Earl “Guitar” Williams

Earl “Guitar” Williams’ guitar sits in his longtime Bessemer, AL hair salon. “I got a set up in my salon in my waiting area where somebody waits, they get to hear some music,” he says, continuing, “When I write a song, I try it out on my customers.”

Recently offered a weekly blues gig by American Idol champ Taylor Hicks’ bar, Earl readied himself by getting back on stage where he started: Gip’s, a Bessmer juke joint in Henry ‘Gip’ Gibson’s back yard, operated until his 2019 passing at 99 years old.

Meeting Gip around the age of ten, Earl thought the blues sounded “ancient.” He remembers: “About ten people were on the porch playing guitar. I wanted to play songs on the radio. He said, ‘Well, that’s OK but one day you gonna have the blues real bad and you gonna want to play those blues.’” Seeing Eugene Patton play Jimmy Reed on his ’63 Gibson SG furthered the blues’ influence on Earl. “That thing was so pretty!,” he exclaims.

Inspired by seeing Roy Rogers, Elvis Presley, and Ricky Nelson play guitar on TV, Earl and his father constructed a guitar from a cigar-box, broomstick, and fishing wire. (He has reincorporated a cigar-box guitar, played with a slide, into recent concerts.)

Earl had borrowed acoustic guitars from friends, learning R&B hits “My Girl” and “Rescue Me.” He laughs, saying, “In the summer, I’d be at their house at six o’clock in the morning and be on their back porch waiting for them.”

A teenager, Earl joined the Corruptors. He then formed the Afro Blues Band, which spun off to become Kalu. That group performed in white wigs, changing costumes multiple times a night designed by Earl himself. They also backed keyboardist/singer Latimore on the chitlin circuit all through Texas and as far as Boston, sometimes opening for B.B. King, Z.Z. Hill, Bobby ‘Blue’ Bland, Al Green, Denise LaSalle, and Johnnie Taylor. “The north was too cold,” he laughs.

When singers like Tyrone Davis and Garland Green would come to Birmingham, Kalu would back them as well.

He now enjoys playing performing solo, at blues concerts or in church. He says, “It’s more personal. Everybody just moves in real close. I’m ready to tackle whatever song I need to do as a singer,” he adds. A music professor told him: “You sing tenor, you sing bass, you sing all the levels.”

Of joining Music Maker, he says, “I’m proud to be a part of it, especially going to Telluride. That crowd of people came looking for Earl. That felt good.”

Music Maker releases his 4th album, Soul King of Bessemer, AL in 2026, demonstrating his versatility across funk, soul, and country, as well as gutbucket blues like his signature song “Can of Alligator.” – Nick Loss-Eaton

Earl “Guitar” Williams was born in 1952 in Birmingham, AL.

Top photo by Tim Duffy.