Mel Brown 1939-2009

Bob Corritore sent the word of this latest sad news to blues folks everywhere in his email newsletter:

• RIP Mel Brown 10/7/1939-3/20/2009: This note just in from Eric Thom: "Mel Brown has just passed - around 5pm tonight, but details are still pending. He was to open for Mavis Staples tonight, but has been in St. Mary's Hospital in Kitchener fighting to get his breathing back without the use of a machine. This is a huge loss for the blues, and for the blues world in Canada, specifically". Mel Brown was one of the real treasures of blues guitar and piano. He had a long history of spectacular recordings for labels such as Impulse, Bluesway, Antone's, and in recent years, for his home base label of the Electro-Fi records. He also recorded as a sideman for some of the greatest of blues artists, including T-Bone Walker, B.B. king, Bobby "Blue Bland," Albert Collins, Lightnin' Hopkins, John Lee Hooker, Snooky Pryor, Jimmy McGriff, James Cotton, Doug Sahm, Earl Hooker and Charles Brown (could a discography be any more fulfilled than that?) Yet another irreplaceable blues great has left us.
  

Mel Brown's biography can be found at Electro-Fi's website.

A few highpoints.

He was the son of John "Bubba" Brown, a Delta Blues Artist of note who ha traveled with Tommy Johnson and the Chatmon Brothers, but in order to raise his family, did not pursue music full time. Growing up in Jackson he met numerous blues legends and saw others growing up like Elmore James, Bobby "Blue" Bland, Hank Ballard and The Midnighters and Sonny Boy Williamson. Mel ended up working several gigs with Sonny Boy in nearby Vaughn, Mississippi "He needed a guitar player, so he came by my house and got me".

In 1958 he moves to LA where he hooks up with Jimmy Beasley and then Johnny Otis. Later he tours with the Olympics and Etta James. At this juncture of his career Mel begins to work steadily in the highly competitive L.A. studio scene appearing on sessions with everyone from Bobby Darin to Doris Day, Bill Cosby to Jerry Lewis. Meanwhile back in the blues world, after impressing T-Bone Walker with his playing one night at the Sands Club, Walker invited Mel to appear on an album , "Funky Town", that he was preparing to record for the ABC/Impulse label . Also impressed with Mel’s guitar work on the T-Bone sessions, producer Bob Thiele summoned Mel back to the studio a week later to record his debut "Chicken Fat". The LP is a flavorsome mix of blues, jazz and funk instrumentals with special guest Herb Ellis along for the ride.

He waxed several more albums for ABC-Impulse as well as records with many blues legends like Bobby Bland (The California Album), Charles Brown (the album "Legend" opposite Earl Hooker), Jimmy Witherspoon (again opposite Earl Hooker) and way too many more. He also worked off and on with Bobby Bland from 1971 to 1981. In 1983, he moved to Austin and becomes part of house band at Antone's including recording as part of the Silent partners. He is heard on a number of Antone's label albums as well as some by Albert Collins.

He moved to Ontario, Canada in 1990 where he remained for the rest of his life. He recorded a number of albums as a leader for Electro-Fi, as well as played on albums by Snooky Pryor and other legends. His 1999 Electro-Fi debut album " "Neck Bones & Caviar," which in 2001 won Mel the W.C. Handy (now Blues Music Award) "Blues Comeback Album of the Year" award."

He was highly respected in the music world throughout his career. I never had the pleasure of seeing him perform, but his legacy as a leader and a sideman is substantial.

The image of Mel is by taLkiN' bLuEs and taken from his website, www.melbrownblues.com

Since writing this I became aware of a Mel Brown obituary on the cbc's website.

Charles Brown's Legend lives on

I had the pleasure to see Charles Brown a number of times after first seeing him at the New York club Tramps in the Summer of 1982 I believe. Charles Brown was a remarkable pianist and a major influence on many performers. The very first album by him I had the pleasure to own was Legend on ABC-Bluesway that came out in 1969 or 1970. I have had it several times on vinyl as this session with the late Earl Hooker as well as Mel Brown on guitar was an absoulute delight. It was reissued on CD in 1993 or 1994 and here is the review I did for Jazz & Blues Report at the time of reissue. Unfortunately this is out of print and may only be obtained at a premium.

MCA has reissued Charles Brown’s Bluesway album, Legend, that featured the late Earl Hooker, along with Mel Brown on guitar, and Red Holloway on tenor saxophone, on their One Way Out label. One is treated to somewhat lengthy, relaxed jams on such Brown classics as Drifting Blues and Merry Christmas Baby, both with incredibly tasty guitar from Earl Hooker, warm vocal duets with Dottie Ivory on I Want to Go Home, and All Is Forgiven (which Brown claimed in the notes to have written for this session), a high-spirited instrumental The Combination, and a couple of other songs that Brown and group really hit it off with. While these are extended performances, nowhere does one feel that the performances are too long. Its a warm, friendly session with Charles trying to bring back those good old days of Dinah Washington, Nat King Cole, B.B. King, Big Joe Turner, and last but not least, Charles Brown, near the end of I Want to Go Home. This album should have revived Brown’s career in the early seventies. Unfortunately it didn’t, but with his well deserved success of recent years, it certainly is nice to have it available again. Recommended.