Mem Shannon (born December 21, 1959, in

New Orleans New Orleans (commonly known as NOLA or The Big Easy among other nicknames) is a Consolidated city-county, consolidated city-parish located along the Mississippi River in the U.S. state of Louisiana. With a population of 383,997 at the 2020 ...

Louisiana Louisiana ( ; ; ) is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It borders Texas to the west, Arkansas to the north, and Mississippi to the east. Of the 50 U.S. states, it ranks 31st in area and 25 ...

, United States) is an American

blues Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...

musician A musician is someone who Composer, composes, Conducting, conducts, or Performing arts#Performers, performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general Terminology, term used to designate a person who fol ...

. He is currently signed to Toronto's

NorthernBlues Music NorthernBlues Music is a Canadian independent record label, which specializes in blues music. The label was established in 2001, and a number of its artists and albums have since been nominated for and won Blues Music Awards. President Fred Li ...

. Shannon is a former taxi-cab driver turned bluesman.Scott Jordan
"Mem Shannon's Spend Some Time With Me & Andy J. Forest"
'' Offbeat Magazine'', March 24, 2005

Early life

Shannon played both

clarinet The clarinet is a Single-reed instrument, single-reed musical instrument in the woodwind family, with a nearly cylindrical bore (wind instruments), bore and a flared bell. Clarinets comprise a Family (musical instruments), family of instrume ...

and

guitar The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

by the age of fifteen, due to being inspired by his father's collection of blues records. However, he started seriously practicing only after seeing

B.B. King Riley B. King (September 16, 1925 – May 14, 2015), known professionally as B.B. King, was an American blues guitarist, singer, songwriter, and record producer. He introduced a sophisticated style of soloing based on fluid string bending, sh ...

Career

Beginnings

After playing in local bands for several years and enjoying local success, his father died in 1981 and he took a job driving a cab in order to help his family pay bills. His music career was put on hold until 1990, when he began playing in local clubs at the urging of a former bassist. In the early 1990s, he formed a group called Mem Shannon and the Membership, who won a spot playing at the 1991

New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival (commonly called Jazz Fest or Jazzfest) is an annual celebration of local music and culture held at the Fair Grounds Race Course in New Orleans, New Orleans, Louisiana. Jazz Fest attracts thousands of vi ...

. Later in 1991, they competed for a spot at the

Long Beach Blues Festival The Long Beach Blues Festival, in Long Beach, California, United States, was established fully in 1980, and was one of the largest blues festivals and was the second oldest on the West Coast (first being the San Francisco Blues Festival). It w ...

, but lost in the final round of the talent contest and did not get to appear. MemShannonFrenchMarket

First album and beyond

In 1995, after being impressed with a demo tape that Shannon had recorded,

Joe Boyd Joe Boyd (born August 5, 1942) is an American record producer and writer. He formerly owned Hannibal Records. Boyd has worked with Pink Floyd, Fairport Convention, Sandy Denny who was in Fairport Convention, Richard Thompson, Nick Drake, The ...

Hannibal Records Hannibal Records was a British record label and one of the first to work with the World music genre. Hannibal was started by Joe Boyd in 1980. Boyd had produced records by artists such as Nick Drake, The Incredible String Band and Fairport Co ...

contacted Shannon, and his first album, ''A Cab Driver's Blues'', was released on October 15, 1995. Songs on the album featured snippets of actual conversations from his customers while in the cab. In April 1996, Shannon announced that he was giving up driving his cab in order to make playing music his full-time job. His song "S.U.V." (2002), won ''

Living Blues ''Living Blues: The Magazine of the African American Blues Tradition'' is a bi-monthly magazine focused on blues music, and America's oldest blues periodical. The magazine was founded as a quarterly in Chicago in 1970 by Jim O'Neal and Amy van ...

'' magazine's Critics Poll Song of the Year, as well as receiving a

Blues Music Award The Blues Music Awards, formerly known as the W. C. Handy Awards (or "The Handys"), are awards presented by the Blues Foundation, a non-profit organization set up to foster blues heritage. The awards were originally named in honor of W. C. Handy, " ...

nomination for song of the year. Shannon appeared as himself in the 2008 novel, ''Bad Moon Rising'' by

Jonathan Maberry Jonathan Maberry (born May 18, 1958) is an American suspense author, anthology editor, comic book writer, magazine feature writer, playwright, content creator and writing teacher/lecturer. He was named one of the Today's Top Ten Horror Writers. ...

. He is one of several real-world celebrities who are in the fictional town of Pine Deep when monsters attack. Other celebrities included

Tom Savini Thomas Vincent Savini (born November 3, 1946) is an American prosthetic makeup artist, actor, stunt performer and film director. He is known for his makeup and special effects work on many films directed by George A. Romero, including ''Martin ( ...

Jim O'Rear Jim O'Rear is an American actor, screenwriter, and director. Career O’Rear began his professional career working on stage with magicians including David Copperfield and Harry Blackstone, Jr. He then trained as an actor at The American Ac ...

Brinke Stevens Brinke Stevens (born Charlene Elizabeth Brinkman, September 20, 1954) is an American actress. A native of San Diego, Stevens initially pursued a career as a marine biologist prior to becoming an actress, earning an undergraduate degree in biolo ...

Ken Foree Ken Foree (born February 29, 1948) is an American actor, best known as the protagonist Peter from the horror film '' Dawn of the Dead'' (1978) and as Roger Rockmore on the Nickelodeon television sitcom '' Kenan & Kel'' (1996–2000). Early life ...

Stephen Susco Stephen Susco (born October 24, 1972) is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. He is best known for writing horror films such as '' The Grudge'', '' The Grudge 2'', and '' Texas Chainsaw 3D''. His directorial debut film, '' Unfriended: ...

Debbie Rochon Debbie Ann Rochon (born November 3) is a Canadian actress and former stage performer, best known for her work in independent film and counterculture films. Early life When Rochon was ten years old, her parents were deemed unfit to raise her, ...

James Gunn James Francis Gunn Jr. (born August 5, 1966) is an American filmmaker. He began his career as a screenwriter in the mid-1990s, starting at Troma Entertainment with ''Tromeo and Juliet'' (1996). He then began working as a director, starting wi ...

and

Joe Bob Briggs John Irving Bloom (born January 27, 1953), known by the stage name Joe Bob Briggs, is an American syndicated film critic, writer, actor, comic performer, and horror host. He is known for having hosted ''Joe Bob's Drive-in Theater'' on The Movi ...

. Shannon's name and persona appear coincidentally in two horror novels: ''Fat White Vampire Blues'' by Andrew Fox and the aforementioned ''Bad Moon Rising''.

Discography

* ''A Cab Driver's Blues'' (1995) * ''2nd Blues Album'' (1997) * ''

Spend Some Time with Me ''Spend Some Time with Me'' is an album by the American musician Mem Shannon, released in 1999. It was his first album for Shanachie Records. Shannon supported the album with a North American tour. Production The album was produced by Dennis Walk ...

'' (1999) * ''Memphis in the Morning'' (2001) * ''I'm From Phunkville'' (2005) * ''Live: A Night at Tipitina's'' (2007) Discography of Mem Shannon

AllMusic AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...

References

External links

Mem Shannon & the Membership webpage All About Jazz
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shannon, Mem 1959 births Living people American blues singers American blues guitarists American male guitarists Songwriters from Louisiana Blues musicians from Louisiana Singers from Louisiana Guitarists from Louisiana 20th-century American guitarists 20th-century American male musicians Northern Blues Music artists American male songwriters