INTERVIEWER: Oh, you want to start by saying good morning. Just thank you so much for being here and giving us your time.
WALTER BEASLEY: Oh man, my pleasure, brother.
INTERVIEWER: So, okay, before we start—tell us, how are you doing today?
WALTER BEASLEY: I'm doing well. You know, I got up a bit later than I usually do. I usually wake up around four in the morning every day. That started when my father began taking me out to the fields in El Centro to work. Yeah, I wasn’t very good at it, but for two years, he took me out to pick watermelons. I thought I had it bad—up before 5 a.m., and I would also sing with a group at night on weekends until two in the morning. But my father made me get up and go to the fields the next day. That probably wouldn’t be legal now.
But I learned the value of hard work. I applied the work ethic I learned in the fields—getting up early when no one else was—to my career. And also to music, along with the lessons I learned from Coach Ralph Valdez, who is still alive and doing well, from what I understand. I applied all those principles to music.
INTERVIEWER: Oh, wow. All right, let’s start by talking about your early upbringing here in the Valley. What was that like, growing up?
WALTER BEASLEY: Well, the first part of my childhood, I was in what the Black community calls the East Side. We moved from there to the North Side, which was predominantly Hispanic—mostly first-generation Spanish-speaking families. And I didn’t know a word of Spanish. I still remember walking into school one day, and people were extremely nice to me. But, you know, it was the '60s, man.
There was a lot going on. You had the Farm Workers movement and people split up into different camps. It was a very interesting time. When we moved to the North Side, I didn’t know anyone. My father knew a few people. It was an adjustment because I lost all of my home base on the East Side and had to start over on the North Side.
But I got to experience the culture, learn a new language, and build great friendships. Some of my homies from that time are still close friends. I still have a house there—well, my parents' house. My sister lives there now. And my aunt is still in the same house we grew up in because my father made me promise to take care of her before he passed. So I still have strong ties to that area.
Growing up there was great because I had great mentors from both the Black and Brown communities. Musically, I was able to learn R&B and jazz, and I joined a band when I was 13 or 14 years old called Jose Andres.
There was a guy named Jojo who was the best saxophone player in the Valley. He played with El León, and it was commonly known that they made money playing music. That’s what I wanted—to make money and to learn different styles.
The senior member of the group, Alice Morales Sr., taught me how to sing in Spanish and how to phrase things properly—how the meaning of words shifted depending on where you placed them. I couldn’t bring too much R&B expression into boleros because those songs required discipline.
So I learned the discipline of Black music and the discipline of Latin music at the same time. You couldn’t ask for a better musical upbringing than that.
INTERVIEWER: Yeah, it sounds like a melting pot of different cultures coming together.
WALTER BEASLEY: Exactly. And even now, I sometimes slip into Spanish. You probably got me a bit in that rhythm just now. But yeah, that’s how we did it. A lot of the Black families on the North Side spoke Spanish too, so it was important to learn.
It’s kind of interesting we're doing this interview now because some of the same cultural tensions from back then still exist. I remember going to school, and friends of mine—who I was very close to—would get teased or targeted by others. That kind of stuff still breaks my heart.
These were my friends—my brothers. And it was painful to see people being treated differently based on how they looked or what community they came from.
INTERVIEWER: Wow. I want to ask an older question now—how were your high school years? Was there a turning point between starting and finishing high school that shaped your future?
WALTER BEASLEY: Yes. I had a mentor named Mr. Jimmy Cannon. He pretty much raised me musically. Before he passed, he told me, “You have to prepare for the world before you leave El Centro.” He included other teachers and community members in that vision too.
He was our marching band coach and also taught jazz band. He believed in physical fitness, so we would march three to four miles early in the morning, then have jazz band practice, then go to school. We were like little athletes in marching band uniforms. That discipline followed me from elementary school through high school.
In El Centro, there wasn’t a lot to do, so you had to create your own challenges—to either better yourself or fall into street stuff. I was able to bypass most of that.
I remember a conversation my dad had with me around age 14 or 15. He said, “There’s a guy named Ricky Williams—one of the best athletes in the Valley. One year, Ricky disappeared from the scene. Turned out, he was just practicing and dedicating himself. And look at him now.”
That stuck with me. I went to my room on the North Side thinking, “Well, shoot—if he can do it, I can too.”
My older brother’s youngest son, Eric Cannon, was a professional musician—much more conservative than I was. Whenever I was about to get into trouble, I’d look at Eric, and he’d just give me that look, like, “You know better.” That was my homie.
But yeah, even in high school, we were kids playing grown-up music—R&B, rock. By the time I got to college, I was already very good.
The Imperial Valley prepared me to be the best I could be. I went on to sell over a million units and teach thousands of students, both at the college level and privately. I still teach online. Not as much now because I’m older and focusing on producing music, but that discipline from high school shaped everything.
INTERVIEWER: Wow. That’s a powerful journey.
WALTER BEASLEY: Yeah, and I had great teachers—like Mr. Dorman. I failed his class my senior year. I went to him and said, “I know I failed.” He said, “Don’t worry, Walter. I’m going to push you through this. But you better make the Valley proud.”
I didn’t deserve that grace. But he gave it to me so I could go to college. I’ve never forgotten that. If it weren’t for him, who knows what would’ve happened?
INTERVIEWER: Yeah, those moments shape us.
WALTER BEASLEY: Absolutely. I had cousins who were in the military, others who were wild. When they left, I was kind of on my own. Musically, I knew what I had to do, but in life, I was still figuring it out.
