Green Eyed Girl By Ted Hawkins
Ted Hawkins was an American singer-songwriter. He was born in Biloxi, Mississippi on 28 October 1936 and died on 1 January 1995, aged 58.
Hawkins was an enigmatic figure through most of his career; he split his time between his adopted hometown of Venice Beach, California where he was a mostly anonymous street performer, and Europe, where he and his songs were better known and well received in clubs and small concert halls.
Born into a poor family in Mississippi, Hawkins lived a difficult early life, ending up at a reform school by age 12, and drifting, hitching, and stealing his way across the country for the next dozen years, earning several stays in prison including a 3-year stint for stealing a leather jacket as a teenager. Along the way, he picked up a love of music and a talent for the guitar. After reform school, he ended up in the state penitentiary and was released at 19. "Then I heard a singer whose name was Sam Cooke. His voice did something to me." In the middle of the mid 1960s folk music boom Hawkins set out for California to try for a professional singing career. He recorded several tunes without commercial success, worked at odd jobs, and took up busking along the piers and storefronts of Venice Beach as a way to supplement his income. Hawkins made ends meet by developing a small following of locals and tourists who would come to hear this southern black man, sitting on an overturned milk-crate, play blues and folk standards as well as a few original tunes in his signature open guitar tuning and raspy vocal style (Hawkins claimed the rasp in his voice came from the damage done by years of singing in the sand and spray of the boardwalk). A series of record producers and promoters would "discover" Hawkins over the years, only to be thwarted by circumstance and Hawkins' unconventional approach to life. Andy Kershaw encouraged Hawkins to come to the UK, and he moved to Bridlington in 1986 and enjoyed his first taste of real musical success, touring Europe and Asia as a well-known performer even while he remained anonymous in his home country.
During this period Hawkins stayed largely out of trouble and refined his unique musical style: a mixture of folk, country, deep southern spirituals, and soul music. Hawkins' music was informed by but did not resemble blues music (Hawkins himself claimed he could not play the blues because his damaged fretting hand—he wore a leather glove to protect his fingers—would not allow him to bend notes).
Despite his recognition and fame in Europe, Hawkins was restless and moved back to California in the early 1990s and again took on the role of a street performer. Several musicians and promoters encouraged Hawkins to record, but he did so only on occasion and without much enthusiasm, until he agreed to record a full album for Geffen Records and producer Tony Berg. Berg added crack session musicians to Hawkins' typical solo guitar-and-vocal arrangements for the first time and brought national attention and respectable sales to Hawkins (though Hawkins, in typically contrary fashion, claimed to dislike the result, preferring his unaccompanied versions). Hawkins began to tour on the basis of this success, commenting that he had finally reached an age where he was glad to be able to sing indoors, out of the weather, and for an appreciative crowd. Hawkins, however, died of a stroke at the age of only 58 just a few months after the release of his breakthrough recording.
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