Page 26 - BiTS_05_MAY_2025

Eddie Boyd - the gentle piano man

by

John Holmes

I must admit to always having had a soft spot for the music of Eddie Boyd - at least

since I saw him perform at The
Eddie Boyd Marquee Club, in Wardour Street, on
16th January 1968. He was the first

genuine US bluesman I saw, and was
supposed to be backed by
Fleetwood Mac, but they were
recording a BBC session, so The

Aynsley Dunbar Retaliation stepped
in at the last moment, and did a
sterling job. Having been a ‘full on’

blues fan for getting on for a couple
of years it was quite magical to see
Eddie Boyd - a man who not only

played the blues, but had lived it all
his life. As with so many of those
who toured the UK, he must have been surprised by the knowledge of his music, and

love shown to him by the British audiences.

Although probably not as well known as Otis Spann, Memphis Slim and Champion
Jack Dupree, Boyd was an understated pianist, with a fine, often plaintive voice and

a gentlemanly demeanour.

Eddie was a true Mississippi bluesman, having been born on Stovall’s Plantation,

near Clarksdale, in November 1914 - either the 13th or the 25th, depending upon
whether you go by his birth certificate, or the date his parents told him he was born!
This was sharecropping country, in the heart of the Delta.

His father William was a guitar player - “but I didn’t learn no blues from him because
he was always out on location. He played juke joints. He would make as much money
in one night as the average man would in six days. But he wasn’t the one who inspired
me you know, that was Roosevelt Sykes and Leroy Carr”.

For much of his younger childhood he was looked after by his paternal Grandfather,
being at school until aged 11, after which time he worked in the cotton fields, planting

and picking - returning to school when the cotton was growing. One of his school
friends was McKinley Morganfield (Muddy Waters) who was also a distant cousin.
They remained close throughout the rest of their lives.