Flying Calvin wings it again with a new CD

By Chris Morris
The photos of guitarist Calvin Newborn in full flight during his Memphis heyday are quite amazing. In Ernest C. Withers' 2001 collection "The Memphis Blues Again," Newborn is pictured at the Flamingo Room club, playing a solo in a wide split. In Stanley Booth's 1991 book "Rythm Oil," he can be seen picking with his guitar behind his neck, T-Bone Walker style.

A 1952 shot by Frank Hardin of Newborn uncannily suspended in a mid-air leap -- reproduced in the guitarist's 1996 family memoir "As Quiet As It's Kept!" -- has been transformed into a logo on the cover of his album "New Born," which the Memphis independent Yellow Dog Records will issue Tuesday.

"They called me 'Flying Calvin,' " the 72-year-old musician says. "I jumped 6 feet in the air and did the split with the guitar behind my head ... They used to throw me money at the Plantation Inn."

Newborn is a member of an illustrious Memphis musical family. His father was a noted local drummer and record merchant, and his brother Phineas Newborn Jr. was a jazz pianist of dazzling virtuosity.

"I started taking piano lessons with my brother, but he monopolized the piano," Calvin says. "I'd take my lesson money and go see shoot-'em-ups at the movies. But my father had B.B. King take me down to Beale Street and help me buy a guitar."

As teens, the Newborn brothers played on King's earliest sessions for RPM. They made their mark during the '50s in New York with Phineas' celebrated quartet.

Although he played with such greats as Earl Hines, Lionel Hampton and homeboy Hank Crawford, Calvin acquired a heroin habit that hampered his career. Phineas, who suffered from extreme emotional problems, died in 1989. After his brother's death, Calvin checked into a Memphis mental health facility. He's been clean and sober ever since.

He calls his new album "my first ministry." Newborn, whose last album "Up City" received minimal distribution (and has been re-released by Yellow Dog), was approached by label owner Michael Powers to cut a new set. This musical homecoming, a bluesy small-group hard bop session, was produced by Scott Bomar, leader of the Memphis neo-soul unit the Bo-Keys, at Sam Phillips Studio in the Bluff City. "I felt very at home there, and I felt it was appropriate for me to do it there," Newborn says.

Newborn, who lives in Jacksonville, Fla., is still a mercurial wizard on his instrument. He says, "I've been playing in a nice little cozy place in Springfield down here." The once-a-week solo gigs pay about $50, but his profile is about to get raised.

Bomar, who composed the music for the Sundance Festival hit "Hustle & Flow," included a Newborn cut on the soundtrack. In September, the guitarist will play the Monterey Jazz Festival, backed by Banyan, the punk instrumental group that includes the Minutemen's former bassist Mike Watt, a Newborn fan. And Newborn is writing another book about a family friend -- Elvis Presley.

The King was no stranger to Flying Calvin's acrobatic stage routine, it seems. Newborn says, "That's how Elvis learned to wiggle his leg and shake his hips."