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"Little Melvin" Underwood was born in Mt. Helen, Mississippi on December 24, 1935. He was raised under the old time Baptist Church and his mother, who was a sharecropper, moved the family to vicksburg, where Melvin got his
first earful of great music. Clarence Gatemouth Brown came to town and had just recorded a tune called "Okee Dokee Stomp" and as Melvin put it, "He okee dokee stomped it". That
nightMelvin decided that was what he wanted to do, got himself a second hand guitar and harmonica, and taught himself to play. Within one year he formed a group and got some work at a little
club in Tululu, Louisiana. From there he worked venues in other towns and finally ended up in Monroe, Louisiana, where he stayed for several years. It was there in Monroe, where Melvin
heard B.B. King when he came to town and where their eventual friendship began.One night B.B. invited Melvin to play on stage with his big band.
And as Little Melvin tells it, 'The whole world just lit up for me". After that, whenever B.B. played in Monroe (on the weekend), he would stay over and come to Melvin's Monday night gigs, and
would in turn, sit in with Melvin's band. After that, Melvin met and became friends with many other artists like; Bobby Bland, Little Jr. Parker, Rocco Gordon, Larry Birdsong, Jimmy Beck and
Jimmy Reed. Through the years he worked and toured with many of these artists and eventually, a friend of his, Otis Jackson, introduced Melvin to Ivory Joe Hunter. Ivory Joe needed a
backup group and Little Melvin's band was the strongest band around. Melvin toured with Ivory Joe for a few
years at a hectic pace which took them all over the country... from Atlanta, G.A. they hit L.A. and Lake Charles...
then Orange, TX: Beaumont, Houston; Corpus Christie; San Antonio; Curryville and back to Houston. He met and
played with Little Willie John in Memphis, T.N. and Amarillo, Texas. There were many more gigs in places around the country.
Finally, a couple of bad car accidents and Ivory Joe's heart trouble, put the band out of commission for a while.
After that, Melvin went on by himself to live and work in Florida for a while. It was another frantic schedule of
endless one nighters, which was hard for Melvin at that time, because his wife was very sick with cancer. After
working all around Florida, Melvin continued on to Indiana, then Asbury Park, N.J. and up into Quebec, finally settling in Lakewood, New Jersey. After the death of his brother, Melvin slowed down for some years and as
Melvin tells it, "I just drifted for a while, but I finally came back to earth... Thank God for that. Now I'm back and
ready to go! And I hope this CD tells a story for a whole bunch of people. Listen carefully. You'll be hearing a lot from Little Melvin! Hang in there." |
