752 Cindy Walker (1918-2006) “You Don’t Know Me” 1964

Though Cindy Walker is known for writing country music hits, “You Don’t Know Me,” written for Eddy Arnold in 1955, has been performed by rock luminaries such as Ray Charles, Manfred Mann, Rick Nelson, and Elvis Presley. She wrote “Dream Baby” for Roy Orbison and dozens of songs for Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys, whose western swing was a precursor of rock and roll. “It never dawned on Walker that, as that rare female hit songwriter, she was bucking tradition… ‘The one thing that everybody in the music business is always looking for is a good song,’ she says. ‘If you could write some, it didn’t matter if you’re male, female, orangutan’” (Michael Corcoran, All Over the Map: True Heroes of Texas Music, 2005). 

Cindy Walker “You Don’t Know Me”