
According to an article in “Southern Rambler,” Walker started her musical career at an early age in Fayette. She grew up learning the piano, and then she got her first guitar after seeing the Beatles on the Ed Sullivan Show.
“I was in my first rock ’n’ roll band when I was 13,” she said. “We were called the Mishaps and made about 35 cents each on our first gig.”
After gigs around Jackson, she went to Nashville.
“I moved in 1980 and stayed for 26 years,” she said. “I got into performing, production and publishing along with songwriting. I was in Connie Smith’s band and played the Grand Ole Opry. Roy Acuff came to the barbecues at my house and sat on the porch and sang ‘Wabash Cannonball.’ I worked with Paul Overstreet and played keyboards and sang backup for Shania Twain during the early part of her career.”
She started Women in the Round at Bluebird Cafe with Karen Staley, Ashley Cleveland and Pam Tillis.
“Nashville was the right place for me because the songwriting community was very supportive,” she said. “I enjoy storytelling songs and wrote for Ford Music for five years and then was signed to Polygram. Kostas Lazarides and I wrote ‘Looking in the Eyes of Love’ that was recorded by Patty Loveless, but won a Grammy for Best Performance for Allison Krauss. Faith Hill also cut one of my songs. Writers want great artists to do their songs.”
In 2006, she built an entertainment and music industry program at Delta State. The Grammy Museum Mississippi opened in Cleveland in March.
“Bob Santelli, the executive director of the Grammy Museum, understood the blues and that much of American music comes from a southern triangle centered around here and many Grammy winners have come from Mississippi,” she said. “They wanted it on a college campus with a recording program and our leaders were on board and we got the support, raised the money and got the museum here.”
The state has a blues reputation around the world.
“Mississippi has an authenticity that you cannot replicate,” Walker said. “People want to find something real, like Po Monkey’s juke joint, and they want to touch it before it is gone. You can fuss at us and point at us, but you don’t have what we have here. People don’t know why they come back, but they come back.”
To reserve a close table, please email us your name and number in your party to: coffeehouse@ubchm.org or call or text David Walker at 601-520-1589.
