With only three episodes remaining on Season 6, host Jim Ervin welcomes first band runner up in the 2026 International Blues Challenge, Melissa McKinney. This woman of the Blues put an incredible band together to compete this year, and narrowly missed taking it all home with her. She has sold her successful music school, and she has come away from the IBC on a mission to bring her deep, soulful Blues to the masses. If you get a chance to check her and her band “Mama” out, you will not be sorry if you do.

Website: https://melissamckinneymusic.com/mama

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/melissamckinneymusic

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/artist/1A5EiKAJr86zuGUlTN2oaC?si=Lae7eZ66Qj2t5H9qk8qXgg

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@melissamckinneymusic

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This is Time Signatures with Jim Ervin, a podcast and radio program presented by the Capital Area Blues Society in Lansing, Michigan. Most any contemporary musical style can trace its roots back to the blues. Time Signatures explores the blues and its musical connections with captivating interviews, lively discussions, and news from the world of the blues. And now, here he is, your host, Jim Ervin.

Well, hello there, everyone, and thank you so much. Parker. I'm your host, Jim Ervin, and this is Time Signatures.

Each year, the International Blues Challenge comes to Memphis, bringing with it a host of hopeful musicians from across the globe. And they all have one mission in mind.

To win either the solo duo category or the band category and find themselves atop the blues world like so many before them. Melissa McKinney and her band Mama, came to Beale street in January of this year in search of that holy grail, and they got ever so close.

Some would say they should have won, but the judges felt differently. Our guest hails from Asheville, North Carolina, and wears many hats, including singer, songwriter, musician, educator, and event curator.

She is a lead singer of the band Mama, and she is renowned for her powerful vocals. And there's lots to talk about here. So let's get this woman of the blues in here, shall we?

Ladies and gentlemen, I am pleased to welcome Melissa McKinney back to time Signatures. How are you?

I'm doing great. I'm happy to be here.

And it's so much more quiet and. And calm than the last time we talked. It's just like 16 women over three days. It was crazy,.

But that was a fun a few days.

So for those that may not remember, you were here with me, I think with, like I said, 15 other women of the blues in preparation for the Women in Blues Showcase, which is sponsored in part by Michelle Simon and the National Women in Blues, as well as Endless Blues record this podcast, Time Signatures with Jim Ervin and many others. The event is held at Alfred's on Beale Street. Each year, you guys celebrated 20 years of the National Women in Blues Showcase. How cool was that?

Talk about. Talk about being part of that event, if you would, would you please?

Oh, so cool. And I got to do that event, I think, five years ago, and that was my first time to meet Michelle and.

And so many of the other ladies that I got to reconnect with again this year. And, I mean, there's just so many talented women, and it's always good to be.

Oh, yeah.

In the company of women who inspire you and then they become your friends and. Yeah. Oh, boy. I've met a Lot of, a lot of great women. Just the Facebook page that keeps us all connected.

Now, it's really funny, if you look right here over my shoulder, that is my honorary ovaries that I won this year and earned. And they also sent me, they also sent me a performer tag because I couldn't make it down there.

But that's what I earned for getting all 16 you girls in there together and getting it all done. But it was fun. I mean, I joke about it. I told her it was like herding cats and all that. But we had a good time.

Yeah.

Now, before we move on here, I would love to hear about your earliest memories of music.

Well, I started singing really, really young. Okay.

And I remember my grandfather was a harmonica player and a guitar player, and I remember hearing him, and my dad said that I would just skip back and forth while he would play when I was really young and I started singing in church, you know, as a very young person. So I think those are my first memories. Listening to my grandpa and then singing in church.

Well, how about your baptism into the blues? How did that come to happen?

I had a mentor very young. I was 11, maybe 12 years old. His name was Nat Reese. He was a blues man from West Virginia.

And he was probably the first person who, outside of my family, you know, told me that I had a gift. And he told me that one day the whole world was going to hear me sing.

And I sang with him, you know, back then when I was young, and I would sit by him and listen to his stories. And then I grew up. I didn't spend a whole lot of time with him during my high school years.

And then I moved from my hometown and I was bartending in a bar that had blues music. And one particular band that played regularly started getting me up to sing with them.