That’s the thing about the Valley—your family knows everybody. So if you mess up, your parents find out. And you have to deal with that. But that’s the beauty of growing up in a tight-knit place. So when I got to college, like I said, I was already prepared. I remember me and my friend Junior were talking about the song “Reasons” by Earth, Wind & Fire. You know that one?
INTERVIEWER: Yeah, yeah, I do.
WALTER BEASLEY: Well, there’s a note in that song—only me and Junior could hit it in high school. So when I got to Boston and hit that note, people went crazy. That’s when I realized I had something special. All my inhibitions went away. I became a creature in Boston!
But I always remembered the lessons from El Centro, from the Imperial Valley. Still, I had a moment—I had to come home for about seven months. I got a little wild in Boston.
INTERVIEWER: Oh wow.
WALTER BEASLEY: Yeah, man. I thought, "This isn’t me." I was the only one from the Valley who had made it that far, and I was screwing up. So I came back. My father was disgusted. But I had stopped listening to him by then.
So my uncle, Eddie Dangerfield, sat me down. He wasn’t the kind to yell, but he broke me down. He said, “You went up there and lost your mind with women, drugs, and alcohol. Do you know how many churches prayed for you? Do you know how many communities supported you to get out of here? You’re the one we sent to represent us—and you’re screwing up.”
Man, I just broke down crying. I felt the weight of the Valley. Afterward, he said, “Alright, go eat something. Mama’s cooking. Then go back up there and make us proud. But don’t drink the milk.”
INTERVIEWER: The milk?
WALTER BEASLEY: Yeah, Rodney was always in the military, so we couldn’t touch the milk!
INTERVIEWER: Haha, got it. So now that you're well-traveled—how does the rest of the country compare to the Imperial Valley? What makes the Valley stand out?
WALTER BEASLEY: Well, my father was my foundation. Funny thing—when I got to Boston, I actually spoke more Spanish than I do now. I was fluent. One of my closest friends there was Willie Cepeda, a trombone player from Puerto Rico.
Boston was very segregated then. This was just after the 1978 busing crisis—they were trying to desegregate schools. People were throwing rocks at buses. It was wild, man. I had no idea—I’d never seen anything like that growing up in the Valley.
At Berklee, the Black, white, and Latino students all sat in different areas. I didn’t know anyone, so I just walked through and greeted the Latinos in Spanish. The Black students saw me speaking Spanish, so they assumed I was Puerto Rican or Dominican. That’s how I found my place.
Willie invited me to join a group. The first concert I played was with Juan Luis Guerra, who’s now the King of Bachata. Back then, he also played trumpet. I remember we played “Loco de Amor”—popular when I was a kid.
That connection gave me confidence. I thought, "If I could hang in the Valley, I can hang here too." And I could—because I had trained in R&B, jazz, mambos, cumbias—you name it. People were like, "Who is this kid?"
That foundation carried me through my 20s. My grandmother also taught me, “If you don’t learn something new every day, you’re better off dead.” She was my favorite person, and I lived by that.
So I kept learning—in childhood, high school, college, and still now. Just before this call, I was learning ambient music. We live in a stressful world, and I want to create music that calms people down. That’s next in my portfolio.
INTERVIEWER: Boston sounds like it was intense.
WALTER BEASLEY: It was. My father thought I’d come back talking like Ted Kennedy. But it was a mess. I went to school with Branford Marsalis. One day, he came back looking terrified. He had gone to North Boston, where we weren’t supposed to go, and got jumped. He left his friend behind—his friend was too slow!
Next day, that same friend came back with a busted head—hit with a pipe.
Another time, we got pulled over in Providence. They said my bass guitar looked like a shotgun. Made us take off our coats in a snowstorm—stood there for 30 minutes. That was my first real snowstorm. And I thought, “Dang, I guess things don’t change, even in the big city.”
But I still expected myself to shine. That lesson came from the Valley too. During the Farm Workers movement, the Valley was deeply divided. It was very conservative. A few big families controlled everything. But you learn how to carry yourself through that. And you learn how to stay strong.
INTERVIEWER: Yeah, absolutely. Okay, now for a more personal question—how many albums do you have?
WALTER BEASLEY: I think Wikipedia says I’ve got around 30. I try not to count because it keeps me focused on the present. Most of them are now released through my own label, Affable Records.
INTERVIEWER: I was listening to one from 2025—"Lazy Afternoon." It was great.
WALTER BEASLEY: Thank you. I wrote "Lazy Afternoon" and also released a song called “Por Mis Paisanos” in Spanish. I’ve been releasing music in Spanish my whole life, but that one was special. It was dedicated to the people who raised me in the Valley.
It was originally going to be instrumental—I called it “Sin Palabras” (No Words)—but I decided to sing on it. I thought, “I used to sing in Spanish at 13—why not now?” I’ve been performing R&B and jazz my whole life, and people know how I feel about that. But I wanted to thank the people who helped me in my teens.
INTERVIEWER: I don’t think your fan base is fickle.
WALTER BEASLEY: Haha, I hope not! I’m interested to see how they respond to this. It’s important to me.
And I have to thank people like Jack Fiesler—my piano teacher. I played classical music very well in grade school, and I used it to develop the technique I needed for jazz and Latin music. That foundation was everything.
You know what really messed me up recently? My friend Bobby, who lived across the street in El Centro, was flying from Atlanta to San Diego. The pilot got on the mic and said, “We’re now flying over the Imperial Valley—El Centro, California—where world-famous Walter Beasley was born and raised.”
That messed me up, man.
