Born in Philadelphia, United States,[1] Welding worked as a journalist for Down Beat magazine and occasionally freelanced for other publications including Rolling Stone.
B. Hutto, Bo Diddley, Otis Spann, Jean-Luc Ponty, Charlie Musselwhite, The Jazz Crusaders and Johnny Shines, Welding was known for discovering talent in unusual places.
In 1961, while doing research for a prospective album on Philadelphia street singers, he was approached by Herb Gart,[5] who found blues singer Doug Quattlebaum "driving a "Mister Softee" ice cream truck — with his guitar plugged into the truck's amplification system, entertaining the kids with his blues!
[7] In 1993, he was nominated for a Grammy Award with Lawrence Cohn for the liner notes to Roots 'n' Blues the Retrospective (1925-1950) (various artists).
[11] He also contributed sleeve notes to a wide variety of albums, including much of Frank Sinatra's output for Capitol Records.