Chris Walker

Chris was born in 1939 and took up playing clarinet at the age of 15,
having been a member of the school recorder band since he was 11.
After leaving school he played regularly around the London jazz scene,
as a member of The Freddy Shaw Jazzmen, before becoming a professional
musician with The London City Stompers and, later, with the Mike
Daniels Big Band and Colin Kingwell’s Jazz Bandits. Chris moved to
Hampshire in 1969 and, since then, he has worked with most of the
local jazz personalities, was a member of The Real Ale & Thunder Band
for 18 years, and has run his own highly successful 5-piece ‘Swingtet’
for the last 21 years. Whilst with the Real Ale & Thunder Band, Chris
was, in 1987, the musical director for an historic BBC “Songs of
Praise” from The Maltings in Farnham and, between 1980 and 2007; he
has produced a series of music and information based jazz programmes
for BBC Local radio all across the South.

In addition to managing and fronting ‘The Chris Walker Swingtet’,
Chris has, for Messrs P&O Cruises, co-ordinated Jazz Themes aboard 9
highly appraised cruises on board Canberra and Oriana, Aurora and
Artemis. He also acts as jazz advisor to Portsmouth City Council for
their Jazz Day every summer on Southsea Sea front, helped set up
the original concept for the Chichester Real Ale & Jazz Festival, and
now, annually arranges and hosts the jazz programme for the Reading
Real Ale & Jazz Festival and the Lyme Regis Jazz Festival every July.