Melvin Sparks

Melvin Sparks ( born March 22, 1946 in Houston, † March 15, 2011 in Mount Vernon, New York) was an American guitarist of Soul - Jazz, Hard Bop and Rhythm and Blues.

Life and work

Sparks began at the age of eleven years playing the guitar; with 13, he has already performed with BB King. In 1963 he became a member of the band The Upsetters, who played as a backing band for stars such as Little Richard, Sam Cooke and others. After leaving the Upsetters, Sparks worked 1966/67, with Jack McDuff, the late 1960s and in the 1970s with Hank Crawford, Lou Donaldson, Charles Earland Charles Kynard and with whom in 1969 he recorded the album Black Talk. In the 1980s he worked with Jimmy McGriff ( Blue to the Bone ), 1996/97, again with Hank Crawford and Joey DeFrancesco, 2000, whose father Papa John DeFrancesco. In 2001, he took with Red Holloway Album Keep that Groove Going! on.

Sparks also appeared on recordings by Bob Cunningham, John Patton, Lonnie Smith / Lee Morgan (think 1968 on Blue Note ), Sonny Stitt, Grover Washington, Jr. and Reuben Wilson. He took in the 1980s and 1990s several albums as a leader for Prestige Records Muse and on, but these are now out of print; From the late 1990s emerged under his own name the albums I'm A Gittar Player ( 1997), It Is What it is (2004) and That Is It! (2005).

His guitar style is heavily influenced by Grant Green.