And that's really the first time I sang with, with a blues band. And I did that for years and years and years when I was in my 20s.

At what point did you determine that the life is of a musician was going to be in the cards for you, Melissa?

Well, you know, all through high school, I mean, my only dream was to be a singer. That's what I wanted to do. But I was told by everybody I had to have something to fall back on.

And I ended up going to college and studying music education so I could have a degree in case it didn't work out okay. And so I, I, I took that path. And then after moving from West Virginia, I started singing in bands in my young 20s.

And did that for a while, but then I had my daughter and very quickly I became a single parent when my daughter was one. And I ended up moving back to West Virginia to raise her and to open a music school.

And so for over 20 years I raised my daughter and ran this music school and raised a whole generation of really incredible musicians. I had a program as an artist development program. So it wasn't just lessons. I took kids on tour and we would go into high schools. Yeah.

Oh, it was a great time, a great time of life. And I worked with some phenomenal, phenomenal artists who a lot of them have gone on to have really great careers in music themselves.

And yeah, so I gave up all of my music for over 20 years. And when my daughter graduated from high school, it was kind of always in my mind that I would go back to music.

But my school was how I, you know, how I took care of mine and my daughter's financial needs and sure, I kind of felt like I, you know, wouldn't have that opportunity, but a lot of things happened in my life and I made a decision to move again and, and I came to Asheville, North Carolina and then I started playing music again just a little bit about five years ago.

Just starting to put my toes back in the water, but yet still running my school and also working another full time job and some music has definitely been on the very, very back burner for me for years.

I've been back and so after the IBCs, I came home and I quit my job and I sold school, which I'm going to West Virginia next week to sign the papers and I'm passing my school on and it's a really big moment for me. I'm taking a wild, crazy leap of faith. Probably at one of the craziest times to take such leap of faith.

But I decided that it's now or it's never happening. And I'm going to give myself a year to see what I can, where I can get myself in a year and then reevaluate what I'm going to do after that.

Sure. I wanted to ask you because you've been involved with this school for so many years.

Do you keep in contact with some of your students and, and if, and, and how do they feel about what's happened with you?

Well, I feel like that's a piece of what has pushed me to take this step and this leap. Okay. I want my students, I want my daughter.

I want them to know that, you know, that your dreams don't always have to go in the line that you think they're going to go like, you're. You know, here I am, you know, taking half of my life.

I'm making a dynamic shift, and I have so many of my students who went straight into music, but I have some that saw it as a dream, that they needed to put it aside to go get real jobs. And I just want them to see that, you know, your. Your passion can be a big part of your life.

What an amazing thing you've been doing here. And then, as if doing the schooling and your band work wasn't enough, you're also the founder of the wtf.

It's not what yout Think Women to the Front Music Festival, which highlights women in music. Talk about that for a moment, if you would, please.

Yeah, that's been really another fun thing and a fun way to get connected with a bunch of really incredible women. I started it with a friend. She had mentioned that she always wanted to do a festival, and I had always wanted to do a women's festival.

I'd worked in festivals before, but, yeah, we got together and she came up with the name wtf, which cracked me up. People were like, oh, my gosh, you shouldn't use that. And I'm like, oh, yeah, we should.

It's the blues, man. It's a double entendre. Let it go.

Yeah. So my friend is no longer involved in it, but my daughter came on and she helps me, and so does one of my former students, my fairy goddaughter.

And, yeah, we have mostly focused on women in western North Carolina. It's been just a side project that I hope to spend more time on now that I am not going to be working 500 hours a week.

Yeah, I can tell. And it's got to be a nice change of pace for you.

I'm sure it's going to be a little bit of an adjustment as you step into that role, but I wanted to turn to Paige here, and I wanted to talk about your band, Mama. Now, the first iteration of the band was called Mama in the Ruckus. Is that correct?

Yep.

Now, how did. How did the band come together? How many years have you been at it? Talk to me and.

And.

And most, most importantly, talk about this iteration of the band that you took to Memphis with you.

The guys were young, like, almost barely older than my daughter, and just a really great group of Musicians, they all went to college together. And it was a real special story how we came together.

