Coast Guard retiree turned musician, Bobby BlackHat, after experiencing “Richneck,” is now singing about his “Broke Knees”
By Joel Rubin
During his often daring 27-year career in the Coast Guard, Robert Stanley Walters rescued countless stranded boaters in heavy seas, but nothing frightened him more than a text he received on January 6, 2023. It directed him to retrieve his granddaughter from Richneck Elementary in Newport News, where a six-year-old had just shot his teacher.
“I rushed up there,” he recalls. “It was terrible.”
But ironically for Walters, AKA Bobby BlackHat, one of the area’s premier blues musicians, it wasn’t his first connection with the horrors of school violence.
“Most of what I write about is what I hear and see and experience,” he explains, which is why he recorded “HRBT Blues” as a joke after enduring a two-hour delay at our infamous bridge tunnel, and then later, at the urging of fans, the “Capital Beltway Blues.”
But his music took a serious turn in 2018 following the Parkland, Florida massacre that took the lives of 17 students. He composed two haunting songs, “Run Baby Run” and “Another Mass Shooting,” because, as he says, “I will never understand why these horrible things happen.”
His love affair with music began with a random purchase in his native Cleveland.
“I bought two harmonicas, not really knowing how to play them,” he remembers.
He learned enough, though, to show up at Goodfellas in Hampton for an open mic night in 2000. Nervous, he was told to “play what you feel, you’ll get it.”
He did, leading a patron to tell him, “I want to hire you and your band.” Bobby replied, “I have no band.”
Undeterred, he gathered some players and before long, he was accepting gigs and finding his niche, thanks to a black hat he wore that became his stage name and constant companion.
As for singing? “I had only done that in choir, so I had to develop that skill, too.”
Now a complete package, Bobby B’s reputation began to spread. He has opened for the likes of B.B. King, Delbert McClinton, Patti Labelle and Ramsey Lewis and performed with Eddie Shaw, Tas Cru, Ruthie Foster and Mick Kolassa.
Bobby has won national and local awards, including the 2016 Song of the Year (for “HRBT Blues”) from VEER Magazine. He recently received the prestigious VEER Magazine “Musicians Musician Award.”
His wife Joy, adult children, and now grandchildren have recorded and/or shared the stage with him. Last summer he shared Virginia Beach’s 31st Street stage with a full orchestra, Symphonicity. “I would like to do that again.”
His latest creation is very personal, a chronicle of this past January’s left knee replacement, to complement the one done 12 years ago on his right knee. The song and video, which captures him in the hospital and in PT, is called “Broke Knee Blues”:
“Knee bones grindin’ in the morning
Snap, snap, snap at noon,
Oh my knees hurt when I walk,
That’s why I wrote this tune.
Doctor Doctor, please heal my pain,
Doctor said, “Mr. BlackHat,
you need a new knee,
Bionic Blues Man you will be.”
He is following the medical pros’ advice in terms of resuming performing. When he does, he’ll find ample empathy in audiences, given that there are 790,000 total knee replacements in the U.S. annually, and recovery is no picnic. “The soreness after surgery was excruciating at times, but I got through the worst of it.”
While recovering, Bobby is writing more fun stuff like his earlier “Robocall Blues” and serious numbers such as “Blues For Ukraine,” and “Vaxed to the Max”. They’re all on his website. But to appreciate his act, you must see Bobby live.
As he says, “You never know what’s gonna happen at a Bobby BlackHat show, because we bring other artists up on the stage and let’s face it, a lot of blues is improvised.” So make a date to catch Bobby BlackHat this summer. During a “break,” ask about his “broke” knee, and if you’re suffering, tell him about yours. The Bionic Blues Man gets it.
Learn more at bobbyblackhat.com.
Joel Rubin
