Tuesday 8 September 2009

Melvin Sparks ”Akilah!”

Melvin Sparks

Akilah!
( LP Prestige Records, 1972 )
Catalog # PR 10039


Tracklisting:
A1 Love The Life You Live
A2 On The Up
A3 All Wrapped Up
B1 Akilah
B2 Blues For J.B.
B3 The Image Of Love

Personnel & Credits:
Drums – Idris Muhammad
Engineer – Rudy Van Gelder
Flute – Dave Hubbard (tracks: B3) , Hubert Laws (tracks: B3)
Guitar – Melvin Sparks
Organ, Piano – Leon Spencer
Percussion – Buddy Caldwell
Saxophone [Alto] – George Coleman (tracks: B1),
Sonny Fortune (tracks: A1, A2, B1, B2)
Saxophone [Tenor] – Dave Hubbard (tracks: A3),
Frank Wess (tracks: A1, A2, B1)
Trumpet – Ernie Royal (tracks: B1) , Virgil Jones (tracks: A1, A2, B1)

Notes:
Recorded at Rudy Van Gelder Studio,
Englewood Cliffs, NJ, February 14 & 21, 1971
Reissued on BGP Records

Biography:
Although not a huge name in jazz, Melvin Sparks brought his Grant Green-influenced guitar to quite a few soul-jazz and organ-combo recordings of the late '60s and early '70s. A lover of jazz as well as R&B and blues, the Houston native took up the guitar at 11, and was only 13 when he sat in with B.B. King. In 1963, he joined the Upsetters, an R&B show band that backed Little Richard, Sam Cooke, and other big names. After leaving the Upsetters, Sparks played with Jack McDuff in 1966-1967. The improviser was very much in demand in the late '60s and early '70s, and he was featured on sessions by Charles Earland, Sonny Stitt, Lou Donaldson, Rusty Bryant, Sonny Phillips, Reuben Wilson, and Johnny "Hammond" Smith, among others. Sparks delivered his first album as leader, Sparks!, for Prestige in 1970, and recorded a few more Prestige dates before providing Melvin Sparks for Westbound in 1975. When soul-jazz's fortunes declined in the mid-'70s, the guitarist wasn't working as much. The only album Sparks recorded as a leader in the '80s was 1981's Sparkling on Muse, although he was featured as a sideman on sessions by Houston Person, Hank Crawford, and Jimmy McGriff during that decade. The 1990s saw a lot of renewed interest in soul-jazz, and in 1997, Sparks returned to the studio for his Cannonball date I'm a Gittar Player.
By Alex Henderson (AMG)

By Pier

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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Anonymous said...

Obrigado por comparti-lhar essa jóia!!

Rubens

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