And at the time, I was so hurt and sad because I was so ready. But in retrospect, I see that in them staying true to themselves. They gave me a huge gift because I made the decision I was doing it anyway.

And so at the time, I strummed a little guitar enough to teach beginner guitar to kids, because I'm a really good teach. I'm really good at the foundations and. But I hardly played in front of people.

Like, it was just something I was not comfortable doing and I wasn't very good at it. But I learned all my songs and I went to the Charlotte Blue Society, and I made it through as a soloist.

And I made it and went to Memphis, and then I made it all the way to the finals as a soloist.

Wow.

But along on the guitar like a crazy person. If you ever hear it, it'll make you laugh. And it makes me laugh.

And it changed because I dealt with extreme insecurity and like so many people do, especially women. And I just, you know, I was so worried about being good enough and what people thought of me and how do I look and blahdi, blah, blah, blah.

Well, oh, Lord of Jesus. I played on the Orpheum Theater stage by myself, clumping along on this guitar.

And I decided there was nothing more humiliating that could ever happen to me because in my. Oh, my gosh. Not even like. Like being mean to myself or doubting myself, but I was not ready. I was not in a professional position to be playing good.

But you weren't afraid to take that step either.

I did it anyway, even though I was scared. And so I knew after that that I wanted to do it again because I wanted to redeem myself.

And so it didn't happen the next year because we had Hurricane Helene, and it just, you know, it completely rocked our. Our whole world. But this following year, I have a new band. After, at some point during all that time I got a new band, and.

But my new band had my daughter in it on bass and a really great friend of mine on guitar. But that band was not available to do the competition during the time.

Oh, no.

Yeah. And so I was so bummed out. But I went to one of my friends. His name is Jonathan Lloyd. He's the trombone player in the Now Mama Band.

And he was like, I'll put you together a band. And so he put a band together mostly of guys that I already knew that were dear friends of mine.

And we literally had practiced two times before we went to Memphis.

That's amazing to me. But I want to. I want to dive into this crazy journey that you and your band embarked on last year. Okay. You won the Merle. Merle Fest.

Is that what it's called? Merle Festival?

Yeah.

Merle Fest band competition. Obviously, you won that. But what do you recall about that day, about that competition?

So the Merle Fest dance competition was with the band, with my daughter. And so it was phenomenal because when I.

When my daughter was about eight or nine years old, I took her to Merle Fest, and she played on what they call the little picker stage, which is where the kids can play. And so it was a really cool moment to have my daughter on stage with me at World Fest.

And then winning that competition, it was just like, wow, how cool that I'm living this life where my kid is such a badass and people confuse us all the time. And it's just. It's so lovely. It is just a gift. And so at that time, my.

My drummer, who is Nick Hope, and my guitar player, Chris Everett, my daughter and Lenny Petnelli was on keys, and that was the band who was not available to do the Memphis. Wow. So now. Now the Memphis band. We're sticking with the band, Mama. I mean, we're sticking with that band name.

I'm still going to play with this other project, but we're going to go buy Melissa McKinney, and I'm going to juggle both of them. I've been juggling multiple jobs for a long time, so I figure out that way when one band's not available, I'll grab the other one.

So you. So you got the band together for Memphis?

Yes.

What did you say to this band and how did they approach preparing for this competition? Melissa? Because obviously they were under the gun and so were you.

It was really special. They believe in me. And especially Jonathan, he's been just. He's such a great friend and a really important part of our music community.

He brings together musicians for this thing called the Monday Mashup. Every single Monday in Asheville. The best of the best of musicians in Asheville.

He brings them together, throws a band together and plays just a night of really incredible music. And so everybody in Asheville is very used to that throw together, go with it for a gig type of band. You know, people just happen to.

In fact, there's not as many bands who are bands because there's just all these thrown together projects. I know it's like that in a lot of cities, but Asheville seems to have a. A lot of that. So everybody was pretty used to that.

Everybody's pretty used to getting the songs a week before the gig, you know, studying them, running them at soundcheck and jumping in and having a really great jam.

So I know you said that you've been to Memphis previously.

I want you to talk about that first day, your first moments on Beale street when you had some of the people that have probably never been there, let alone to compete there. What was that experience like?

