From Wolfgang's Vault: Philip Melnick, born May 7, 1935 in Chicago, got his start in photography as a teenager in Los Angeles in the 1940s, winning awards for his work in high school and developing a marked passion for stage production and music, especially folk music. From 1958-9, Melnick helped conceptualize the Ash Grove cabaret, and was the first general manager of the club, whose lighting, stage, and sound systems he designed and installed. He continued to help at the Ash Grove as a stage manager, performance coach, and general consultant, also photographing many of the historic folk and blues concerts that took place there. Since the Ash Grove’s closure, Melnick continued to be involved in the recording industry through the mid-’70s as a photographer. From 1977 to 2000, he served as a professor at Northern Illinois University, taking his talents into the realm of landscape photography, which he continues to explore in his present-day home of New Mexico.
Listen to shows from the Ash Grove here.
The Chambers Brothers, 1967
Howlin' Wolf, 1968
Johnny (and Shuggie) Otis, 1968
The Kentucky Colonels, 1966
Lightnin' Hopkins, 1972
Lightnin' Hopkins at the Village Recorder, 1972
3 comments:
Great pictures and what a lineup!
Check this post out KB
http://machinegunthompson.blogspot.com/2009/04/new-order-part-4-ce-la-vie.html
Wolfgangs Vault - I love that site. Not sure if it's still run by the original guy who started it a few years back, but he was a fellow Minneapolitan and he managed to score the Bill Graham collection. I read an article about him - how he started the whole thing, etc. I was SO jealous.
I studied under Phil at NIU in the early 90s, and as a graphic designer who was forced to take photography classes, he didn't much care for non photo majors. Cantankerous and ornery if you were there because they made you take the class, but he knew his film. He didn't really like my work much (and he tried to flunk me), but strangely enough, in retrospect, his later landscape work was similar to what I was trying to do in college.
I still remember the things he taught me about black & white photography these 25-odd years later, and continue to use them daily.
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