Eva Cassidy was the third of four children born to Hugh and Barbara Cassidy. From an early age, she displayed artistic and musical talent. When she was nine years old, her father taught her to play the guitar, and she began to play and sing at family gatherings.
While a student at Bowie High School, she did sing with a local band, called Stonehenge, and received considerable praise.
At the age of eighteen, Cassidy began her professional career, singing and playing guitar in a Washington, D.C., area band, called Easy Street. This band performed in a variety of styles, at weddings, corporate parties, and pubs.
During the summer of 1983, Cassidy sang and played guitar, six days per week, at Wild World, in Maryland. Her brother Dan was also a member of this working band.
Throughout the 1980s, Cassidy worked with a number of other bands, including the soul and Motown-oriented band The Honeybees, and the techno-pop band Characters Without Names, later called Method Actor.
During this period, Cassidy also worked as a propagator at a plant nursery and as a furniture painter in Annapolis, Maryland. In 1986, she met (bassist and recording engineer) Chris Biondo, who encouraged her and helped her find work as a backup singer for various acts. In 1990, Biondo and Cassidy hired the so-called "Eva Cassidy Band", composed of Chris Biondo, Lenny Williams, Keith Grimes and Raice McLeod, and she began to perform frequently in the Washington area.
In 1992, Biondo played a tape of Cassidy's voice for Chuck Brown. Best known as the "Godfather of Go-go", Brown is also a jazz and blues vocalist. This led to the first commercial recording of Cassidy, the duet album with Chuck Brown, The Other Side; which featured performances of classic songs such as "Fever", Billie Holiday's "God Bless the Child" and Cassidy's signature tune "Over the Rainbow". The album was released and distributed by Liaison Records, the label that also released Brown's Go-go albums. The duet CD attracted the attention of various record companies, but the offers all required Cassidy to pigeonhole herself within a single style (e.g., pop or jazz), something she adamantly refused to do.[citation needed]
In 1993 Eva Cassidy was first honored by the Washington area music community when she was awarded two Wammie awards for "Female Vocalist Roots/Traditional R&B" and "Vocalist Jazz/Traditional." The next year she was chosen to perform for the awards ceremony.
In January 1996, Cassidy recorded the album Live at Blues Alley, about which The Washington Post later commented that "she could sing anything and make it sound like the only music that mattered". [1] Cassidy was unhappy with her singing on the album, because she had a bad cold on the night of the recording; she began recording a studio album which was eventually released as Eva by Heart posthumously in 1997.
During a promotional event for the Live at Blues Alley CD in July 1996, Cassidy noticed an ache in her hips, which she attributed to stiffness from painting murals. The pain persisted, and, a few weeks later, Cassidy was diagnosed with melanoma. By the time of her diagnosis, the cancer had spread throughout her body. Cassidy's health rapidly deteriorated, and her final performance was in September 1996. At the performance, she had used a walker to reach the stage, sang "What a Wonderful World" in front of an audience of friends, and was subsequently admitted to Johns Hopkins Hospital.[citation needed]
Eva Cassidy died on November 2, 1996, at the age of 33. She was posthumously inducted into the Hall of Fame of the Washington Area Music Association.
Walkin' After Midnight
Eva Cassidy Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Out in the moonlight just like we used to do
I'm always walkin' after midnight searchin' for you
I walk for miles along the highway
Well, that's just my way of sayin' I love you
I'm always walkin' after midnight searchin' for you
Maybe he's cryin' for me
And as the skies turn gloomy and night winds whisper to me
I'm lonesome as I can be
I go out walkin' after midnight
Out in the moonlight just hopin' you may be
Somewhere walkin' after midnight searchin' for me
I stop to see a weepin' willow cryin' on his pillow
Maybe he's cryin' for me
And as the skies turn gloomy and night winds whisper to me
I'm lonesome as I can be
I go out walkin' after midnight
Out in the moonlight just hopin' you may be
Somewhere walkin' after midnight searchin' for me
Eva Cassidy's version of "Walkin' After Midnight" portrays a woman who is passionately in love but feels abandoned by her partner. She walks "after midnight" on the highway, looking for him and longing for his return. The absence of her lover is causing her loneliness to deepen, and she is constantly searching for him and hoping they will reunite. The first verse describes how she's always walking after midnight, reminiscing about her past with her lover, and how they used to walk together under the moonlight. She misses those times when they had each other's company.
In the second verse, she admits that walking along the highway for miles is her way of saying that she loves him. She is still searching for him and is always looking for a way to reconnect with him. Cassidy's lyrics also include a weeping willow crying on his pillow, suggesting that perhaps even nature is sad and lonely without the love of her partner. The last verse expresses hope that he may also be walking after midnight, searching for her. But her yearning for her lover remains unfulfilled.
Line by Line Meaning
I go out walkin' after midnight
I often take walks in the dark after midnight
Out in the moonlight just like we used to do
In the moonlight, the same way we used to go out together
I'm always walkin' after midnight searchin' for you
I walk around constantly after midnight, hoping to find you
I walk for miles along the highway
I walk along the highway for long distances
Well, that's just my way of sayin' I love you
That's my way of expressing my love for you
I'm always walkin' after midnight searchin' for you
I constantly walk around looking for you after midnight
I stop to see a weepin' willow cryin' on his pillow
I pause to observe a willow tree with drooping branches crying
Maybe he's cryin' for me
Perhaps the tree is crying for me
And as the skies turn gloomy and night winds whisper to me
When the sky becomes gloomy and the night winds whisper in my ear
I'm lonesome as I can be
I am feeling very lonely
I go out walkin' after midnight
I venture out at night after midnight
Out in the moonlight just hopin' you may be
Hoping I might find you out in the moonlight
Somewhere walkin' after midnight searchin' for me
Looking for me while walking around after midnight
I stop to see a weepin' willow cryin' on his pillow
I take a break to watch the weeping willow tree cry
Maybe he's cryin' for me
It seems as though the tree is feeling the same kind of sorrow as me
And as the skies turn gloomy and night winds whisper to me
And, as the sky darkens and the winds howl, I feel even more lonely
I'm lonesome as I can be
I am as sad and lonely as I can be
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC
Written by: Alan Block, Don Hecht
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
King Lear
Beautiful rendition
troy peterson
Oh Eva how you are missed!!! Love you!
Trudy Daniel
My Mom always sang this as she played the accordion My Dad’s song was Your Cheating Heart as he played the guitar Precious Memories of my childhood ❤
Ash Phil
Superb version ❤
Mark Kubiak
So good, so good !!
lakelizard
The best!
GlenGH
Very nice!
Randy Reynolds
You gotta be f'n kiddin' me Gary! Patsy greatest of all time. End of discussion no negotiation
Hannes Stuber
The album is called SOMEWHERE !
Michael Dark
Garth Brook's put's all the 'girls' to shame.....