Matthew Walters stood alongside the first baseline for the National Anthem at a Thunderbolts game last July as he typically would. He placed his right hand on his white T-Bolts jersey over his heart and swayed throughout the song.
This time, however, Walters gripped a microphone and echoed the song throughout Blair Baseball Stadium. The field was silent as the outfielder filled the space with vibratos and the anthem’s melody.
Walters then jogged to his spot in right field while teammates and spectators applauded. Among the audience was Walters’ family, who he surprised with the performance after traveling from Texas to watch him play.
The outfielder grew up around music as his father was a choir director and his mom was a singer. His love for performing arts spurted into choir and theater performances throughout middle and high school.
Even though he’s focused on playing baseball at Cornell, he still holds that passion close to him. Walters will again sing the National Anthem on Friday against the Braves in front of his family.
“I’ve been singing my whole life,” Walters said. “For as long as I could talk I’ve been singing … I enjoy it a lot.”
Walters often sings in the dugout white teammates play music postgame. Assistant coach Max Eckert said he sings every single national anthem, even when he is not the performer. Eckert proposed to have Walters sing the anthem last summer.
“He’s got a great voice,” Eckert said. “He’s one of the most well-rounded kids ever … There’s nothing he can’t do.”
His father, Randall, and his mother, Misty, sang to him when he was a child going to bed — developing his “inner ear” at a young age.
Matthew fondly remembers singing church hymns at the Granbury Church of Christ while younger. With no hired choir, the congregation packed into 20 rows of floral-patterned chairs and sang together in the trapezoid-shaped auditorium.
Walters joined his high school’s tenor-bass choir, which was selected to perform at the Texas Music Educator’s Association Clinic and Convention in his senior year. Each year, six Texas high school choirs are selected to perform at the conference. They first had to submit three years of recordings to be considered.
Walters and his choirmates sang in the two-thousand-seat Henry B. González Convention Center in San Antonio in 2022. The outfielder’s older brother Andrew, who had graduated but had previously sung in the program, recalls being proud of his brother’s accomplishment of making it to the convention.
“They were the best men’s choir in the state of Texas that year, probably in the U.S.,” Andrew Walters said. “I was just overwhelmed with how awesome they sounded and how amazing the concert was.”
Walters became interested in dancing when his family bought him the video game, “Michael Jackson The Experience,” for his Nintendo Wii while in elementary school. He spent hours in front of the console practicing the pop star’s moves and singing his songs.
He even acquired Michael Jackson costumes. Walters moonwalked at talent shows, Randall Walters recalled, sporting Jackson’s singular sparkled glove on his right hand. He bounced around stages wearing similar black loafers and glimmering silver socks.
The talent shows translated to full-scale musical performances at Granbury High School. From ensemble to lead roles, Walters was a constant in the theater department — acting, singing and dancing. Walters even learned how to tap dance in a production of Newsies his sophomore year.
“It was a lot of months of work,” Walters said. “Weekend rehearsals, late night rehearsals, staying after to get the moves right, it was a lot of fun.”
Walters’ passion for performing didn’t end once he stepped on the baseball field. It’s where he first sang the National Anthem.
Matthew played at Granbury with his older brother during his freshman year. Both in choir and theatre together, the two brothers sang in their lone season with each other.
They even sang with Randall Walters once, as their father was the PA announcer for home games.
Randall wrote a three-part arrangement for the occasion — with Matthew singing the melody, Andrew singing the bass and Randall singing the tenor. The trio stood behind home plate with Randall in between his sons in their uniforms.
“I wanted to be clever and creative, arranging that to showcase them,” Randall said. “It was neat having them jog out after the anthem together, putting on the warm-up music and just feeling charged seeing the other team’s face say ‘holy moly.’”
Friday’s rendition of the National Anthem won’t be the same surprise to the Walters family as they travel to Silver Spring again to watch Matthew.
But for Matthew, it means the same. He’s performing for the family members who fueled his love for performance.
Photos Courtesy of Misty Walters