I feel like it was probably like Disney World is for a kid. I was just like, oh, this is where I want to be and I don't want to go home. Home. Yeah, it was. It was something else.

I, you know, I felt like kind of home, you know, just being surrounded by, you know, in Asheville, we just don't have a huge blues crowd. We don't have a lot. We have some. Some musicians, but not, you know, there's not a. A lot of blues here and.

Right.

Getting there and just feeling the history of that place and feeling the energy of the air and seeing all these people from all over the world showcasing how they interpret the blues. Oh, that was powerful stuff. And it, you know, I was like, this is what I'm supposed to be doing. This is where I'm supposed to be.

I'm not quite sure what's going to happen next, but.

Yeah. All right, it's time to do battle. Talk about that initial day of competition. Butterflies, nervousness, anticipation. All of the above.

What was going on?

Yeah, back then, that first year was still. I was stuck in that. You know, I didn't have a lot of confidence back then, but I. I've always fought through it.

I've always, you know, got up and did it anyway, even when I was scared or not feeling well. But, yeah, I always get the nerves. But I do remember that we took a few shots of whiskey before we got up. And that helped.

That helped a lot I didn't do that this year, but, yeah, that. I was definitely like, oh, I am among some really great people and I really have got to step it up. And.

Yeah, so that. So that round that took you to the semifinals, how were you feeling at the end of that round when you knew you were going to the semis?

Yeah, I just. I was so happy. I was so happy. I was like, yes, everything's going according to plan.

And I think there was a part of me that knew, you know, that we were gonna make it to the finals. I. I just. My. This thing has been pulling me, and it's been so. I can feel it, you know, this thing that's been pulling me forward.

And I knew that that was part of the story.

Now, once you cleared the final hurdle and you learned that you were gonna go head to head with Derek Dove and the Peacekeepers, what were you thinking, girl?

Well, so, you know, when we get to the finals, there were five. Five bands in the finals, or was it four? I think it was five.

Okay.

All right. As I mentioned, that third place band, their name is eluding me right now. They were the ones we thought was our biggest competition. Their.

Their music, their band. It was real, it was raw. It wasn't the super polished thing like Derek, you know, they were. They were very polished. Very.

You know, you could tell they've been together for a long time and had it together, but we thought that that other band was our competition. So when. Yeah, I mean, I. I was so excited for that, just to be there at the Orpheum with those guys. Like, I was like, this is. This is amazing.

And I just wanted to enjoy that moment and really take that moment in.

And when the dust settled, you ended up taking second place. That still had to make you feel some kind of special, though, right?

Yeah, I was just. I was the way I felt. And I kind of made a deal before they called out the winners.

And, I don't know, you know, a lot of people around Asheville, they really believe in, like, you know, you got to.

You got to say it out loud what you want, but I made a deal that if I didn't make it to first place, which is what, of course, we wanted, that I was not going to be disappointed because I had so much support and so much love from my community and my. And this band for them, they gave up a week of their time for me.

And with no guarantee of, you know, very little money, I give them a very little guarantee. And, yeah, I mean, I just was like, this was A gift. So I cannot be selfish enough to be disappointed. So I kind of told myself that already.

And since the IBC according to you, it's been crazy, hasn't it? What's been happening?

Well, I've gotten some cool opportunities for sure. I got to come back to Memphis last week, which was great, and got some really cool sit ins and got to connect with some people. So that was great.

I've been just completely smothered in work, closing out my business, turning over my job, which ended up. Ended up getting placed into three different people's hands.

So just trying to, you know, get my job passed on and get them prepared to go on without me. And so I've been really busy and haven't had the time that I would have liked to really spend on, you know, all the follow up opportunities.

But hopefully now that May is coming, I'm going to work really hard to get my kind of a plan for myself for the rest of the year and see what happens.

And you, you also played at the Juke Joint festival, didn't you, down in Clarksdale?

Yes, and I didn't actually play on Saturday of the Jujoy Festival. I played for the Chicks and Blues event and another event that, you know, it's. I forget what they call it.

The official Juke Joy is just on Saturday, but the other around it are Juke Joy affiliated events. So that's what I played.

It still got you plenty of exposure though, right?

Yes, it was, it was, it was so fun.

Yeah. Now I know you got some singles out there and you're talking about an album. What's, what's going on? What are your plans?

You expecting to be in the studio during the summer months or fall? When do you think you're going to start that process?

Yeah, well, I'm actively trying to find a producer. I want to work with someone who works with other blues artists. I want to find just the right producer who believes in this music.

And so that's kind of what I'm on the hunt for right now. And it's. Soon as we find that, then I want to jump in immediately.

What I'm hoping in a perfect world is that we'll be able to bring that producer here to Asheville to record at Echo Mountain, which is a studio here in town that just went through a big change of hands, you know, Covid and then the hurricane, you know, really impacted our town.

And so I'd love to be able to record here in Asheville if we can find the right person who wouldn't Mind, you know, traveling here, flying here or whatever. But yeah, so as soon as we find that producer, we're ready to jump in. The songs already there.

I have an album of tunes on my website as well that I never officially released that I just had remixed and mastered that I'm going to release next month.

That's with the old band with the Ruckus, but they're all songs, but yeah, yeah, so that'll happen and then hopefully this album will, you know, be looking at releasing, you know, maybe the late fall. That might be okay. That might be a pipe dream, but that's what I'm setting my goal at.

Speak it, girl, speak it. You know, that's all. You just got to aim for it. So what about touring are you going to be doing? I know you've done some festival stuff already.

Have you got other plans for, for more stuff coming up this year?

Yeah, we've got some really cool gigs coming up this summer mostly in our area in Atlanta and West Virginia, you know, mostly east coast right here. But in November we're going to be doing a tour and doing Memphis and New Orleans and Clarksdale and.

Yeah, trying to, trying to start the planning of that November tour right now. So hopefully we're going to have some music ready by then, by that November tour.

I'd love to see you perform up here in the Michigan area. That would be so, so much fun.

Yes. One of my students, my former students that I'm very close to lives there, so she would love that.

I know Michigan's place, but if I got to come to Michigan, she would be so happy.

Whereabouts is she located?

That's a good question.

You know, you don't know the town.

No, she went to grad school and then. I wonder if it's on her Facebook. I'll have to look. Yeah, but she went to grad school there.

She, she played in my daughter's band, which was an all girl funk band. Excuse me. And then she went on to study classical music. She got her degree and then a graduate degree in classical guitar. She's phenomenal. And.

Yeah, but I don't know, somewhere up there in Michigan she's cold.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Believe me, this was a rough winter, man. It was, it was a real Michigan winter this year.

And I know up in the up they had upwards of four and a half feet of snow on the level up there. Okay. Yeah, there were, there were, there was one storm where some areas got as much as 4ft of snow in that storm. So it was, it was a Ridiculous.

Michigan winner.

That is crazy.

Anyway, where can we send people to learn more about you and the band, Mama? Get some merch if you've got it available or to get you booked for a gig.

So my link tree is Melissa McKinney Music. My website is Melissa McKinney Music. My Facebook everything is Melissa McKinney Music. So I'm pretty easy to find.

My link tree is what I've been sending to people to lately because it has lots of cool articles of the things that we've done and it's all in a really easy to pick format. But yeah, my phone number is on there. It's also in my website so it's really easy to get in contact with me.

Very good. Well, Melissa McKinney, I cannot tell you how much I appreciate your time today. And thank you very much for joining me on Time Signatures.

As I said, anytime you need a microphone to help promote an album or a tour, please make me your first stop. Would you do that for me?

Absolutely.

And that wraps up this edition of Time Signatures. Once again, my thanks to our guest, Melissa McKinney, but also to you. For without you, none of this would be possible.

Jim Ervin reminding you keeping the blues alive is everyone's responsibility. But preserving the history of the blues, one story at a time, that's my mission. Until next time. So long, everybody.

This has been Time Signatures with Jim Ervin, presented by the Capital Area Blues Society in Lansing, Michigan. For more information on CABS, visit CapitalAreaBlues.org. You can find this episode and past episodes at LCCconnect.org. The Time Signature's theme song, Michigan Roads, is used by permission and was written by Root Doctor featuring Freddie Cunningham. Until next time, keep on keeping the blues alive.